Jim Matthews, Outdoor Editor
Big rainbows continue to pour out of Santa Ana River Lakes
Santa Ana River Lakes rainbow trout action has been excellent over the past week and the parade of big trout through the tackle shop from six to 12 pounds has been a long and steady one. The best news is that this week is when the really big trout are being planted for the long four-day Christmas weekend. The plant last week only held the “teenagers.” 
The largest trout weighed in the tackle shop was a 14-pounder caught by Victor Perez, Anaheim, at the Bubble Hole on garlic dough bait, while Taylor Ware, Corona, landed a 13-pound rainbow near the boat dock on rainbow dough bait. Ben Hinojosa, Orange, had an 11 1/2-pound rainbow and an eight-pound trout on two different trips to the lake topping his stringers each of those days. An 11 1/4-pound trout topped off the 23-pound stringer of rainbows posted by Jerit Cokeman and Andrew Ramsey, both Long Beach, fishing off the sandy beach with chartreuse dough bait. John Aslanyan, Studio City, fished a mini jig at the bubble hole for his 10 1/2-pound trout. There were at least another dozen fish weighed in from seven to 10 pounds and most anglers weren’t even bothering to weigh fish that size. “The fishing hasn’t been like this in many years,” said Craig Elliott at SARL. “The good old days are back.” The action has been good all around the big lake and Chris’ Pond with the new water circulation system working exceptionally well and the fish well distributed throughout both of the lakes. The bite was good for shore, float tube, and boat anglers and there were no real hot spots. Anglers fishing small jigs or trout plastics might be getting a little faster action than the dough bait crowd, but both tactics are getting a lot of fish. Top colors for both the jigs, plastics, and dough bait has been the chartreuse and greens, yellow, orange, and rainbow, and anglers fishing light leaders are having the best success. The fishing should stay this hot through the rest of December and into early January. There will again be huge plants of huge trout, not just these mere “teenagers,” each of the next two weeks. Super trophies, along with the teenagers and the one-pounders, will be planted this week and next week, just before the long New Year’s weekend. Many of these trout will run from 12 to 20 pounds, and some over that magic 20-pound mark are going to be in the mix this time. Santa Ana River Lakes will close 2 p.m. on Dec. 24 and remain closed all day Christmas, but it will go back to its seven-days-a-week schedule the day after Christmas, including the New Year’s holiday. Fishing is allowed from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. on day passes or from 5 p.m. to 11 p.m. on an evening pass. Each of these passes is $25. Seniors pay only $23 with a $20 special on Wednesdays. All of these passes have a five-fish limit. For kids 4 to 13, a three-fish pass is just $12. There are 24-hour passes offered on Friday and Saturday night on weekends nearest the full moon each month. The 24-hour passes cost $75 and have a 15 fish limit. An angler can bring his wife and up to three kids and all can help fill the 15-fish limit on one of these passes, and camping is free at SARL with a 24-hour pass. For Santa Ana River Lakes fishing information, call 714-632-7830 or log on at www.fishinglakes.com.
Corona Lake trout action remains simply wide open
Limit-style fishing with a lot of six to 10-pound rainbows has been what Corona Lake anglers are reporting over the past week. Most of the trout are in the one-pound class, but most stringers have at least one or two kicker fish in those bigger size classes. There were two 11 1/2-pound rainbow weighed in at the bait shop, one by Ralph Acarso, Moreno Valley, on a Mouse Tail off JD’s Point and the second by James Elskamp, Ontario, on a marshmallow off the west shoreline. Trout at 10 1/2-pounds were caught by Doug Batter, Garden Grove, on a jig from a float tube and by Dave Halfacre, West Covina, fishing a jig from shore. Halfacre also had a 5 1/2-pounder as part of his stringer, and on another day he had a five-trout limit that weighed in at 16 3/4-pounds and included a 7 1/2-pounder. Jimmy Nunez, Chino Hills, landed a five-fish, 16 1/2-pound stringer topped off by a 7.4-pound rainbow, all on chartreuse floating bait from shore. The bite has been good for the rainbows on a wide variety of scented floating baits and scent-doused nightcrawlers, but the small jigs and plastic trout worms are just as good if not better. One of the keys for both has been to fish light leaders. As good as the fishing has been this past week, the action will just get better for the two long holiday weekends at Christmas and New Year’s. This week and next week there will be bonus plants of three to eight-pound rainbows and loads of the Super Trout weighing 10 or more pounds with fish topping 20 pounds possible. That is in addition to the regular plants of one- to two-pound class rainbows. Corona Lake will close 2 p.m. on Dec. 24 and remain closed all day Christmas, but it will go back to its seven-days-a-week schedule the day after Christmas, including the New Year’s holiday. Fishing is allowed from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. on day passes or from 5 p.m. to 11 p.m. on an evening pass. Each of these passes is $25. Seniors pay only $23, with a $20 special on Wednesdays. All of these passes have a five-fish limit. For kids 4 to 13, a three-fish pass is just $12. The 24-hour passes are only sold the weekend nearest the full moon. The next weekend for this all-night fishing is Nov. 30-December 1. The 24-hour passes cost $75 and have a 15 fish limit. An angler can bring his wife and up to three kids 17 and under and all can help fill the 15-fish limit on one of these passes, and camping is free at Corona with a 24-hour pass. For Corona Lake fishing information, call 951-277-4489 or log on at www.fishinglakes.com.