Night fishing report from Dave Quaglia and friends who went fishing at Round Valley Reservoir after the hot September sun had gone down. They caught two nice rainbows and a bunch of bluegill anchored in roughly 50 feet of water off the East beacon near the campsites. Corn and shrimp were the baits of choice. Notice the jacket, it’s getting cooler out there at night now that we are almost in October.
Dave Quaglia holds one of two Rainbow Trout caught while night fishing at Round Valley.
Thanks for sharing the report Dave! Everyone can send in reports to robert@roundvalleyfishing.com
On August 30th, myself, Zach, and my buddy Chris headed out to Round Valley to do some night fishing for rainbow trout. At our first drop, we caught a dinner-plate sized sunfish in 65 feet of water so we moved deeper in search of rainbows…chasing rainbows? Heh #dadjokes.
At our second drop, we doubled anchored in 85feet, surface water temp. measured 74.5F. After a few hours of soaking cut shrimp without success, I finally get a no-doubter of a hit on my line, set the hook, and start fighting a nice size fish on my light spinning outfit which has 6lb test mono all the way to the size 8 baitholder hook.
The fish wasn’t fighting like a rainbow trout, it was sounding like a damn tuna, what the heck is this thing? I call for Zack to get his fancy rubberized net ready just in case I’ve got a new state record sunfish on my line… Slowly I start gaining line on the fish and as it comes up we see that it’s a lake trout! Zach snapped a quick pic and back into the drink went the fish. I got another solid hit about 15 minutes later but it snapped my line. My fault. I should have checked it for damage after the first fish, what a stupid mistake on my part. You’d think after fishing for twenty something years I’d have some of this stuff memorized but nope, live and learn.
We bobbed around for a few more hours without a hit or a fish and I think we finally packed it in around 3:30am. It was a beautiful night even though the fish were few and far between. A more ambitious group of anglers would have pulled up anchors and kept trying locations, but that’s hard work with double anchors and honestly the part I love most about night fishing is how peaceful and relaxing it is. If you’ve never tried it, I strongly suggest going out with a friend or two, you’ll have a blast I guarantee it.
I made it out with two good friends of mine (John Vitiello and Jayson Miao) for a bit of night fishing at Round Valley for some Catfish this past Friday, June 14. Was out from about 9:30-11:30 p.m. and between the three of us, we had five lines out, all with cooked shrimp on the hook with a basic bottom rig consisting of a 1-ounce egg sinker, barrel swivel, a short leader, and a size 6 bait holder hook. Our night started out extremely slow, though I wasn’t too surprised since I have a knack for not catching anything when I go fishing with either John or Jayson, for whatever reason. But anyways, other than a few very light bumps on a line here and there, nothing we really even bothered to pay attention too, we had nothing for probably close to two hours or so. Then out of nowhere, my bait feeder reel starts peeling line out like crazy, probably almost 50-75 yards or so in the time it took me to stand up and get to my pole not even 10 feet away. After I reach my pole, I engage the drag, set the hook, and start reeling. Definitely felt like a good sized fish, pulling hard, making strong runs, and of course peeling drag. After a short but good fight, I land a nice Channel Catfish which weighed in at 6.1-lbs and 22-inches, not bad for my first RV catfish of the year!
My 6.1-lb Channel Catfish
Maybe about half an hour after I landed the catfish, I saw a Rainbow Trout swimming around relatively close to the shoreline. Rather than try to get it on the shrimp, which I didn’t really think would work, I decided to try a slightly different approach. So I took my socks and shoes off, rolled up my jeans, and slowly waded into the water. After waiting a bit for it to come around again, I was able to get a hold of it with my bare hands and bring it to shore. Can’t say I thought it would work, but it did!
Rainbow Trout caught by hand!
It ended up being a very nicely colored Rainbow and measured just a hair over 15-inches, and ended up being Jayson’s first Rainbow Trout dinner! Luckily Jayson and John were with me to get it all in video as well, which I will try and post up soon. About 5 minutes after that we decided to call it quits and end our trip with that interesting catch. Then to our surprise, as we reeled in all of our lines we found that every single one had a fish on, all small Bullheads or Bluegill. They may have been small, but we were mainly surprised at the fact that every pole had a fish on after only being in the water for a few minutes. Also saw some big eels swimming the shoreline on our walk back. Overall it wasn’t the best bit of night fishing I’ve had, but it definitely was a decent night out with a few fish, good friends, and some nice cool weather.
I’ll keep it short. The near full moon shut down the night fishing. We fished in 5 different locations (45 to 60 feet depths) from 10:30pm to 4am and caught…one sunfish. Met a fella at the concrete ramp on the way in, he caught…two sunfish. Another boat near us had one Rainbow Trout and 4 small bass before calling it quits. It was a nice night to be out but a terrible night for catching fish.
There will be no moon (aka New Moon) Friday August 17th. I recommend you fish that night, weekend or the handful of nights before or after the 17th.
The following fishing report has been shared by Ed Harabin, President of the Hunterdon Anglers and captain of the Double Anchor. – RI
Last night, Saturday, June 23, 2012 Dennis Haggerty, Richard Willey and Ed Harabin fished for night time rainbows at Round Valley Reservoir. Conditions were perfect. No moon, slight breeze, comfortable temperature. Surface temperature 76 degrees. Doubled anchored over 47ft. of water on the South shoreline. Started fishing at 9:30pm. Last rainbow in at 4:50am.
Chumed with corn. Baited with cooked Shrimp. 1st. fish in at 9:50pm. Found them at 30ft. over 47ft. Action was fast & furious! At 10:45pm Dennis caught a 21in. 4lb. rainbow at 40ft.
Most of the largest rainbows were caught close to or on the bottom. All the fast action was at 30ft. The choice was yours. Ed & Richard stayed mostly at 30ft. Dennis only caught a few, but they indeed were the largest.
11:50pm – 21in. 3lb. flat on bottom – Dennis
1:00am – 23in. 5lb. flat on bottom – Dennis (largest of night)
1:15am – 21in. 3lb. flat on bottom – Richard
Other 3 pounders were also caught between 25 & 30ft. down. Everything was caught on cooked shrimp. No other boats at our location. Most at campsite #72. Have no idea how anyone did. We hit a slow period between 3am & 4am. Wanted to break the old record of 101 rainbows in one night with 4 fishermen. We totaled out with 110 with 3 fishermen.
Ed Harabin – 45
Richard Willey – 49
Dennis Haggerty – 16
We could have had a much higher total if Dennis fished at 30ft. Last rainbow caught at 4:50am. We actually ran out of shrimp.
Ed
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If you’d like to start receiving the full color Hunterdon Anglers printed newsletter contact President Ed Harabin double.anchor@yahoo.com or Dennis Haggerty hunterdonangler@aol.com
