Fish plant #2 (1,800 lbs.) arrived Thursday evening, just in time for a weekend getaway or day fishing trip to one of the few lakes in Northern California that is still open for fishing!!! Our plan for our Fall Trout Planting Program has not changed even though our lake is very low.

You’re going to have to walk a little further to the water’s edge if fishing from shore, good news is the fish are much more concentrated in a smaller area and the amount of fish we are stocking during this record low has not changed. We still are expecting another double plant and a single plant, a grand total of 7,000 lbs. of trout, and a good percentage of trophy sized trout in that mix.

Beyond this plan, we then start stocking our Net Pens with Trout. The exact dates are not “set” yet but it looks like the first nine pens will be filled first and those fish will arrive the week before Thanksgiving. The last three pens will be filled with trout arriving the week of Thanksgiving and when the exact dates are known we will post them on our Facebook page as we will be asking for volunteers to help in this process.

Trolling for trout is working much better than shore fishing according to the trout catches reported to us this week. Derek Schies caught a 3 lb. trout on a bass lure. Cole Tarvin trolled with a Mepp’s lure and hooked two nice trout. Jackie Lamson of Sac. hooked a 3 lb. 8 oz. and a 4 lb. trout trolling with her lure of choice. Pat Divers from Grass Valley caught a 3 lb. & a 4 lb. trout on watermelon jigs by the dam.

Demetri Pena-Parks caught his 1st Trout Ever here at Collins Lake while they were trolling!!!

Lots of Catfish were caught this past two weeks too…..Mike Towe caught an 11 lb. 4 oz. monster Cat using garlic PowerBait and he was close to the dam. Jim Preus hooked a huge 8 lb. Cat while fishing from his boat and he used worms for bait. Jeff Morford of Sac. fished near the rental boat dock with worms and a bobber and caught a huge 7 lb. Catfish from shore.

Tasha Skow from Modesto proudly showed off her big 5 lb. 12 oz. Catfish which she caught near the islands using chicken liver for bait.

This morning Jennifer McNally of Oroville brought up two Cats that she caught using Mackerel by the boat launch, the biggest one weighed 10 lbs. 8 oz. and the other was a 5 pounder!!