So, Gage, Giuseppi Maselli, Brian Rocha and I decided to give the rockfish and crab a try today. The weather was not quite as advertised but at least running south into a south wind meant an easy ride home. The ride down? Well, let's talk about the nice things. The crabbing was good. This pictured pot had a three hour plus soak. It was our best trap with ten jumbos and two 6"ers. Out of seven traps, we came home with our forty Dungeness, 6"+, and six traps. Note to self, when someone gives you rope saying they don't trust it for their traps and you use it, assuming that your hand pulling won't break it, then you buy a pot puller, you should change your rope. Don't worry, all my crappy traps are okay. Only the good stainless one is gone. Dammit. I had to buy a pot puller after reading on Coastside Fishing Club that anybody without a puller was obviously a pot pirate. You'd think a good pirate would spend his money on a puller rather than traps since one gets the other, but, I bow to the accumulated knowledge of the discussion boards there. That bowing cost me a pot but Gage is still walking upright, so... Break even I guess. The commercials drop on Sunday, so the crabbing awesomeness will likely drop off soon after, but the fishing was stupid. Biggest problem? Too many lings. It is hard to concentrate on rockfish when the lings keep assaulting your gear. We released, conservatively, twenty keeper sized lingcod today, not counting the fish that came off the hook on the way up. Giuseppi said to me, " I've never heard you curse before." Well, he'd never seen me lose a big ling before, either. That fish felt like I'd hooked the bottom except that it was coming up. Dammit. It was a good day, but the ones you lose haunt you. For the record, We crabbed and fished off of Ten Mile, best fishing and crabbing south of Abbott's Lagoon. 

      

   Brad Stompe sent a report :"Hey Willy,

Thanks for the heads up on rockfish reg. changes.  I find it interesting that you have caught so few quillback considering the results we had Saturday fishing between the end of Pt. Reyes and Abbots Lagoon.  I think browns were the most prevalent, but quillback were abundant.  We did well on vermillion and canaries too fishing 150 - 200' of water.  It was one of those beautiful days with little wind that made it easy fishing the deep water.  Also plenty of crab on 10 Mile with easy limits for 3.

Regards,

Brad Stompe"

   Well, Brad, for the record, the first fish we caught today was a quillback, but at 5" long, Gage wouldn't keep it. His pride got in the way. We suck at quillback, but part of that might be our focus on schoolies. In that area we like to find schools and fish them until they quit biting. They clean easier and bite quicker, usually. Today? We think the post-spawn lingcod have the rockfish a bit nervous as they are hungry. The rockfish were schooled up 20 feet off the bottom or more. Seven of eight of our lingcod were spawned out. Try for lings. They were stupid for swimbaits today.