After months of persistent desert wind conditions that prevented us from fishing one of our favorite spots on the Colorado River, the wind took a break for one day, and we headed out early in the morning.
This place has a very sketchy launch, especially in the dark, and it is a couple miles of paddling in the dark to the fishing spot. There was enough light from the crescent moon and stars to see the water level in this section of river was about as high as it gets.
The bass usually start biting as the sun rises here, but this day there was no action at all. Conditions were perfect, what was going on?
I got the answer a few minutes after deploying the trusty swimming pool thermometer. The river water temperature was 52°F. That’s far too cold for largemouth bass fishing. The fish are in cold storage. There’s always a chance you could catch one, maybe even a big one, but it’s a long, long shot. I explained everything here on this YouTube video about bass fishing and water temperature.
This is an unnatural situation in a man-made unnatural environment. The part of the river we would be fishing the most is choked with milfoil. The main river channel, what’s left of it, is either almost dry or transporting as much water as possible. The river water, that comes from the cold depths of an upstream reservoir, has no chance to warm up in the winter desert sun.
There’s a couple more places we can fish, spots that are shallow and don’t have the full flow of the main river channel. Hopefully, they will be a bit warmer. It’s still pretty early in the short desert winter to be this cold, but the way things are going, who knows? Check back soon, we’ll find something.