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New Hogan Reservoir has a well-deserved reputation for being a mecca for water skiers, personal watercraft users and wake boarders during the Mother Lode’s long hot summer, prodding many anglers to go to less crowded destinations in the Mother Lode and the Sierra Nevada.
Yet anglers are really missing some great striped bass fishing by writing off New Hogan during the late spring and summer, as evidenced by a fantastic trip that Allen Bonslett, Fish Sniffer publisher, and I made with Bruce Hamby of Sierra Sportfishing. The key is to get on the lake early on a weekday – and you can fish the lake in relative solitude, as the three of us did on June 29.
In fact, the inspiration for our trip was a report that Bonslett gave me after he and his family made a wake boarding trip to the lake the previous weekend. “I saw stripers boiling over a dozen times,” said an excited Bonslett. “If I saw just one or two boils, it wouldn’t mean much, but I saw lots of fish boiling a number of times as my son Derek and daughter Elizabeth were wake boarding and swimming.”
I quickly called up Bruce Hamby of Sierra Sportfishing, who had asked me to call him if I heard any reports about striper activity at New Hogan. “Let’s go fishing on the lake early this Thursday or Friday,” said Hamby, who absolutely loves to fish stripers with light kokanee and king salmon gear. “If the fish are boiling, that means they are feeding.”
Allen and I arrived at the lake at 5:30 am on Thursday, July 29 and we got in Hamby’s 22 foot Fish Rite boat to try for the stripers. We went over from the Fiddleneck #3 ramp - the only ramp open now because the lake is completely full - to the main body near Wrinkle Cove and Deer Island.
Hamby put out three rods rigged with rolled threadfin shad about 3-1/2 to 4 inches each, the same size baits he uses for king salmon at Don Pedro and Shasta lakes. “I put the bait down 15 feet on my downriggers and with my extended boom, that adds another 8 feet,” he explained. “I troll the shad around 1 mph.”
I was next up to bat, hooking and landing a striper about the same size. Two fish in the box – and we had been on the lake less than one hour!
Over the next several hours, we caught nine fish, ranging from 2.98 pounds to 5 poounds, 4 ounces. Five of our fish were over 4 pounds, with the average weight about 4 pounds. In fact, we barely fit the fish into the big ice chest that Hamby had brought. “These are definitely bigger fish than the ones we caught on trips to the lake two years ago,” he noted.
New Hogan features the healthiest striped bass fishery of any lake in the state, since the fish reproduce successfully in the Calaveras River in the spring. With ample flows in the river, the striped bass experienced ideal spawning conditions this year. New Hogan striped bass aren’t big by Delta and San Francisco Bay standards, with Hamby’s largest taken at the lake going 12 pounds.
As we started to see stripers boiling throughout the main body. Hamby trolled carefully through the feeding fish. It was exciting to see the fish boil, since we usually hooked up stripers when our baits approached the feeding fish. The bass also moved through closer to the shoreline towards the middle of the lake as it approached noon.
In contrast to our trip, the stripers were considerably smaller in a benefit striper derby for disabled veterans that I attended at New Hogan on September 11, 2004. The fish taken by the 62 anglers in 27 boats that day were all in the 2.5 to 3.8 lb. range.
On our recent trip, six of our nine fish were larger than big fish of the derby, a 3.8 pounder. Every one of these fish was an absolute blast to hook and land, since we were using the same rods that Hamby uses for kokanee and kings, G. Loomis CR84 7 feet ultra-light rods fast action rods with 4600 C3 Abu Garcia Ambassadeur reels.
I was impressed how slowly and cautiously Hamby approached boiling stripers. At one point when we had dozens of stripers boiling right next to the boat, Hamby advised us to not talk loudly and to keep a low profile in the boat so as not to spook the fish. One of the most frustrating things to Hamby and other anglers is when some bozo drives their boat at full throttle through a huge school of stripers, sending them sounding down to the bottom.
Hamby has fished the lake since 1965. The lake was then known as a premier rainbow trout fishery, with fish regularly caught in the 3 to 4 pound range. However, the introduction of the predatory striped bass by the Department of Fish and Game in 1979 decimated the trout fishery and they DFG stopped stocking trout.
When the DFG planted the stripers, they believed that the lake didn’t have the habitat to sustain successful natural reproduction. However, the fish surprised everybody and began successfully spawning. Army Corps of Engineers rangers have found striped bass spawning as far as the cement plant on the South Fork of the Calaveras, about 4 miles from the junction with the North Fork.
Millerton Reservoir on the San Joaquin River is the only other lake in California with a large self-sustaining population of striped bass, according to Dennis Lee, DFG senior biologist. Lee believes that the stripers spawn successfully during the spring in the interface area between the lake’s warmer water (top) and the cool water of the river (bottom). The striper eggs and fry are able to drift into the lake in the cold current that runs through the river channel.
Rainbow trout are no longer stocked at New Hogan, but anglers pursuing other species catch an occasional wild rainbow trout.
To book a New Hogan striper trip with Bruce Hamby, call Sierra Sportfishing at (209) 599-2023, e mail: Bruce@SierraSportFishing.com.
New Hogan Lake Facts
Location and Size: New Hogan Lake is located in the oak and brush-covered foothills of the Sierra Nevada 30 miles east of Stockton near Valley Springs. The 4,400 surface acre lake was created in 1964 with the completion of New Hogan Dam. When full, the lake has 50 miles of shoreline and extends nearly 8 miles upstream to the confluence of the north and south forks of the Calaveras River. New Hogan Dam provides flood protection to the city of Stockton and water for irrigation, drinking, recreation, and hydroelectric power. The Army Corps of Engineers determines flood control releases when the project is in flood control mode, while Stockton East Water District determines municipal and irrigation releases in non-flood control periods.
Fishing Season: Anglers can fish at New Hogan year round for striped bass, largemouth bass, spotted bass, smallmouth bass, black crappie, bluegill and channel catfish.
Boating: Boat launching is available at four ramps. Only one Fiddleneck #3, was open to the public at press time. Fiddleneck ramps #1 and #2 will bec ome available for lanching as the lake level goes down. Boat launching is also available for campers at the Acorn East and West campgrounds. No marina services or boat fuel are available.
Camping: New Hogan offers 177 campsites in its three developed campgrounds. Acorn East and Acorn West have hot showers and flush toilets while Oak Knoll is more primitive. A group campground is also available at Coyote Point. 95% of these campsites and the group campground are available by reservation. To make reservations call toll free 1-877-444-6777. 30 boat-in campsites at Deer Flat are available on a first-come first-serve basis from May through September.
Day Use: Picnic sites are located in Fiddleneck Day Use Area and at the New Hogan Dam Observation Point near the Park Headquarters. Wrinkle Cove is a popular swimming area. NO lifeguards are provided.
Guided fishing trips: Bruce Hamby, Sierra Sportfishing, at (209) 599-2023, e mail: Bruce@SierraSportFishing.com.
Facilities Information: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, New Hogan Lake, 2713 New Hogan Dam Road, Valley Springs, CA. 95252, phone (209) 772-1343, email: NewHogan-info@usace.army.mil, Website: www.spk.usace.army.mil/organizations/cespk-co/lakes/newhogan.html
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We began seeing schools of bait and striped bass on the fish finder screen, accompanied by hungry stripers. Around 6:10 a.m. Bonslett hooked up the first fish. The striper made a long run, straining the light gear, but he soon got the fish next to the boat and Hamby netted it. It was over 23 inches long, a good fish to start our trip with!
Allen and I each lost one striper during the morning, but we managed to get all of the rest of our fish in the boat. We tried to catch one last fish to make it 10 stripers for the day, but the bite shut off during the last hour and we got off the lake at 1:30 p.m.
Not only does the lake sustain a unique striped bass population, but largemouth bass, spotted bass, smallmouth bass, crappie, bluegill and channel catfish populations also thrive in New Hogan. For example, Eric Sussek, of Pleasanton nailed an 11 lb. largemouth bass, in addition to numerous other black bass, hefty crappie and three good-sized stripers, on a very memorable weekend this spring.