So the Gage got invited to ride along with Rick Powers on a scientific research trip to Cordell Banks last Thursday. The mission was to collect some yellowtail and chilipepper rockfish with eggs. Mission successful, with many other "wrong" fish returned via descender device. Gage's bottom line report: "There's a lot of fish there." That's good news, because twenty years ago when they closed it to fishing there weren't any to be seen on the fish finder. You could still catch some fish but it wasn't the blackout-the-meter, can't-reach-the-bottom situation of the past or the present. You can already see the spillover of recovering deepwater rockfish appearing in the shallows. I've seen widows, bocaccio and yelloweye in 160 feet of water in the last five years and it used to be (in the 1980's) rare to see a yellowtail or olive rockfish near the shore, shallower than 250 feet of water. Perhaps some deeper water sites could be opened, even if on a limited basis, to relieve some of the pressure on the shallow rockfish. Cordell will surely never be re-opened to the rest of us but the Football, Rittenburg Bank and Fanny Shoals would sure be nice options to visit.
   Gage spent a bit of time in the New Sea Angler's wheelhouse and is very happy to report that there were schools of anchovies "all the way out and all the way back." This bodes well for salmon fishing this year but may predict sadness for the salmon smolts hitting the ocean this spring as it may be too much competition for krill. Time will tell.
   Here's a (sorry, previous week's) report from Mike Martin :"Just read your report about the crabbing in the outer bay. On Monday after pulling our last pots from 200’ for the year, when we got back to the dock, a couple guys in a Zodiac showed us 2 limits, and they threw a few back, after a 4 hour soak. They were in 50’ about a mile south of Doran beach(Estero?). Could have been luck and being in the right place at the right time but just passing it along.

Mike"

    Not too much to report, as you may have guessed. Crabbing in the ocean has been tough. There's a few in the outer bay but they need to be worked for. Out deeper is even slower. Hopefully the commercial guys caught enough at the start to pay their bills because now it sounds like a good day barely pays for fuel and bait. From the shore the snares are still accounting for a few Dungeness. FYI, I'm seeing more "Crab Hawks", or folding castable nets, getting used and I'm pretty sure that they're not legal in California. I haven't heard of anyone getting ticketed for using one but I doubt that anyonr reading this wants to be the first.
    I heard that the hatcheries got all the salmon they needed and lots of jacks showed up but I haven't heard any numbers of wild salmon returns. There will probably be an ocean salmon season, maybe. If there is, it looks like it should be pretty good since some of the commercial crabbers have seen sea lions eating salmon out in 40 fathoms (240 feet). There's lots of anchovies out there, too.
   I heard about a herring spawn in Tomales bay last weekend and a fresh school of herring pushed into the bay yesterday. I would think that there'd be few stripers chasing them but I haven't heard of ant caught except for a couple in the surf. Gage finally went surf fishing and managed a couple of barred perch at low tide. "The only structure to fish is at low tide," said the man.