In January 2025, kayak angler Isac Ochoa and founder of Indigenous Anglers found himself tournament fishing the lake he grew up fishing. Here at Kayak Angler wecaught up with Ochoa to talk competitive fishing your home lake, Indigenous Anglers, and of course, kayak fishing:
How Isac Ochoa found a passion in kayak fishing
From his home lake, Ochoa moved from fishing the shore to fishing from a kayak when a cousin asked if he could store kayaks at Ochoa’s home.
“I had an older cousin that doesn’t live here and he had asked me to store his kayaks here at my house so he didn’t have to haul ’em back and forth,” Ochoa explained. “I used them religiously.”
Now armed with an Ocean Kayak, Ochoa dove into the world of kayak fishing without multi-screen fish finders or a several thousand dollar rig. With a simple kayak, a rod, a knowledge of his home lake and a passion for fishing, Ochoa found himself out on the water fishing whenever he could and it wasn’t long before the tournament world found him.
Ochoa got into tournaments from his home lake as well; while out fishing himself he ran into kayak anglers from Southwest Kayaks across the lakes who were hosting their monthly tournament. From his Ocean Kayak setup, Ochoa fished the whole season with them.
“I ended up becoming second in the angler of the year points, and I barely lost it by, I think it was two points,” Ochoa shared. From here, it was game on for Ochoa; he saved a few paychecks and ended up buying a Hobie Outback.
“Once I bought that Hobie, competition and kayak fishing lit my fire and it’s been lit ever since,” said Ochoa.
From survival to recreation, Indigenous Anglers founder shares that Indigenous anglers are still here
“I grew up here in Lake Havasu. My backyard is about, it’s less than a hundred yards from the lake on the California side,” shared Ochoa. “I’m Native American. I grew up here on my reservation, born and raised in Havasu Lake, California. It’s the Chemehuevi Indian Reservation.”
While it may seem kayak fishing has only in this recent century reached mainstream recreational popularity, Indigenous peoples across the globe have been kayak and canoe fishing since time immemorial both for subsistence and recreation.
“I’m very active in my culture and my language,” shared Ochoa. “I’m really big into outdoors, and one thing I wanted to do is put a message out there in the fishing world that us Indigenous people are still here, and we were fishermen. This is one thing that we did as survival. Now, we’re doing it as a sport and it’s a shared sport amongst everybody. Us Indigenous anglers are still here.”
Ochoa founded Indigenous Anglers, which is both a social media page and creates hats and t-shirts to help spread this message.
“I started it as just a couple of my cousins. I ended up making a couple hats and t-shirts, and now they sell it at our local market,” shared Ochoa, adding that Indigenous Anglers has opted to use the name Nuwu instead of Chemehuevi on hats and t-shirts as Nuwu is the Indigenous name for Chemehuevi.
“Chemehuevi was the government name given to us after the settlers came in,” explained Ochoa.
Ochoa on tournament fishing his home lake
In winter 2025, Ochoa fished in the Newport Bassmaster Kayak Series presented by Native Watercraft January 18-19 on Lake Havasu.
“It was very nerve-wracking,” Ochoa shared, regarding fishing the Bassmaster Kayak Series on his home lake. “I hit the shoreline, my everyday shoreline. I grew up fishing this since I was able to walk; I grew up fishing this whole entire bank. But that whole entire field of bassmasters coming to my home…it was just a nerve-wracking feeling.”
“Like I do every tournament, learn from it, pick up my mistakes, and I’ve actually done a few more things, adjustments to my kayak and a couple other things that I did to be on my game a little bit better,” added Ochoa. “You learn from the last and you pick it up on the next one and hope for the best.”
When it comes to kayak fishing specifically, Ochoa shared that one of the things he appreciates most about the sport is it limits impacts on fish and has a lower overall environmental impact than boat fishing.
“I prefer kayak fishing just for the conservation of the fish,” Ochoa said, comparing kayak fishing to boat tournaments where a fish might be transported long distances on the bass boat before returning to the water. “This catch-photo-release is one of the best things we can actually do for these fish tournament-wise, because … whenever they take ’em off of their bed, they’re [the fish are] relocating and then they have to start all over, find another bed.”
