Dakota's big one weighed 21 pounds and was the not only the largest on the boat she fished on but the largest we weighed in yesterday. Amazingly, even larger then Gage's fish.

    Gage went out after work yesterday with his pal, Travis Franceschi, and they landed a double of nice fish. Again, not as big as Dakota's fish, but nice.

    Sometimes, you catch a fish and you just can't believe it. This photo was sent in by Alec Bennett from the Shrimp Boat yesterday:"Slammin fishing out here. Reminds me of that great year 5 years ago or so. Just put your line down and wait a few minutes." Results may vary. I couldn't get bit last night, and other people had trouble with hooking a fish after about 5:30 yesterday.

   These fish, like most of the salmon caught here in the last week, were taken in the fleet of boats fishing between the Tomales Bay outer buoy (02) and Elephant Rock in 50 to 90 feet of water. As of 3:00 PM today there were still a few salmon left in the narrow gaps between boats. I saw a few boats trolling with their fenders out and I realized it was because of how close everyone seems to want to be. Boats were catching each other's lines. My only consolation today (aside from 5 limits of salmon) was the knowledge that it will be worse on Saturday. My recommendation: If the fish are already in an area a couple of  miles long, probably they are close to everywhere. If bumperboats isn't your game of choice you can probably find salmon off of Ten Mile or, even more likely, points North of Bodega Bay. 

   In other news, the halibut bite at Hog has been slow for most but the fish are there if you have you have the kind of local fishing knowledge acquired over a couple of decades. Mr. Mosby has been putting 3 or 4 halibut a day in his boat while fishing at Hog, so the fish are there, it's just that you and I may not be able to catch them. There was a thresher shark hooked and lost by the pier yesterday. He put on quite an aerial show before busting the line on a piling. Shark fishermen are also catching quite a few spiny dogfish sharks from the shore. If that sounds like fun to you please come out and catch them so that I won't have to.