I have had several guys ask when the optimum time and place to target them is, but there are a lot of factors that contribute to the fishing conditions being optimal. In my opinion the fishing is always best during a slight rise in the water, closely followed by a stable river. When the water is dropping I just don't fish! I used to pay no attention to what the river was doing and just went fishing but over the years I am not sure that I have ever caught one when the river was dropping, maybe a couple inch drop but anything much more than that I try and stay away from. I know if your not fishing you have no chance of catching one but the amount of time and money that is invested into each sturgeon trip leaves me wanting to tip the odds in my favor to the best of my ability!
The sturgeon is a weird fish and unlike striper or salmon you just never know when they will feed or what they will feed on! It has been said that sturgeon primarily will feed at night and I agree with that so the bulk of my fishing is done at night unless the water is muddy. They seem to be more actively feeding during the day when the water has risen and become muddy. I attribute this to the amount of new feed in the river as earth worms, crawdads, and clams get washed down the river presenting a sturgeon smorgas board! The rise in the water also triggers the fish to move upstream as they make their way towards their spawning grounds North of Colusa!
When fishing the river I let the current flows and conditions predict where I will fish.
On a low water year such as this when the water is around 40' at the Colusa bridge I will typically try to find a slot between two holes and that is where I will set up for the night. If I you find a couple deep holes between 20'-40' deep that is typically where the sturgeon will hang out and rest. As they go on the feed they will move into the flats either below or above the hole in search of a meal. If you graph the area with your sonar you can usually find a slot that is a few feet deeper than the rest of the river and usually a couple boat widths wide. This is the path I assume the fish will use on their way between holes. I like to look for a good flat, hard bottom roughly 10'-12' deep and set up above that so my bait is sitting accordingly. I have had a lot of success fishing slots and this is my go to if the water is low. When the flows are high, 50+ feet at the Colusa bridge I tend to fish inside corners with sand or gravel bottoms as I like to find the 10'-12' water for my bait to sit in, and being on an inside corner will help to keep you out of the trash that is coming down the river with the increased flows. It has always been my assumption that the moving fish will take the path of least resistance when actively feeding and moving during high flows and this approach should put your bait right in their way! During the high water I will fish gravel if I can as your weight and bait are less likely to get sanded in like they will when fishing a sand bar.
As far as bait goes, you can get fancy or just go with a plain old sardine! My personal favorites, and go to baits, have always been a sardine, pile worms and eel. Early in the season before the water warms up the trash fish are not too active so you can get away with sardines and pile worms. As the water starts to warm the trash fish will start feeding and you will get sick and tired of changing bait as the trash fish peck at it as fast as you can put it in the water. When this happens I will switch to using ghost shrimp as they seem to not bite it as much or I will use eel. Eel is the toughest bait on the planet and no matter how much the trash fish chew at it they won't get it off the hook. I always run at least one rod with eel and will switch all of the rods to eel when I get tired of rebating with the other baits. I have also used night crawlers and crawdads in the past with success. Remember they are bottom feeders so if they swim by it and are hungry they are likely to eat it, some baits just seem to do better attracting them!!
I will start fishing again this weekend or the first part of next week as the river should stabilize and be done with the yo-yo effect that it has had for the last couple weeks due to the tributary water inflow.
There should be a ton of new fish in the area that have made their way up river in the last couple weeks of high water and they should be hungry!!!
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