Make no mistake, this has been a tough summer and fall for bass fishermen on Clear Lake. The bass population appears to have shrunk because of a number of factors and most fishermen are struggling to a put a few fish in the boat.
A good example was a club tournament held a week ago. The tournament drew 10 boats (20 fishermen) and a grand total of 25 bass were weighed in. The winning weight was 16 pounds and the next best weight was 9 pounds. Most of the fishermen weighed in less than 8 pounds. Many of the fishermen said this is the poorest fishing they can remember on Clear Lake.
Bass fishing and tournaments are the heart of the fishing and tourist industry at Clear Lake. It’s hard to believe that a single species of fish could have such a huge impact on a lake. Forty years ago crappie and catfish formed the backbone of Clear Lake fishing, with bass taking a backseat.
Bass are not native to California, Clear Lake or even the West Coast. They were first introduced into the state 1874 and into Clear Lake just before the turn of the 20th century. Prior to that the only native game fish in Clear Lake was the Sacramento Perch.
The first bass brought into the state were the northern largemouth and they soon adapted to lower-elevation waters. Clear Lake, with its warm shallow waters and rich nutrients, offered ideal habitat for bass and they flourished. However, it wasn’t the bass that drew anglers to Clear Lake back then, but the crappie and catfish. In those days just about all the fishermen kept their fish to eat. Crappie and catfish were preferred over bass because of their delicate flavor. In those days any bass that were caught ended up on the dinner table. Catch-and-release fishing for bass didn’t become popular until well in the 1970s.
Studies done by the Dept. of Fish and Wildlife (DFW) back then showed 90 percent of fishermen kept the crappie and less than 10 percent kept the bass.
In 1969, the DFW recognized that Clear Lake had the potential to become a trophy bass lake. To improve the fishery, 136 adult Florida-strain largemouth bass were introduced into the lake. This was followed by the planting of another 242 Floridas in 1970 and 58 more in 1975.
It was known that Florida-strain bass breed with northern largemouths and the Florida genes quickly dominate, but the speed at which it happened on Clear Lake surprised even the biologists. In 1975, just four years after the last Florida bass was stocked into the lake, there were Florida genes in 17 percent of the bass. In 1976, it was 27 percent. By 1978, it was up to 52 percent.
In just seven years, 52 percent of all the bass in Clear Lake were either Florida-northern largemouth mix (called intergrades) or pure Florida bass. By the mid-1980s, all the largemouth bass in the lake were considered to be carrying the Florida gene.
The result of introducing Florida bass into Clear Lake has been dramatic. The size of the bass continues to increase. Last year the average size per fish caught in a tournament was nearly 3 pounds. Few lakes in the country can match that. In fact, even in the well-publicized lakes of Florida, there are none that can boast a 3-pound average per fish. To win a bass tournament at Clear Lake it usually takes at least a 5-pound average per fish. There are very few major lakes in the country that can come close to that.
Just about all the experts say the excellent bass fishing will return to the lake at some point. There are still plenty of Florida-strain bass to rejuvenate the fishery and the poor fishing right now is just a temporary setback.
