For those of you that know Tim Woerner, I just heard that he was spotted outside today, doing a few practice laps and getting ready for salmon season. He's healing up and will soon be back at the Landing.

The leopard sharks were spotted (no pun intended) today in the cove at Tom's Point (Brazil Beach on some maps). The gentleman reporting said he saw fins all over. They are probably spawning, so a sportsman would practice catch and release. For those of you that aren't sportsmen, try to pretend.

Not too much to report. Still a few Dungeness crab getting caught on the pier. The weather is keeping the pier uncrowded. There was another sea lion eating a shark a couple of hundred yards from the pier on Wednesday. It looked like a decent sized leopard shark from the glimpse I had of it.

The crabbing has been pretty slow. The one boat that went out over the weekend caught three Dungeness in six pots after an overnight soak. The ospreys are flying around with perch in their talons but neither of the guys that I spoke with had caught any. The rain muddied up the bay, so the leopard sharks have probably moved to the deeper holes for a little while. The clams and cockles have been there for those that try for them. I heard a story about a salmon being caught in a crab pot out in the deep. If it's true, it's a good sign that there's a lot of salmon out there. My rule is to never let the truth get in the way of a good story, so I'll just assume it's true.

Just a quick note from Fish and Game: 

Point Arena to Pigeon Point (San Francisco)

Open April 7-30, 2012

• 2 salmon per day of any species except coho
• Minimum size limit: 24 inches (total length)

Final regulations for May through the rest of the year will be decided in April. Sharpen those hooks and crimp those barbs, we're going fishing.

The pier has crab for the lucky, apparently. I saw a group of boys pull their four nets, three of which were completely empty but the fourth was plugged with crabs.They ended up with six keeper Dungeness from the one net. All the nets were baited the same and nobody had "checked the nets for them." The snare crabbers have been pretty consistently catching dinner but not limits. There were a few surfperch fishermen this week but the few I spoke to hadn't caught any. If any shark fishermen are reading, I saw a sea lion tearing apart and eating what looked like a brown smooth-hound shark right at the pier a couple of days ago. With the tiny amount of rain that's fallen the leopard shark fishing should be pretty good from the shore this month, especially on the incoming tide right after the mud flats get covered up.