The section of river we were fishing is a little ways downstream of Woodbridge Dam and does see the occasional striper especially when the hatchery upstream at Camanche Dam is releasing smolts. The abundant flows of the past couple of years seems to have brought more than the usual number this far up stream. I had heard that stripers up to 17 lbs. were taken in this part of the river last fall although the only one I saw was closer to 4. Most of the year, this is a small stream. Summertime flows are low, clear, warm and often less than 125 cubic feet per second.
Kids can wade almost anywhere except the deepest holes catching crawdads, frogs, and bluegills.
But this January, flows are closer to 600 cfs. I had almost written-off the experience of the previous weekend as a fluke when we found ourselves walking back down to the same stretch of the Mokelumne on the following Saturday afternoon, almost but not quite. Not wanting to be totally outdone by Larry, I was starting with a spinner this time. We caught a half-dozen little steelhead in that first run. When we went three or four casts without a fish, we decided to move on down to the next fishable spot.