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Desert Stripers and smallies

3K views 18 replies 11 participants last post by  trigger22 
#1 ·
After being out of the country for way too long, I finally made it back to the states on Friday and was dying to do some fishing. Headed out on Sunday with hopes of catching a smallie or two on a drop shot out of the canals around Yuma. Picked up a handful, but overall the fish weren't very active.
. After an hour or so I decided to give the stripers a shot so I jumped in the car and headed down the road a little ways to another canal where I started picking up Stripers right away. Ended up landing 7 and a couple more smallies including one really nice one for the area. Spro Aruku Shad caught the Stripers and biggest smallie, robo worms on a drop shot caught the other smallies.
. Went back the next day with a friend in hopes of putting him on a few fish. As luck would have it the bite was a lot slower and I couldn't get him bit. I did manage one striper, a largemouth, and a catfish though. The Aruku Shad was the bait of choice again.
 
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#5 ·
Trigger: Great pics & report. Welcome back.

Swampin, as hot as it is around Yuma (and early Sep is often the hottest time of year), the water stays pretty cool in the river & canals because all the big reservoirs for the Colorado River are very deep and release water from well below the surface. The further upstream you go, the cooler the water gets. They stock rainbow trout quite a ways further up north than Yuma. You ought to see a group of 20 - 40 lb stripers tear into a school of those "sewer trout" right off the truck. "Bathtub sized boils."
 
#10 ·
Thanks guys. For the most part, they are canals that I've fished since moving out here last summer. There are still a lot of sections of canals that I've not fished but they all seem to hold the same pattern. If you have experience with fishing moving water, you most likely wouldn't have trouble figuring out the fish. Theses canals are pretty featureless where cover for fish is concerned, but there are some obvious things that stick out fish will relate to.

The water is much colder than one would thing, largely in part due to it is constantly moving and comes from some cold deep reservoirs.

The Colorado River system is definitely full of Stripers, unfortunately the days of 20-30 pounders are long gone most likely due to the extremely liberal creel limits (10 per day no size limit).
 
#15 ·
Nice stuff......are you out there with the military? or just decided to move out there?
 
#19 ·
If you get any time to fish at all, please let me know and we will try to make something happen. Would love it actually.

I've fished Havasu once, it was in the winter, from a Kayak and the wind was blowing 25 mph... only think world class about it was my skunk haha. It is a really good fishery from what I've gathered. I will be back under better conditions.
 
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