The halibut didn't bite for these guys but the jacksmelt and stripers did. Shane and Michael Nichols caught these stripers on live smelt at the north end of the bay. Stripers were caught from Pelican Point to the mouth of the bay this weekend, but both of these were caught within sight of our launch area. Nice work gents.

Mitch Hamilton sent over this report from Saturday: "Pretty good day with two grandsons, Lucas, the youngest , landed a 32” fish. My fish was 27”. Found tons of 6” jack smelt towards Marshall.Fish were caught around hog island just as low tide was winding down." Sounds good to me. Low tide at Hog seems to be the sweet spot now for water temperature and active fish. Good job putting the grands on fish, and good on you for also showing them how it's done.

 

     With salmon over, one would expect the halibut to step up. They had two days off, after all. But the halibut seem to have different priorities. There have been a few caught near Hog but nobody is complaining of the fish biting too aggressively. Gage and I are back to not liking shiner perch again as the halibut decided they didn't like them yesterday. Big baits were key for us and they worked well, the only problem being that we couldn't hardly catch any big bait. We caught two halibut and two stripers by Hog on a large sardine, a large jacksmelt and two 6-8" walleye perch. We missed two other bites on a jacksmelt and a walleye. I had been told long ago that halibut won't bite walleyes. Thankfully, the fellow that told me that didn't tell these halibut. If you catch a mix of bait, use a mix of bait, as who knows what they like today? The strange things may not work but they sure make catching bait more interesting. And, they may actually work. 

    There's lots of Dungeness being caught in the bay, unfortunately they are mostly a hair too small. Maybe they'll be keepers this fall, but for now they're heartbreakers. There are a few keepers in the mix. There seems to be more crab nearer the mouth of the bay. 

       I don't want to brag, but it has been literally years since I got skunked while salmon fishing. That ended today. In my three and a half hours of trolling off of Bodega Head I released a shorty and a silver and lost a small but probably barely legal salmon before I could decide to net him. I was not the only skunked boat, but overall the fishing and catching was better today than yesterday.

     I have to say that I enjoy getting texted photos of fish being caught while I am not catching. I have to say it because I want pictures, but in fact I tried not to look at my phone at a certain point. Mason Lessard sent the first hurtful photo: "Owen put this 25lb into the box 

Straight bait 150 OTW 288' off bodega head...

No other bites so far for us"  My understanding was that no other keepers followed this one, but one keeper is the difference between success and failure, so good on you, Owen. Very nice fish.

     Bob Brodsky caught the top 17 pound salmon yesterday. Good thing he got to catch one Saturday because today Natalia went with Bob and Tom and she caught all the fish. Bob got to net, at least. They were off of Bodega Head both days.

     Branden Mendoza sent in this report: "Hey Willy. We trolled both days out with the fleet. Nothing yesterday. But today we got lucky. Fishing 150ft down with 2lb balls straight bait resulted in 2 fish for us. Happy that we had some success in our short season. As always thanks for the reports." Thanks for your reports, sir. Straight bait did seem to be the ticket for a lot of fish this weekend. I guess we all have to keep that in mind for September.

    Gage sent me this picture at about noon today: "Robert and Nate Baker with this nice striper from the surf. Live jacksmelt" Surf stripers are the best stripers. Nice job. Makes you want to catch another, doesn't it?

       So another fish it was. Nate Baker reports, "Hey Willy, 

Gage got a pic of a striper Robert landed this morning off the point. He nailed this one this afternoon at the tide change in the same spot. 

stay fishy, 

Nate " I'm pretty sure that I'm not as fishy as Robert. Really nice work there, Robert. Two in a day from the surf is pretty special.

     Not from here, but nearby, Kelly Roy reports: "Willy

6 limits by 10:30. Some smalls and some nice high teens with a high 22 pounder.

Came in flurries of triples doubles and a few singles.

HMB great day great ocean" It sounds like it was a little slower down south today and little better up here, but south was still the place to be. There are a lot of salmon out there and we'll get another shot at them in September when they will count against next year's salmon count. Yeah, I don't get it either, but if I get to fish I guess it doesn't really matter.

      It is salmon season, so let's roll out the salmon pictures!

   This week Lou Zanardi discovered that his boat steering didn't work. Luckily, Fred Fritz in Petaluma had a bleeder tool he let Lou borrow to get the air out of his helm. It worked, and he caught today off of the Head. Not a lot, but not zero, either.

    The Coastodian found a keeper off of the Head today as well. There weren't a lot of bites to be had in our area so every one (and for most there was only one) was critical. This 15 pounder stuck. Others had fish that didn't stick. They will be thinking about those fish until the next salmon opportunity.

       Kaare Johnson was fishing with Chris Lawson and they caught two salmon about ten miles apart. This one weighed 27 pounds and was caught near Point Reyes. The other was half its size but was also half the distance from here. Most of the fish were being caught on bait without flashers or dodgers, but these two fish bit a hootchy and a spoon. I only heard of three other salmon out of the Landing today although I didn't talk to a lot of boats so I'm sure I missed some. Not many, though. As expected, the best bite was well south of here. Many boats fishing from Morro Bay to the Farallones got limits of salmon today. You can assume that tomorrow is the last day for salmon until September. 

      Mike Mack and crew gave up on the slow salmon and caught the turn of the tide by Hog Island this afternoon for five halibut, three of which weighed 23, 21 and 21 pounds. Who needs those salmon, anyway? Most of the other boats fishing in the same area did not have these gentlemen's luck. I heard of one other halibut caught and that was Gage's fish. Gage finished with a salmon and a halibut for the day. There were a couple of stripers caught from the beach this morning, so there's something else to look forward to in the salmon postseason.

       Gage and I went out in the south wind today to do a little scouting. We saw no bait in close from Tomales Point down to the top of McClure's. Then we ran out to 15 and 5 and saw only travelling birds along the way, no feeding. We did find a pod of humpbacks possibly feeding at 15 and 4 but we saw no biat there except for the faintest of lines of krill at 150' down. Then, as I had neglected to wear raingear and the spray was pretty cold and constant from the chop, we went back into the bay. 2.5 hours of trolling by Inverness later we had released three very short halibut. We had skipped past Hog as the water temp there closer to the high tide was only 53º when we passed by. By noon the outgoing tide had the water up to 59º. Also up was the south wind which had increased in strength there from earlier. We weren't able to find any schools of bait at Pelican Point but we did catch a bunch of shiners. Shiners aren't really our favorite bait, but we gave them a try. 

    Ninety minutes later we were done with fish from 10 to 17 pounds. We had to release one at the end as we had three fish in the box and then doubled. We missed another six or eight bites. We had to stop halibut fishing and catch more perch to finish. We may not be shiner perch fans but the halibut were today. It seems like the halibut may be coming in.

    Gage was grabbing a beer at the Boathouse around 5:00 PM when Jeff Tucker of Petaluma walked up from the beach with this 21 pound halibut. He caught it from the beach, this side of Sand Point (not the surf side), on a fluke drop shot rig. He also needs a larger ice chest if he's going to catch fish like this. Very nice job and fish, Mr. Tucker. It really seems like the halibut may be coming in.

 

   I received this report from the Coastodian yesterday: "Any idea where the whales, birds or bait fish are ?

I was unable to make bait this morning near Hog. Others found plenty near the grass beds, I found tangles and lost gear as well as drifting far from where I wanted to be as I addressed the aforementioned.

Got three bites on frozen herring, converted two of them.

I heard of two other fish landed and one skunk.

Mildly sloppy for a kayak, but manageable." So, there's a few fish at Hog Island. I guess there had to be a few somewhere, and Hog is as good as anywhere. There are some scattered sardines and anchovies in the bay but they are harder to find than the halibut. Jacksmelt can still be had, but as mentioned in this report, they can be a bit hard to find, too. But, maybe you don't need live bait. Even better. I haven't heard any other reports of halibut, but this report is pretty good. 

    But who's thinking about halibut now? Salmon season is coming! And if you blink, you'll miss it! The Coastodian is not the only person asking about whales, birds and bait fish. So, here's what I heard: Commercial boats have seen quite a few whales and birds working baitfish out in 50 to 70 fathoms (that's 300 to 420 feet of water to us sporties). There's also some birds and whales off of Bodega Head in 40ish fathoms (240 feet). If you're a guy that likes to find the place with a bunch of other boats because instead of birds and whales, boats are your indicator species, well, Bodega Head should be your target. Whether there's any salmon there or not, there will be a lot of boats there. Put out your fenders and watch out for the MPA. In the last three years there will have only been two days to write tickets to salmon guys trolling through the Bodega Head MPA and those two days are this weekend. There will be wardens in boats. Good luck. 

   And don't forget to check your flares and get your Boater's Card.

 

   In today's episode of The Old Man and the Sea, Tim Woerner caught the first bragging board fish of the season. Everybody that had their name on there last year, so sorry, but you got erased. Tim's halibut weighed 26 pounds and bit a trolled 6" tray anchovy in 90 feet of water in front of Bird Rock. Why would you fish for halibut there in 49º water? You wouldn't, nor was Tim. He was trying for some fresh rockfish for dinner but had to settle for flatfish instead. The south wind was chugging pretty good, so even though Tim would have rather has rockfish on his plate, this fish let him go home, which by that point was really all he wanted. Note the spots on the fish. It barely hit the deck and Tim was on his way home. 

    I received this bit of clever marketing from Bigfoot Bait Co.,  maker of Bigfoot jigs. The text had little information other than this happened this morning, but I bet it bit a Bigfoot jig and it looks like Hog Island to the right of the halibut. The south wind came up an hour or two later and dropped again by the afternoon, a theme we will likely see repeat a bit this week. Nice fish, Jonathon. I'm going to have to get out and try putting one of those jigs in front of a halibut myself. It looks like fun.