Watsonville/Pinto Lake Stocked

http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/archive/2006/January/27/local/stories/06local.htm

I've basically dropped out of fishing for the last month or so (sick family, work, travel, etc.) but this might cause me to pull out the kayak and charge the FF battery. 

Molbasser has had great success in this tiny lake. 

Joel - how big is the lake? (size of a football field?)

Probably about Vasona-sized...there's a marshy area in the back with lots of tules -- good for flippin' some bass.  I'm surprised trout survive in that water -- usually it's pretty gross looking.

In my experience, the water quality is much better in the winter.  In the late summer it is an algae fest.  The lake is in the heart of the farmland and thus gets a lot of fertilizer run off which fuels the algae blooms.

This lake has some of the best flipping for bass in the monterey bay if that is your deal.  I have personally seen LMB to 7# come out of that lake and I would not doubt for a second that there are fish over 10.  I have had some very good days for bass in this lake.

It has limited shore access so it is best fished from a yak or a tube.

I have only tubed the lake, but would like to paddle it. 

I have also caught a monster crappie here throwing a shad rap for bass, but I don't know about the population of crappie.

Joel, we might need to hook up for an exploratory mission.

MolBasser

As an added note, there are a bunch of tagged trout in the lake worth 10 bucks a piece, so in theory, you could make 50 bucks catching trout.

MolBasser

  Well darn, I'll have to bring my trout stuff Sunday then!  Was planning on just Bassin, and maybe some blug-gillin.  Hopefully the water quality will be ok.