Thursday, August 20, 2020

   Here's a report from Swampy from yesterday:"Evening Willy,

Have had a blast the last few days down here.  Today was slow on the halibut front with two 7 pounders boated. Could you check with Gage to see if he can identify this 20 pound fish caught north of Hog and south of Eddie?" Yes, Gage says that's his fish. You described exactly where he left it. Just bring it back on your next trip and we will release it directly into a frying pan.


    Eddie Kim and Doug Bagley put the hurt on the halibut on Tuesday and bruised them again on Wednesday. Thursday Doug went back to work and the halibut decided to just chill. The chill may have been caused by the cold water entering the bay on the incoming tide. That cold water chased in some more anchovies but if halibut were following them in nobody I spoke with could tell. Gage and I launched at 9:00 and quit at noon with one fish caught near Marker 5. We made two long drifts and the only reason they were long was because I got to practice my backtrolling. With the wind and current  going the same way we were drifting at 2.5+  knots. I generally troll slower. Putting both motors in reverse slowed us to 0.5 to 1.0 knots. The nice part is that you could pick where you wanted to fish and drive over it, like trolling. The bad part is that I had to drive the whole time while Gage worked the gear (which he had to do a lot. We found all the seaweed, I think. There couldn't be any more). Just saying, another tool in the arsenal. At the time we left Mr. Kim had a halibut but his drift through the channel (even with his parachute out) was crazy fast. Let's just sum it up by saying it was tough out there. It looked to be even tougher on the ocean as the wind didn't wait very long today to go to town. The forecast is worse tomorrow and then we get another reprieve. 
 

14 comments:

Jerrdirt said...

Went clamming on Wednesday and I think it was Doug that I met near the store. Cool dude! Anyhow while we were leaving there was 4-5 DFG trucks parked at one the campsites. Appears they’d as a big sting operation going on.

Tailout said...

What's the sting about? Overloaded small boats, and rafts not operating safely. Are they checking for flares and PFD's. Or it could be over harvesteing under sized clams, and fish?

Onemore said...

Tailout
After your posts earlier in the week I decided to take my boater safety course a couple years early, it took 8 hours with work and running the Course in the background. I learned some new nautical info and thought it was well worth the time. I used the US Boating online course witch was free plus the $10 fee for the license.
I bitched about it when I first heard of the new regulations especially After bing on the water for 30 some years but now that I’ve done it i think it’s a good course for all boaters to take.
Thanks for getting g me fired up to get her done
Doesn’t loik like any rain soon so maybe those salmon will just stay around and keep getting bigger.

Tailout said...

Congrats skipper! And yes I'm hoping for at least one more shot at some Salmon. If a guy wants the study guide and the mail in test West Marine had the packets. Call ahead they had'em behind the counter, have to ask. Safe boating

Willy said...

Good job on your boaters cards. The sting was (we think) about a group of "commercial" harvesters. It is likely that a press release will follow.

Tomales Outlaw said...

DFW doesn't care about boating regs, just like Coast Guard Doesn't care about game laws. If DFW wardens were there, it was about fish and game violations.

Outlaw

Tailout said...

Ah, do ya think! And doing it in overloaded,unsafe vessels. There's a pattern here... just saying

Tailout said...

Any word on a press release about the sting?

BIG"D" said...

The landing cares about their revenue.

Harvest Time said...

Every businessman cares about their revenue, otherwise they cannot provide service!

Sucka-Fish said...

anyone have a salmon report. i am going out sunday. thank you

Anonymous said...

Hey Chris it’s “Jose”, we picked up one fish before we got tired of getting beat up in the swell today

rokefin said...

My thoughts exactly Harvest Time.

BIG"D" said...

No dock. No gas. I've taken my boat and have been denied launching. Quite the service.