Tom and Jerrie Carter found a patch of good ones today. The fish weighed 13 to 16.5 pounds and they bit live jacksmelt. They missed as many bites as they hooked, so there's a few fish around. Apparently the wind quit here when I left, but started blowing offshore in SoCal, where I went. Huh. Probably coincidence? I hope... At least the water here has warmed up and the fish are moving. I've only been back here for a day and only spoke to a few people but it sounds like some of the deep water halibut with an urge to make little halibut have warmed up enough to slide in to the beach and bay. Probably, for the next few days at least, the good catching should move from the bar toward Hog as the fish move in to sheltered waters. Probably.

   The Carters were not the only successful fisherpeople today. I received this picture at 10:30 this morning from Shrimp Boat captain Alec Bennett. He was fishing not quite off of Dillon Beach. The fish ate, no surprise, live jacksmelt. One wonders how jacksmelt live long enough to spawn.

   The warmer water has other fish moving around, most notably a lot of baitfish. Clearly, as stated earlier, there's jacksmelt, and they're helpfully biting again, mostly. There's some anchovies around, and some of them are larger, meaning more useful than the previous batch of anchovies. 5" fish, not 3". Halibut will eat them all, but maybe not if you're hook weighs the tiny critter down. The pictured fish is, not a sardine, not a herring, but a shad. I've never fished a live shad for halibut, but considering how much halibut love the shad's cousins, sardines and herring, I'd guess a live shad would probably work.

    I received this picture in an email this morning: "Albacore are here" No info on where or what they bit, but other people have posted a few reports that seem to indicate the close water may not have fish in it, yet. The successful guys went far from here, 70+ miles. The 35 mile area looks good, and perhaps these fish came from there, but others have tried and failed. If I'm going to burn 50 gallons of fuel I'm looking for a better report or at least a good looking satellite picture with no catching info. Aw, who am I kidding. Costco gas station here I come. Thanks for the hope, Joe.