heard the splash and knew it wasn’t one of the giant bass we sought. With the impact coming from above the surface, not below, California pro Matt Newman and I were not surprised to turn and see an osprey haul- ing a fish out of Mexico’s Lake El Salto. Full grown, the bird had plenty of wing power, but still it struggled to gain altitude with a solid 16- ounce tilapia in its talons. The bird had captured its
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quarry, but the voluminous number of cichlid forage remaining in this 12,000-acre Sierra Madre lake con- tributes to conditions ripe for the pickings of anglers hunting lunker largemouths. In 1986, the Mexican government dammed the Elota River, thereby flooding steep valleys and creat- ing an impoundment that serves irrigatio n needs for coastal farmers raising a mixed bag of onions, tomatoes, corn, sugar cane and blue agave cactus
March/April 2009 »