Barrett was not the same

[Billy Senko]

Barrett State of the Lake
I previously posted about taking my Grandkids to Barrett. That part was great and the kids had a great time.
From my observations it seem the lake has really suffered and has deteriorated considerably.
I've been there and not caught any fish and had 50 fish days.
That is NOT what I am talking about. The banks were devoid of new growth and it seemed that decay was the state of the day.
Areas I was in just smelled bad and were not healthy.
I did not get out there last year, but it seems a stark contrast from years past. It did not seem to be thriving like the Barrett of past years (2019).
It seems that it has lost it's luster and vitality.
Maybe it is just me, but wondering if anyone else sees the decline.
Many factors involved with my humble opinion.
The fish I caught were not as healthy and beautiful as years past.
I understand each lake has cycles and pendulum swings. It seems Barret has swung way to the opposite end of healthy.
You may disagree with me. Please just state your case either way.
Billy Senko

[JWall]

Been fishing it since the 90’s when it reopened and there have definitely been cycles. Low water/high water. Great numbers/low numbers. Healthy fish/skinny fish. Are we going downhill? Maybe. What scares me the most is the politics of selling our water supply now. And how our lakes and the people who enjoy them are getting the short end of the stick.

More importantly today, how did the kids do? Did gramps put them on a good time?

[SLURP]

The following is from Jim Brown - I'm not sure if he is on this SDfish but wanted to offer his explanation.

"If past is prologue, I offer the following:
When we reinstated the fishing program at Barrett, the bass were thriving and in good shape. A few years later they had generally declined to the condition described here, underweight with a poor physical appearance, but still being caught in high numbers.
Over time the condition of the bass would change with the general population being smaller but in good condition. This trend of physical improvement would continue for a few seasons, followed by another decline which over time led to a period of improvement.
Fortunately, I had hired the best biologist for warmwater species (Larry Bottroff) away from the state DFG which frankly underappreciated him.
Based on his surveys and observations, along with a lifetime dedicated to our fisheries, Larry came up with a general description of what we were seeing at Barrett, and I'll try to paraphrase that here.

The Barrett bass fishery ran in cycles that tended, and again generally speaking, replicated itself over time.
It seemed the fishery would be dominated by one or two successful year classes that would produce good fishing for several seasons followed by a season or two of truly extraordinary fishing as the concurrently began to age out and eventually disappear. When they reached that point they became increasingly aggressive and easy to catch for the simple reason that they were mostly senior citizens with declining liver function that shut down their metabolism, followed by evidence of poor physical condition and eventually disappearance from the fishery
Losing a large measure of the population meant dood things in terms of recruitment and growth of subsequent year classes that needed the seniors disappear so that they could thrive.

There were and will always be X factors that may be critical to these cycles and their timing, including water levels, water quality populations of prey species, year class distribution, mortality and the like.
I think most fisheries run in cycle and for various reasons we may not always be certain or fully understand and that may be as good of an explanation as any.

One final note, and that is the question of why we created Barrett as a C&R fishery.
At that time, Larry's scale count surveys showed that the vast majority of Barrett's bass were northern-strain making it the last fishery in the county that had not yet been taken over by Florida-strain which are dominant genetically and less vulnerable to angling pressure. Accordingly, I felt that transition which I believe was inevitable could be delayed and of benefit to anglers.
Scale count and DNA surveys over time showed that Barrett's bass were slowly but steadily increasing in terms of their influence on the overall population.

I've been retired now for 22 years and have no idea what has been going on since with regard to that population. I'm just trying to describe what we felt was going on at the time.

As a final note, in addition to trying to give a little protection to the northern strain, I had a strong desire for Barrett to be representative of bass fishing's past and to create a unique C&R fishery for all of Barrett's warmwater species. At the time, I could find nothing else like it in the country - aside from Upper Otay which we also created as C&R fishery."

[Billy Senko]

To JWALL:
The grandkids had a great time with each catching fish. Grandad caught only one bass. The wind was hollowing it was starting to get real hot. I took them for a nice boat ride and called it a day.

[JWall]

To JWALL:
The grandkids had a great time with each catching fish. Grandad caught only one bass. The wind was hollowing it was starting to get real hot. I took them for a nice boat ride and called it a day.

Discretion is the better part of valor…or something like that. Good move making it about them and calling it early. That wind and heat is nothing to sneeze at.

[falafeluver]

Sounds like a good time just to be with the kids, did you guys try fishing on the dock?

[JWall]

@Billy Senko

One last thought on your original post…the city has been doing draw downs to either sell or fill Otay or who knows with this group. When a lake suddenly has an unnatural amount of exposed vegetation, algae, microorganisms, etc, from draws as opposed to a slower rate of evaporation, there is bound to be a smell. We did see a dead fish or two Sunday but nothing unusual. Im going out on a limb saying the greater smell of decay you described is being caused by the latest series of drawdowns by the city.

[DarkShadow]

It seems Barret has swung way to the opposite end of healthy.
You may disagree with me. Please just state your case either way.

Try fishing it in April.

https://www.socalangler.com/sharing-is- ... rett-lake/

I remember the reports during the open season in 2024, while nearly not as bad as 2026, weren't 'good.' People reporting the same things you are reporting now.

The reality is that by the time the public season rolls around, the lake is fighting a losing battle against Southern California's infinite thirst. While everyone down the hill is busy filling their swimming pools and watering the fairways, San Diego County treats Barrett's water levels (and judging from the San Diego Fishing Podcast guys, every lake in San Diego) like a bad day on the stock market.

When they violently draw that water down in the summer heat, all the shoreline brush and cover dries up. You're left with an overpopulated, unharvested tank of Northern-strain bass forced into barren open water. The bait gets wiped out, the water turns into a warm, low-oxygen soup, and the fish get skinny, stressed, and text-book stunted.

DFW should just run another "SHARE" type of program where they invite the public to catch and relocate the 1-to-2 pounders to various SoCal community ponds or lakes that recently suffered a fish kill. They did it years ago to stock Lake Gregory and curtail the stunted crappie there—they can do it again.

Hell, have a 99 Ranch Market Friends and Family Weekend out there, set some slot limits, and let people have a field day. Until there is either selective harvest or the county manages the water levels for the health of the reservoir instead of the local golf courses, the summer slump is just going to get uglier.

[ryfield]

Lol. Big mouth bass. They're always talkin' shit. Can't ever keep a secret.

It seems Barret has swung way to the opposite end of healthy.
You may disagree with me. Please just state your case either way.

Try fishing it in April.

https://www.socalangler.com/sharing-is- ... rett-lake/

I remember the reports during the open season in 2024, while nearly not as bad as 2026, weren't 'good.' People reporting the same things you are reporting now.

The reality is that by the time the public season rolls around, the lake is fighting a losing battle against Southern California's infinite thirst. While everyone down the hill is busy filling their swimming pools and watering the fairways, San Diego County treats Barrett's water levels (and judging from the San Diego Fishing Podcast guys, every lake in San Diego) like a bad day on the stock market.

When they violently draw that water down in the summer heat, all the shoreline brush and cover dries up. You're left with an overpopulated, unharvested tank of Northern-strain bass forced into barren open water. The bait gets wiped out, the water turns into a warm, low-oxygen soup, and the fish get skinny, stressed, and text-book stunted.

DFW should just run another "SHARE" type of program where they invite the public to catch and relocate the 1-to-2 pounders to various SoCal community ponds or lakes that recently suffered a fish kill. They did it years ago to stock Lake Gregory and curtail the stunted crappie there—they can do it again.

Hell, have a 99 Ranch Market Friends and Family Weekend out there, set some slot limits, and let people have a field day. Until there is either selective harvest or the county manages the water levels for the health of the reservoir instead of the local golf courses, the summer slump is just going to get uglier.

[Gotfish?]

Sorry, but some of you are dead wrong. If the problem with Barrett was too many starving bass, they would be easy to catch and the fish counts would be high.

The problem is too high of a nutrient level (nitrogen and phosphorous) in the lake causing severe algae bloom and low oxygen levels. When the oxygen levels are low, the fish simply do not feed. Back in April, the catch was like the "old days" as previously mentioned above but repeated again: https://www.socalangler.com/sharing-is- ... rett-lake/ .

Lowering the lake levels increases nutrient load, making the problem worse. High nutrient level is usually due to fertilizer run off, cattle manure run off or soil run off from fires. Not obvious what is causing the problem at Barrett. I have fished at Barrett when the water level was a lot lower and the fishing a lot better.

Threadfin shad are unusually fragile fish. They would be the 1st to die off with low oxygen levels. An aerator would help some, they have one of those at Morena. It might take several for a lake the size of Barrett. A threadfin shad can lay as many as 50,000 eggs in a year so it would not take long for the lake to rebound if the problems were fixed. https://www.google.com/search?q=how+man ... s-wiz-serp

https://www.google.com/search?q=threadf ... s-wiz-serp

[falafeluver]

I have to agree with Gotfish? comment about the fishing was better when the lake level was fairly low as I’ve mentioned before in an older thread, it’s like fishing in a barrel as the bass are more concentrated versus being spread out.

The honey holes were pretty much in the same limited general area over the season.

Some days we were anchored all day, went to look for shade to break for lunch then come back to the spot and resume till close to having to leave to head back to the dock.

[Gotfish?]

Note that small bass can tolerate lower oxygen levels than larger bass. They also tend to be close to the shore (to hide from the bigger bass) where oxygen levels are higher due to wave action.

If the oxygen levels were normal, the larger bass would be eating the smaller bass and there would not be as many of them. A 4-6" bass is no problem for even a 1 lb bass to eat. Bass will eat prey up to half their body length.

I am still a fan of the idea of stocking Barrett with tilapia as they eat algae and are often stocked in ponds to fix algae problems. A large amount would be needed and they might die off in the winter when the water gets cold so they would have to be restocked yearly. Considering how bureaucratic California is and the low priority given to fishing, it's unlikely to happen. The bass lakes in Mexico have tilapia so we know bass do well with tilapia.

https://www.google.com/search?q=can+sma ... s-wiz-serp

https://www.google.com/search?q=how+big ... e&ie=UTF-8

[MaxZmus]

It’s going to be another 2-3 years before the lake bounces back to its former glory. I haven’t seen shad or silversides since last season. It would be nice if the city would do another round of aerial shad stocks. That’s the only way to give the B a jumpstart to its road to recovery.

[Gotfish?]

Algae blooms come and go thru the season. Dead algae sinks to the bottom and that removes some of the excess nutrients from the water. Wouldn't surprise me if the fishing gets good again in September, especially if the drawdown slows. Most of those fish that resulted in the red hot bite in April are probably still there, there aren't reports of widespread dead fish along the shore.

I have seen pea soup algae blooms at Crowley, Bridgeport, Hodges and Lower Otay Lakes that cleaned up a week or two later. And I have heard that Barrett was smelly and poor fishing years (20?) ago and bounced back in the fall.

[dwaynesda]

My friend was their a week ago. Fished all day by himself. He ended up with 87 bass. He fished deeper with small HookUp baits in the mid day. Big fish he said was around 4.5. He is a biologist and said the fish looked healthy.

[DarkShadow]

He ended up with 87 bass.

Damn, 1 more and he could've had 88.

[JWall]

It’s going to be another 2-3 years before the lake bounces back to its former glory. I haven’t seen shad or silversides since last season. It would be nice if the city would do another round of aerial shad stocks. That’s the only way to give the B a jumpstart to its road to recovery.

So this last Sunday 7-26 as we were motoring out in the dark w headlamps etc, we saw jumping baitfish almost all the way from the dock to our first position around the corner in Hauser. Something is out there and it was in such volume you would think its a healthy forage.

[Gotfish?]

Good thing the Barrett fish don't read sdfish. The bass don't know they are starving and over populated and the shad don't know they aren't coming back for years.

Can maybe we all agree that it is damn hot there though? Sitting here, I want to go but when I think how nice the bay weather is, something holds me back.

[Spektrum]

A few weeks ago there were bass activity chasing bait fish in the shallows right inside Hauser. It wasn’t anything like the wolf packs I’ve seen in the past but it was nice to see some life. It ended once the sun came out and brought the heat with it.

[MistrRocko]

Last year my worst 2 days were 25 and 40 fish, most were 60-70, a few for more. Caught a little over 1100 bass before I got 2 flats and was afraid to drive on the road again. Fished there 3 days this year so far and caught less than 20 bass all 3 times. There was plenty opportunity to catch more because they are mostly 10-12 inches so I kept leaving wide open rats to find a real bite which I never could. Did have one epic crappie bite where I caught 50+ but it's not worth driving there for me anymore this summer. Maybe closing day.

Happens every few years. 2022 was a pretty sucky year if I remember right. After 2021 being the best year in the lake's 32 year modern run. I'm sure the lake is fine, will probably bounce back by next year. ~1000 calico bass and ~100 yellowtail/tuna combined the past 3 months so I sure don't feel like I'm missing anything.