"I have been limiting out on trout every day I've been at Lake Amador for the past three weeks," said Rene Villanueva of Steelie Dan's Guide Service after a trip we made on Amador on March 9. "These fish are big, beautiful and fight harder than a wild steelhead.

"Why go out on the American for one or two bites from steelhead in a day when you can have great action on fish that range from to 2 to 6 pounds and jump more than a steelhead does," he stated.

I have fished Amador numerous times for bass, bluegill and trout, but our recent trip yielded the largest five fish limit I have ever weighed in from the lake. Villanueva's limit weighed a total of 20 pounds, a 4 pound per fish average, while mine weighed 19 pounds, just under 4 pounds each. Where else can you catch 10 trout weighing a total of 39 pounds?"

Not only were the fish big and hard fighting, but also they were gorgeous, some of the best quality trout I have ever caught. The fish were thick and torpedo shaped, a lot like a spring run American River steelhead, with full tails. When I cleaned my fish, four of the five fish had bright orange flesh like that of salmon or steelhead.

We got on the water in Villanueva's boat about 8 a.m. and began trolling at his "secret spot" off a couple points in the Jackson Creek Arm. I had just begun letting out my nightcrawler behind an in-line Pro Troll E-chip when Villanueva yelled, "Hook-up!"

Villanueva had been taking clients out of the popular lake since February - and this was a day for him to get into the fish himself big time. I netted the fish, put the net in the boat and we both admired the beautiful cuttbow. The fish weighed over 4 pounds and had silvery sides like a steelhead, but the red slash on its "throat" indicated that it was a rainbow/cutthroat hybrid.

Minutes later, Villanueva caught another beautiful fish about the same size that I netted and we put in the fish box.

However, the next fish was mine. The fish took several bites on my nightcrawler and starting ripping line off my Shimano Aero Stradic 2000 reel. I set the hook and the big trout came flying out of the water. It fought me hard all of the way to the boat when Villanueva shouted "Double-hook up!"

He put the net under my fish, brought it into the boat. Meanwhile, I got my hook out of the big trout and waited until Rene got his fish close to the boat and I slipped the net under his beauty.

Over the next couple hours, Villanueva finished off his limit of five fish while I caught two more cuttbows. "I'm done," said Villanueva, teasing me about what was taking me so long to get my limit.

"I've been your net boy for most of the day," I complained. The bite slowed down, with me losing one more fish on the nightcrawler. Finally around 11:00 am the bite picked up again and I hooked two hefty trout in a row on Villanueva's homemade Prince nymph.

"The fish seem to really go crazy when you hook them on the fly," he stated. Both fish came leaping out of the water several times, but the last fish fought the hardest. When I got it next to the boat, it jumped and careened out of the water at least a dozen times before Villanueva was able to subdue it with his net.

"That's the biggest fish of the day," he said. "Let's weigh it." The fish weighed 4-1/2 pounds, but the other ones we landed weren't much smaller. It was a great day of fishing - and the surprising thing is that it was a relatively "slow" day. Villanueva and his clients had finished with limits by 11 a.m, rather than 1 pm, on his previous trips to the lake.

Lake Amador has planted 120,000 pounds of trout since October 15 and they plant to stock 7,000 to 8,000 pounds each week through May or whenever the water becomes too warm to plant.

The lake management is famous around the state for raising its own trout on the recreation area grounds, allowing them to innovate with the latest technology to create the prettiest, most hard fighting hatchery trout I've ever seen. These trout look better than many holdover trout and wild fish that I've caught over the years.

The quality of the fish originates from a number of factors. First, the fish are raised in water five feet deep - most hatcheries raise the fish in water much shallower. The fish develop full fins, rather than the rounded tails of most hatchery trout, according to Bob Lockhart, Jr., of Lake Amador Resort. Second, once the fish reach the age of 8 months and are taken out of the raceways, they are raised in 7 octagonal tanks with a constant current running through them. Swimming in the current forces the fish to become strong and healthy.

Third, the fish are given floating food three times per day. The fish have to compete with other trout in the current in order to feed, increasing their ability to fight when hooked.

Fourth, the water is oxygenated more than other hatcheries, with the water saturated with 10 parts of oxygen per million at 50 degrees. This also increases the health and liveliness of the fish.

In addition, the fish that hatchery plants are larger ones averaging 2 to 6 pounds and going up to 10 pounds, since the fish are 2 years old or older. "These fish are more mature fish than most hatcheries plant, accounting for larger and more muscular fish," said Lockhart.

The orange meat found in many of the fish originates from the zooplankton that the cuttbows feed on when planted into the lake, combined with the herring meal the management uses for fish food. "Both the plankton in the lake and the meat of the herring, which feed on plankton, have a considerable amount of carotene in it, resulting in the orange color," said Lockhart.

The hatchery, although it used to spawn the fish from its own brood stock, now raises its fish from cuttbow eggs obtained from Aquaseed and Trout Lodge in the state of Washington.

"The reason for the quality of fish that you catch at Lake Amador is not just one element, but a bunch of factors," summed up Lockhart.

For information about Lake Amador, including entrance and boat launching fees, call (209) 274-4739, www.lakeamador.com.

Rene Villanueva, in addition to booking trips at Lake Amador, is available for rainbow trout, king salmon and kokanee trips at Lake Berryessa. He fishes the California Delta and Sacramento River for striped bass, sturgeon and king salmon and the American and Feather rivers for king salmon, shad and steelhead. For more information, call (916) 684-7148, www.thefishsniffer.com/steeliedan/