Crabbing? Not awesome, Fishing? Mostly similar, although there are a few surfperch and jacksmelt being caught. Halibut? Not for our Gage at McClure's or Inverness, but there's a separate report from Hunter Smith.: "Went Tuesday for two limits in twenty five and thirty five feet at mcClures . 28” to 31” all fine fish. Great conditions and the Solunar tables were dead on.   Hunter" So there's fish, but not all the time. Those same solunar tables let Gage down the next day. There's fish, but they aren't easy. Luckily rockfish opens in April. 

     Crabbing is still slow but not dead. The Dungeness have been clutching, as they tend to around this time of year, but that should be ending and they can go back to eating. Luckily, not all the crab are interested in making little crabs, so there's still been some Dungeness getting caught. Crab snares are catching some but not as many as the boats, as usual. The whales are on their way back and traps will probably close here next month, as they're already closing traps below Pigeon Point on March 27th at 6:00 PM. If you haven't used your traps yet this year I'd plan on doing it before tax day. 

    There will be salmon season this year. It will open on April 11 and close on May 15 below Pigeon Point. The season post-May 15 is to be determined. In the San Francisco sub-area, Point Arena to Pigeon Point, it appears that our season will start in either May or June with a few weeks on and a few weeks off until the quota of 31,200 to 34,000 salmon are close to being caught, in which case the season will end. We may even get a second chance at them in September for a second quota of 20,000 fish. Of course, all this can change. 

      A few windy days here, making it seem like spring is here, but today was nice, as is the forecast for the weekend. The break from the screaming northwest wind is appreciated. Wednesday and Thursday the wind was screaming. Luckily, not enough to cool the water down much, so there may still be bluefin offshore and (Gage hopes) halibut onshore still biting. Hopefully, we shall see.

     Last weekend we had quite a few clammers but only a few crabbers and no fishermen. The clammers did okay, as the clams have been doing well post-water pump ban. Crabbers mostly had a hard time, but there were a couple of good stories. One story from last Friday (the 27th) was of a gentleman wading off of the oceanfront beach in knee deep water that picked up two keeper Dungeness by hand. The other good story was three guys in a boat that caught only two crab all day on Saturday. Sunday they tried a different spot and caught their limits off of Dillon Beach proper. Monday they tried again and caught half limits before the crabs just stopped. These guys learned a few tips from Eddie Kim and burned through the squid and chicken to catch to their crab. Maybe the crab stopped because they caught them all. Or maybe the crab bite or don't, like fish. I'm leaning towards the bite or don't thing, but to be fair, there aren't a lot of crab out there. 

 

   It's still February and there's still a few February halibut biting. I went with Gage today and we caught two and lost a third one. This was outside the bay as inside the bay the water is as muddy as the creeks running into it. Outside was 55 degrees and green. Not much bait and only a few birds feeding here and there. The only other boats we saw were commercial boats stacking gear to either move to greener pastures or just give up and haul the pots home for the season. 

    The Coastodian sent over this photo on Monday with the report:" Hi Willy 

Just spoke to a couple that worked all day for 2 Dungeness crab limits and a bunch of red crab too.

Best hoop was three keepers. Lots of shorts and zeros along the way." So there's hope in the bay.

  The crabbing has been mostly from shore this week as the weather was pretty gnarly. Yesterday a few boats hit the crab in the bay and got a few keepers, but the current was pretty bad in the afternoon and most of the crab are small. Still, action! Shore snarers have been getting a few but not much bragging. Neil Anderson sent over a snaring report: "Hi,

Ive been reading your fishing report for many years and wanted to thank you for keeping us all updated on how things are going at my favorite crabbing spot.

On Tuesday (2/17), I came out to Lawson's Landing and threw out a crab snare with a camera attached to it because I've always wanted to see what's going on under water when crab are going at my snare.  

I wanted to share the video with you in the hopes that you find it as entertaining as I did (nothing too exciting).  The video file is large so it wouldn't me attach it to the email.  Here's a google photos link: 

https://photos.app.goo.gl/3qjhSMdVqQA6xT6LA

Also, attached is the camera I rigged up.

Thanks

Neil Anderson

" Looks like there were a few Dungeness cruising around down there, Neil. Maybe not keepers, yet, but soon. I'm surprised by how many jacksmelt showed up at the bottom, as I've caught pretty much all of mine near the surface. I guess the messy eating habits of your crab must have chummed them in. I guess that I can lower my chum disperser and sabiki . Nice video and I hope you got a keeper on a wet day.

    

     Wingle noted in the last post's comments that he had a caught a halibut last week as well. Here's the photo as was shared to me by Gage. It sounds like 50 to 80 feet of water have a few flatfish if you're lucky and can get there from here.   Mostly lucky.

     In other news, looking ahead towards this summer, it appears that there a salmon season is likely. GSSA posted some numbers from the PFMC ahead of their scheduled meeting on the 25th, and the numbers look good. Not great, but the best returns of jacks and adults in a decade. A decade of crap, but crap fishing makes us better killers because you gotta try harder or quit. The jack count, 65,000 is second to only 2011's 85,000 jacks. I don't know if you recall 2012's salmon fishing, but it was good. As one year's jacks are the heaviest weighted variable in the algebra (calculus?) of salmon season prognosticating for the following year, a big number is good. Let's just say these numbers will make it harder to say no. Not impossible, but a no will require a really good liar. I don't think a good enough liar lurks within our border, so I'm pouring lead and tying up leaders. We're going. Game on.