Fishing Reports, Beer, Rock and Roll, and Sports - The All American Blog Post

So, this weekend felt like a true spring day. I spent both days on the Lower Sac and the weather was AMAZING! No wind, sunshine, flip flops, shorts, sun tan lotion…and lots of trout. With a bit of down time today I decided to throw a blog post with some fishing reports and mandatory randomness up…

Fishing Reports –

Public Service Announcement - First and foremost if you are not planning on going fishing, going on a guide trip(with any guide not just me), or have a fishing trip on the calendar in the next 2-3 months get off your can and make it happen. Life is to short to miss spring fishing. I know of no one that died thinking they fished on to many spring days.

Lower Sacramento River – March has turned into on the best months to fish the Lower Sac. Last March was possibly the best trout fishing have ever seen…anywhere ever. This March so far has been good, I have not had the fishing I was having last march but it is still early. I floated Bonnie to Anderson on a two boat trip both Saturday and Sunday this last weekend and had one angler in my boat but was never to far from the other boat. Both days everyone hooked and landed a bunch of rainbows from 12-20” inches. Multiple 18-20” rainbows were landed by each angler on both days and there was plenty of 16” sac footballs mixed in with some smaller 12-14” fish. Hot bugs were sucker spawn, rubber legs, Hogan’s March Madness March Brown, Hogan’s Amigo in olive, Hogan’s PMD S&M, and the King Prince #14. Fish were in the riffles, long runs, and even the flats. Changing bugs to fish each type of water was key. Small mays in the flats and long runs and stones and caddis in the riffles. Fishing should continue to be good to very good through the first part of April until the fish really start to spawn…but then it is time to move down to the lower river.

Deel Getting Ready for the Scoop...man is an athlete

Deal sealed by the Deeler

Nice Sac Bow

Not a bad 2nd fish of the day within sight of the boat ramp

Lower Yuba River – The Lower Yuba is LOW. I have heard the fishing is good and there is some technical dry fly fishing if one wants to search it out. I personally have not been on the river in a few weeks but I have heard some good reports from guys wading and stalking the banks.

Lower Feather River Spring Steelhead – They are in and fishing is good both nymphing and swinging flies. Nymphing will catch more fish but these guys are pretty receptive to a swung fly. Bright days swing caddis and soft hackles, over cast days swing low clear water traditional patterns. Fishing should remain good through mid-may. There may even be some dry fly fishing or swinging flies on floating lines ounce the caddis start hatching.

Stripers and things that eat bigger fish – Heard some early reports of some nice stripers being caught down out of Yuba City/Colusa area on the Sac and the Feather. The sac up outside of chico is clearing up and the smallies and resident stripers should get going pretty soon with some of the largemouth in the river getting up on beds as well.

Beer Report – I bought the 4way IPA Sampler from Sierra Nevada this last week. It has 4 IPA beers in it, 3 are new and one is the Torpedo.

Snow Wit White IPA – This is a light beer for an IPA but has the great IPA flavor with a bit of lemony citrus flavor. Much lighter then the traditional IPA’s that I have been drinking, like the Torpedo and some of the  Lagunitas Beers. Would be a good summer IPA style beer I think.

Nooner Session IPA – This is exactly what it says…and IPA beer you can drink the in afternoon…and have a few of them and not be totally hammered. This beer is really hoppy but does not have a huge alcohol content (4.8%) so you can have a few. Good beer with good flavor that won’t get you crooked after two.

Blindfold Black IPA – This is by far the darkest of the beers in the sampler. It is dark but not super thick and heavy. It has a good hoppy taste with a roasted malt flavor mixed in with a bit of the typical sierra Nevada IPA fruitieness. It is a 6.8% beer so a bit heavier then the others and will keep you down if you have more then one or two.

I also had the first release from the Harvest series which showcases “our favorite ingredient by exploring a range of hopping methods: single hop, fresh hop, wet hop, and wild hop. By working directly with breeders and growers, we can recreate this series each year using rare hops early in their development” according to the website. I had the first issue, Harvest Single Hop IPA Yakima #291 Varietal. This is by far one of the best releases I have had in a while from Sierra Nevada. Great Hoppy IPA flavor balanced with a berry fruity like smell and taste with a little spice. Now they have over done this flavor in the past in my opinion but they NAILED it here.

Tunes that make long drives early and late in the day better – I was on a “band discovery” phase for a while but there has been some good main stream/established in my rotation band releases the last few weeks.

Drive By Truckers released “English Oceans” – I was in love with these guys for many years and then Jason Isbell left the band and I have just not connected with them the way I did when he was part of the band. I think this is a good album but I just don’t connect with Cooley and Hood like I did Isbell…maybe a phase in life thing or something. It is a great rock record though and it is good to see good rock music being made

Beck released “Morning Phase” – I love Beck. Talk about a true musical cameleon. He has not released an album in 5 years sense “Guero” which I loved but was totally different from the previous album “Sea Change” which I also loved…So “Morning Phase” is more in the “Sea Change” line but WAY better and way more evolved. This is a true album from start to finish. Great work!

Taking Back Sunday released "Happines Is"– This falls into my guilty pleasure emo leanings band thing…This is the 2^nd release sense the original lineup got back together in 2011. The line up that brought the world “Tell All Your Friends” in 2002…this album changed my life so I buy pretty much everything they release. That said the non-original line up was a total bummer and sucked for the most part.

Sports report – March Madness is upon us and if the tourney is anything like the conference tourneys this year it is going to be good! Get your brackets filled out and enjoy the run. Personally I am making a stand and not filling out a bracket. I always get involved in all these bracket pools and loose money, get pissed at teams, and really have a whole negative vibe usually going by the sweet 16 on most years. This year I am taking it in one game at a time, no bracket watching, just hoping for good games.

Spring Training is wrapping up and Giants open the season in March 31 @ AZ and then have a weekend series against the dodgers on the road and then open up April 8^th at Home against the D-Backs. With Patrick Corbin going down for the D-Backs they are in trouble. The Ace Lefty is done for what sounds like the season possibly needing Tommy John surgery. Also opening up the season in Australia against the Dodgers should wear on both our first 3 series teams. I would love to go into the home opener with series win over both the D-Backs and the dodgers. April should be an interesting month for the Giants with 2 series with the Dodgers and the D-Backs along with a series with the Rockies and Padres plus an Interleague match at home with the Tribe. Should get a pretty good idea of how the NL West is going to stack up after the month of April. PUMPED For baseball season this year!!!!