There are many techniques used to troll on Shasta Lake in the winter, but I favor trolling in the upper 20’ feet of the water column in February every year. A one to three color section of lead core line or 1-3 ounces of snap weights will get your presentations into the depth we typically see the trout holding. When trolling or casting from a boat, pick areas likely to hold browns and rainbows, and keep your lures away from the boat to keep from spooking the bigger, more weary fish when trolling up so high in the water cold water column. Big fish are definitely boat shy and so are the smaller trout for that matter.
One of our top techniques for finding and catching big trout on Shasta Lake during the winter is the use of inline side planers. Top lining the surface and having different length setbacks using downriggers (100-200’+) can be somewhat effective, but not nearly as effective as side planers. I typically only use one downrigger this time of the year to target trout below 20’ feet deep. There are times when big, aggressive brown trout will be attracted to the disturbed water from your trolling motor and will come up to hit lures trolled in this piece of water behind the boat. You can use any number of ways to get the lines down a bit deeper straight behind the boat, but this technique is where snap weights or Torpedo weights will shine. I like to run the rods off the back of the boat a bit deeper to avoid being too close to the boat and to make room for reeling in hooked fish straight behind the boat and to the net. Shallow lines off the transom will almost always get tangled with other lines when fighting hooked trout to the back of the boat.
In February, I’ll use weighted lines off the side planers to get the lures down a bit, but not a lot. Three colors of lead core line or an ounce or two of lead on a snap weight is about all you’ll need to get into the strike zone. A dynamic thats often un noticed when running side planers is the action that the side planers impart on your trolled lures. On choppy surface days, theres no better way to take advantage of the action the chop gives the side planers and subsequently imparts on the trailing lures. Add lead core or copper lines and you’ve just created an even more attractive presentation to your targeted trout.
LURES WE USE TO CATCH BIG TROUT IN FEBUARY
There are lots of flies and lures you can use to catch February trout on Shasta Lake, but if I had to choose only a few, one would be a Trinidad Tackle Optimizer or Optimizer Jr. spoon. Its been proven time and time again that these spoons will catch big Shasta Lake trout. Another is the Brad’s Kokanee Cut Plugs which have and the option to stuff them with bait and that has its advantages. I started using the KCP’s a lot last year in the spring and summer, and after some trial and error, I started catching some amazing trout. It should be noted that some days, the Brad’s KCP’s will out fish every lure in the boat. They are also a favorite for catching Kings on Shasta, but I’ll talk more about how I fish them a little closer to spring when we start to target King and Kokanee salmon.
Last but not least, I have previously written an article surrounding the use of trolling flies for trout on Shasta Lake and its had thousands of readers since I wrote it a few years ago. Flies are deadly when trolling for trout on Shasta so taking the time to read that article is very much worth your time. Flies can be trolled with any other presentation at the same time which makes them one of the most versatile attractors for trout known to mankind. Flies are especially effective when fishing in bright sunlight and calm surface conditions. Flies presented with finesse during blue bird days seems to be one way to get a bite going when nothing else will work.
WHERE TO FISH ON SHASTA LAKE DURING THE MONTH OF FEBRUARY
Trout fishing on Shasta Lake in February can be pretty tough, and most of that tough fishing comes when we’re seeing continuous pressure changes due to the weather. Staying on top of the fishing pattern is pretty important and that means spending a lot of days on the water figuring out where the trout are hanging out. Rainbow trout, unlike the brown trout, will hang out in certain areas of the lake for a short period of time, but will often move to another part of the lake without proper notice to the anglers that pursue them. This can be very frustrating and will have you second guessing yourself for days on end. I will almost always look for the browns and rainbows that are in the lake in February to be located higher in the lake arms. The limits for me at the top of the arms are generally where water below 48 degrees begins. Its not often I find a good trout bite when the water is colder than 48 degrees.
Two patterns that the trout in Shasta Lake seem to stay true to is, browns hold on or near structure most of the time, and rainbows will hold shallow over the deeper sections (channels) of the lake. Browns are territorial to specific areas of the lake and rainbows, are definitely nomadic. As always, browns and rainbows are going to be near some baitfish if you can find some during the winter. Trolling side planers is a great way to cover the areas that browns will hold close to shore, and even over the deeper water sections of the lake. Its hard to beat this technique for covering large sections of the water surface that will hold two different trout species simultaneously. Be prepared to cover a lot of structure and open water to catch trout on Shasta Lake during the winter months.
FINAL THOUGHTS FOR FISHING SHASTA LAKE IN FEBRUARY
I know this information will be helpful to some and I truly hope to see some of this information put to use by the readers of this article. It doesn’t contain every piece of the puzzle, but the puzzle pieces change every month of the year. Some of the biggest trout, especially brown trout, are caught during February each year and this year will be no exception. I’m still looking to beat the boat record which was a 10.5 lbs. brown 3 years ago. I guarantee there are browns in Shasta over 20 lbs. I wish all of you the best of luck in 2021 and hope to see some amazing Shasta Lake trout pic’s again this year.
My next article will contain a few different insights on how to fish Shasta Lake during the month of March. As with February, March will bring some subtle changes to Shasta Lake and my methods of fishing it will change slightly as well.
Captain Jeff Goodwin
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