When the CDFW announced the opening dates for salmon in 2025 I thought, "Well, now I now when the wind will blow." I was wrong. The weather was beautiful. So this year I figured it would be all good on the opener.  Nope. Got a gale warning for the opener. Eventually I'm right. The wind never got as bad as predicted, but it never got as good as anybody wanted. We announced yesterday that we wouldn't launch today, but the the weather only sucked in the morning, so we launched a couple of bay fishing boats. One guy self launched early and went out and banged a quick limit of salmon in the outer bay, so they're out there. I saw maybe a dozen boats in the outer bay this morning (only kite surfers by the afternoon)  and I heard a few fish caught out of Bodega. 

 

I had to sneak out early today as I had a meeting at 8:30 and the wind was supposed to start blowing at noon. I  hit the water at 6 and had a few live squid for bait by 6:30. Over to Dillon Beach proper, in front of the parking lot. Anchovies boiling out of the water, birds diving. Seemed legit. Dropped in two lines with live squid and a third with a live large jacksmelt, as the big jacks are thick in the 'chovies. Missed a smelt bite, then missed a squid bite. Then I cast out a Redrum jig and started working it back near the bottom.  Third cast and hookup. Felt like a halibut. Then it ran. Fifteen minutes later I had a 43 pound white seabass in the boat, shaking hands, and a rapid heartbeat. I ended up leaving before the real bite started. I was shaking so bad I could barely hold a rod. Other people did very well. 

    Foreshadowing. This is the concrete this afternoon near the scale. Lots of blood and fish slime in vaguely halibut shapes. And why...?

   Cameron sent this picture with this note:"13, 16, 26, and 27 lbs for the Dentone crew. Live squid off the day beach. A personal best for Dan at 27, and an impressive debut for Macie with the 26." Nice job Dentones! The slabs are coming in and you're capitolizing on it. 

 The Carters whupped them again. They were there for the bite and caught four quickly, so quickly that Tom barely had time to gaff them all. But he did. 

    The halibut bite on the day beach was epic but short today. Gage took his buddies Mason and Dario fishing and they finished by 11 with limits of stripers and halibut to 29 pounds. Good day.  Now the wind is blowing and will blow for the next few days.  Obviously, as salmon opens Saturday.  

 

       Cameron sent me this picture today with the note, "34 and 22". A glance at the bragging board, later, let me know that this is Adam Evans of Santa Rosa with a 34 and 22 pound halibut. A 56 pound limit was kind of a big deal back when the limit was three fish, but two? A 28 pound average? Pretty fricking badass. I don't know what bait he was using, but I seem to recall some Santa Rosa Evenses using live jacksmelts and doing well recently, so.....

     When I was checking the board for the last fish I saw Cannon Brunkhorst's name. A quick stop at Instagram and I found this. Fish to 28 pounds. I think we know who caught the big one. The guy with the biggest smile.

     Cameron wanted to fish this evening, so after looking at the weather forecast showing wind for the next four days, I said yes. We went out and caught bait pretty quickly, even though there weren't nearly as many squid around as there had been. We went to Dillon Beach, proper, as Gage caught a couple of nice halibut there this morning. Of course, Gage was there again with his wife and two buddies. 

They had just landed a mixed double of a halibut and a striper. Seemed legit. We made a drift alongside them and then they went home. We made another drift for no bites. Then we moved over and tried a different drift. At the end of the drift, a striper on a Redrum. Repeat end of drift, and another striper on the same jig, 21 pounds. Repeat again, no stripers, scary close, so pull the live bait to go home, and Cameron says he's got a fish on. One ten pound halibut on a live squid. I love a bloody boat.

   So, squid showed up last weekend. That, more than anything, is what brought the halibut in from the deep. Halibut fishing in Northern California has been mostly crappy this year, as three hard years of no salmon have done their worst for the halibut. Inside the bays has been tough fishing (even tougher to be a halibut). So I welcome the squid. Bring in the fish. And be easy to catch, and taste good if I don't catch my target fish. Problem is, I worry that if I mention squid here, squid boats will arrive and hoover them up. So I try not to mention numbers or locations of squid. As  you can see, somebody did. Well, good for them. Squid is the commercial fishery that generates the most income in California. Their price per pound is kinda low, compared to what we pay at the store for it, but they catch a lot of pounds. Anyhow, as these pictures show, the squid, like Elvis before them, have left the building. Or mostly. There's some stragglers. But they're harder to catch now, and the pull of easy meals has likely diminished the refill halibut from the deep coming in to eat. Get 'em while you can.

 

    I received this photo from Gage yesterday. His note:" Pat (not pictured) from Sac with a 18 lb halibut caught on dead anchovy on the bar". So dead bait worked. And, Pat doesn't want his picture taken. Both items are good information, for different reasons. Nice fish, invisible Pat, and well pictured, fish models.

     About 1:00 PM today these gentlemen boated up for a photo op. Their "smallest" fish went 14 pounds and the big boy hung at 27 pounds. The big one was caught by Sebastian Evans of Santa Rosa. All of these fish pictured here bit live jacksmelt. Live bait had a bit of a pause in its parade of success, but the parade is back on, it seems. As it should be. Nice damn work, boys. Way to ignore all of the negative reports and just catch. You make it seem like halibut is en fuego here. Well, if it is, it's only because halibut fishing everywhere else in California sucks worse. Both can be true.

   Here's the report from Austin Muir: "Hey Willy, 

My dad and I went crabbing on Monday 06/22 for Father’s Day weekend, we didn’t have high expectations because of your reports, also it being end of season. Thought we could get enough for dinner for ourselves while camping and we’d be happy (along with our scallops I surprised him with). After 3 1/2 hours, and lots of heavy heavy pulls of undersized crab, we settled with 19 really good looking keepers by 12:30pm. Launched at 8am. We figured we’d save that last crab for the boys that may go out this week! As always, the fish gods blessed us. And maybe the 20 years of constant learning/experience may have helped. But we will never know. 

My dad has been bringing me here since I was a baby, and some of mine & my brother’s best memories have been made on the water launching from Lawson’s. Thanks for everything. 

Sincerely, 

The Muir boys - aka the deplorable’s" Very nice, Austin! The crabbing has been, in a word, bad. 19 keepers is pretty awesome. Keep being deplorable, I guess. It's working.

    While there are still halibut and stripers being caught near Hog Island, the mouth of the bay went off over the weekend. The fish are coming in. Today there were a few boats that limited out by noon, and a couple that limited in an hour or two. Live baitfish was not the ticket, for once, nor were the tube baits that have been pretty consistent killers. Nope, it was good old white bucktail jigs, or "Hair Raiser(Razer?)s". People may not appreciate the classics, but it's good to see that someone does. 

     Cameron and I went out this evening after work for the turn of the high tide. Earlier today the reports were that there was lots of bait and feeding fish. When we arrived the water was at it's coldest temp of the day and no bait was to be found. We scouted around but saw nothing on the meter. Then we made a drift over the bar, from 35 feet of water outside the bar to 30 feet of water on the inside. No bites or sign. Well, Gage and I caught a halibut and missed two other bites trolling P-Line Predator Minnows on the bar on Thursday, and there was almost no seaweed drifting about, so I talked Cameron into a couple of passes with the broken-backs. Forty minutes later we had 14 and 18 pound halibuts in the boat. If you can keep the weeds off, the Predators work. Unfortunately, almost all the time there's too much weeds. Almost all the time. 

    Yesterday Gage took Amanda out for her first trip of the year and she almost made the big fish board ahead of him. Their only bite that stuck (on a white bucktail, of course) was this 18 pound halibut. You can tell Gage gaffed it because he hit the center of mass. He learned to shoot before he learned to gaff. Good thing he learned to gaff, too, because he's got to do a lot of it if he's bringing Amanda out to fish. 

     I'm afraid that in all the hustle and bustle of the busy weekend we did not get this gentleman's name yesterday. We do know that his ling cod weighed 25 (26?) pounds. That's a nice ling, no matter who caught it. Good work, nameless sir. 

    

     I believe that I mentioned that the crabbing sucked, but if i didn't, well, it did. Outside the bay has been a lost cause and inside you might catch one. That's the most I heard of this weekend. One.  No bueno. The reds weren't even very good. Well, at least salmon are coming! You don't even need a rule book to see when the season starts, as the forecast shows wind starting about the time our season should start. Seems legit.