BY MIKE STEVENS
Water from Lake Piru is being released resulting in a water level that can no longer sustain boating of any kind, and there is no timeline on when those activities will become available again. According to lake officials, the amount of water in the lake will decrease from 39,000 acre feet (13 billion gallons) to 15,000 acre feet.
A release from Lake Piru Recreation Area read, “United Water’s release from Lake Piru Reservoir starts September 14, and that means time is running out to enjoy all your favorite lake activities. Much of the released water will recharge the Piru, Fillmore, and Santa Paula groundwater basins as it flows through lower Piru Creek and the Santa Clara River to the Freeman Diversion, and from there to the Saticoy Groundwater Recharge Facility. Another portion is sent directly to farms on the Oxnard Plain, reducing the demand for groundwater pumping and helping local growers plant strawberry seedlings and other crops during this critical time. This release serves agricultural needs, recharges groundwater, and supports river ecosystems during a normally dry season.”
On October 6, a follow-up release announced boat rentals “are temporarily suspended as of today” and as of October 11, “all watercraft (motorized and non-motorized) access to the lake will be temporarily suspended. The duration is unknown at this time.”
In a bit of irony, in late September Lake Piru officials boasted the arrival of new rental boats added to the fleet.
Western Outdoor News readers keeping tabs on Lake Piru are well-aware that the lake is home to some of the most consistent bass fishing (on a year-round basis) of any fishery in Southern California, and needless to say, they are feeling left “high and dry” to say the least. WON’s primary source of intel on fishing and conditions at Lake Piru, Kevin Hughes, puts up double-digit numbers on largemouth bass that eat reaction baits almost all year long on his home lake.
“This is what I was afraid of,” Hughes told WON. “I don’t know why they do this. They put the lake in such a bad situation that it could possibly be worse if we don’t get enough rain this winter. This is exactly what happened 10 to15 years ago, and it never recovered until just a couple years ago when we had record amounts of rain that filled it back up. It was almost empty for 10 to 12 years, unusable and unfishable. All the big fish died, and it’s sad they would put the lake in that situation again. I’m just concerned. I have fished there since the ‘80s and used to catch 8 pounders there, and they have mis-managed it horribly.”
According to the National Weather Service Climate Prediction Center, “La Niña conditions are present and favored to persist through February 2026.”
While that typically points to wetter than normal conditions in California, other factors can throw a wrench in the works, so if releasing water is ever based on the possibility of a lake being “recharged” by winter precipitation, that is a big roll of the dice as history has shown.
