Compiled by Dave Hurley and edited by Roger George, a central San Joaquin Valley native and local fishing expert.

BEST BETS

New Melones brown trout are hitting, Melanie Lewis said. Pine Flat trout bite has improved, Patrick Movey said. McClure rainbows are working, Diana Mello said. Don Pedro trout fishing is "excellent," Gary Vella said. Huntington trout are on a tear, Merritt Gilbert said. Delta sturgeon bite is heating up, Jay Lopes said.

ROGER'S REMARKS

There are times when something happens during a fishing trip that is so unusual that it catches you totally off-guard. I had one such experience more than 20 years ago on the San Joaquin River.

I had a friend who said he had been catching some nice bass off the Palm Bluffs area of the river, so we headed down into the river bottom to a big area of sand we had to cross. It was clear that the sand had just been deposited there, during a flood conditions-type spring, pushing the water line far above normal before receding.

As I walked across the sand, I noticed a ditch about 15 yards long and about 6 feet wide. It was all by itself in the middle of a huge sand dune about 100 yards from the river and at least 20 feet higher than the current water level. It looked like someone had taken a backhoe and scooped out a trench -- and it still had some very brackish water in it, about a foot or so, I thought. The ditch had to have been out of the water for at least three months since the flood in the spring had covered it. I went past it a good 40 yards, when I suddenly stopped and told my friend I had a funny feeling that I should try fishing this tiny bit of water. Laughing at me, he told me he wasn't going to waste any time and headed for the river.

Talking to myself about how stupid this was, I underhanded a black plastic worm into the water not more than 15 feet from where I stood. The water was about 2 1/2 feet deep from the worm's fall and, feeling really silly now, I decided to fish it back to my feet. That's when I got the shock of my life, as I unexpectedly felt the telltale tick of a fish sucking in the worm, almost at the end of my pole!

Hardly daring to believe it, I let the fish swim a foot or two before I set the hook. The bass was as surprised as me and exploded in its shallow prison, jumping and thrashing from end to end of the ditch.

My fishing buddy, now about 100 yards away, was laughing out loud, thinking I was doing a pretty credible job of trying to convince him I was fighting a fish way up the bank in a tiny sewer hole of a trench! Incredulous, he finally came running as I landed the game 21/2-pound bass.

Realizing this poor old fish had survived in this tiny prison a good three months, and feeling sorry for him, we decided to take the survivor down to the river for a well-deserved release and a new life of freedom.

We caught and released a few more small bass, but our good deed was what made the trip special. I've always wondered if that bass appreciated what we did for him, springing him from certain death in that gulag. All I know is that he seemed pretty happy as he swam off into the river once again.

Roger George is The Bee's fishing expert. He be reached at rogergeorge8000@sbcglobal.net

PHOTO GALLERIES

Check out catches from local anglers that have submitted photos from their outings ...

Gallery #51 (New November 3)
Gallery #50
Tournament Gallery #3 (New July 4)
Archived Galleries

Take your digital camera with you so you can send us your pictures for our galleries. Please send your photos to fishpictures@fresnobee.com. Please include the following information: Your name, city, type of fish, length and weight of fish, when and where caught, and what type of bait used. Large photos work best – we can crop and reduce a picture, but we can't expand a small picture and make it look decent. You can also send photos to rogergeorge8000@sbcglobal.net.