Here's a picture from Thursday. Conor Padon and his junior Padon are showing their catch from the bar. Conor smacked two srtipers and a halibut on jigs. We (Gage, Richard Porterfield and I) took two trips to catch the same thing. As far as I know, this was the best result from the bar on Thursday. The crazy good bite of Tuesday night rapidly devolved to scratching a few fish here and there. The bar has been slow and Hog, slower. But, fish are being caught.

    Megan Hirschfeld caught this 23 pounder at Hog today. No other biters, but the team effort paid off for one big enough to share. I didn't hear what this fish bit, but most of the fish coming in now are the results of grit and perseverance, as there aren't that many coming in. Grinding is a valid method. Nice work, Team Hirschfeld, as they aren't coming easy.

    Big fish of the day is this 30 pounder. Cameron sent this message with it: "Lapp crew, 30 lbs. First and only bite by the weather buoy on "one of those stupid tubes with the green thing on it."" I think that's a Bigfoot Bait Jig, as some of them have the green thing in them. Tip of the hat for catching a damned good fish on a lure that you clearly had no faith in. Maybe now? I will say that a lot of the time I think that anything presented in front of a fish will catch. But the tubes, when properly jigged, will dart around like a scared baitfish, and that seems important. It can surely help an indecisive fish make the right (or wrong, if you're the fish) decision. Nice fish, folks. Keep jigging.

    So as Gage, Richard and I went out on Thursday we passed a Klamath boat with three people that looked familiar. Holy crap! It was Frank Green, David Gonzales and the Jigger John. I didn't hear anything further until today when Kerry Apgar sent me this photo. That's a halibut and a white seabass for you folks playing along at home. Kerry also said that the seabass was really tasty. Dammit. I'd like to think that those were my fish, but when the jigging is happening the world likely belongs to people with "Jigger" in their nickname. 

   I gotta get a new, functional nickname. 

   Also, the fishing, aside from these fish, was pretty slow. High boat that I heard of was four fish at the bar and a mix of stripers and halibut. Their bait was caught outside the bay proper and was mostly anchovies, but there are a few big sardines out there. Hog has been dead but  clearly a few fish have trickled back. No spot is good but there's possibilities. 

 

     Well, that ended pretty quickly. There were quite a few boats on the bar today at a couple of different times but not too many fish caught. High boat that I heard of was Conor Padon with two stripers and a halibut, all on tube jigs. We had to go fishing twice just to catch up. Gage, Richard Porterfield and I caught two stripers in the morning/afternoon and Richard caught a halibut this evening on a separate trip. There were other fish caught on the bar at various times today but it wasn't even slightly "hot." One fact I neglected to share was that on Tuesday night both Chris Brown and Doryon Dye reeled up halibut that had a second, smaller halibut following it. The only reasonable explanation is that those second halibut were spawning males, as generally it is the stupid horny guys that get into trouble because they can't see it as they are horny-blind. I've been that guy, I know. It seems like when the halibut come in to seriously spawn (as they're doing now, or have done) they bite initially and then lockjaw for a week or so. Post-coital malaise? It doesn't matter the name, the results are the same. The fish quit biting. They will start again, tomorrow or maybe next week. Halibut have small stomachs and feed less than a fisherman would hope for, but eventually they will bite again. There is a ton of bait in the outer bay 

 

    These two halibut came pretty quick this morning. The big one went 24 pounds and did not fit in the net. They grabbed it by the gills and dragged it into the boat like men. This is why men often have bloody hands. They caught them just inside the bell buoy (TB) on tube jigs. Nice work, men. Don't forget to show off the scars. "Did I ever tell you how I got this scar?" "Yes, Dad. Please, don't tell me the story again." "There I was, on the Tomales Bar...."  

     You know what they say," The family that fishes together often curses in front of their children." Not so with the Padons. That's probably mostly because they catch a lot, and catching takes a lot of the edge off. Success will do that, I'm reliably informed. I believe that this is Mrs. Padon's first jig fish. Catching halibut is fun, but hooking one by working a jig in the correct manner and feeling that "thump", well, it can be addictive. They had three bites on the jigs today but this is the only one that stuck. It looks like a pretty good one though. The bar was kind of slow for most guys for the bulk of the day, but after 5 and the tide change an evening bite lit up again. I only had one bite, but I saw one boat land five fish while I was there (Nice work Loren Poncia and team on the Early Shirley.) and another had four (Team Dark Lord, way to holler at Gage). Cannon Brunkhorst jumped in with Gage this evening and they caught three. All on tube jigs and mostly Bigfoot Baits but there were some Redrums in the mix.

    Gage and Chris Brown caught and released several halibut this morning, looking for the right one. This 28 pounder was apparently the right one. I struggled to catch a wrong one, so please excuse my snark. Nice work, Gage. 

    Also, Cameron said to call out James Ludovina. James, I hear you're busy. Understood. But they're biting. Right. Now. 

   

    Nick Donnelly reports: "Saturday and Sunday were a grind with the south wind and poor drift conditions. scratched a limit one day and only a single fish the other day and a bunch of ray and shark and couple more missed hookups, all on Bigfoot jigs. only action I got on lives was a stolen chovie that the hook never stuck" Unsurprisingly, the guy that caught fish ain't wrong. The live bait action has been tough. Dead bait? Tougher. But the jigs have worked? Why? I haven't a clue, but what I do know is that why doesn't  matter if it works. Nice job Nick. Them fish don't hook themselves.

   The Coastodian sent over this picture. There's some stripers around, it seems. For the record, Richard was fine with me posting this but Gage said no. So I can't say where, but it was close and apparently painful. Nice frickin' fish, though.

   Speaking of striper fishing, here's a picture of Cameron and I hooked up on a double. I hooked a fish and he casted on my hookup and got his own fish. So  most importantly, mine was first. He still caught more than me.

  So. Steve Cato has been trying hard this season. He tried hard last season, too, and he caught a few, but this season the fish have been tough. And, to be fair, they have been tough for everyone. A couple of years of no salmon lay hard on every other fish. But today, tough be damned. He took Cameron out to the bar (like a stray dog; If you feed him you can't get rid of him) and they caught fish. I believe the total was two stripers and three halibut. The pictured one went 21 pounds. All fish on Redrum and Bigfoot jigs. Live bait entertained but did not hook a halibut. What kind  of world is it that fish bite junk faster than real stuff?

        The Chris Brown hasn't been out to visit since Prime Time last year. It has now been scientifically proved that when he arrives to fish, it is go time. All of the pictured fish were caught on Bigfoot Jigs. They're biting. You may have heard Gage's whoops and hollers this evening. I sure did while I was fishless. Doryon and I couldn't buy a bite until Chris and Gage left with their limits. Then we started catching. Limits all the way around, but some of us started sooner and finished earlier. It doesn't matter, as the feeling of a fish biting a jig is special on its own. I highly recommend it. They're biting. Best time to get bit, it seems. 

       Not much to report, as the halibut catching inside Tomales Bay has been, well, bad. There are fish getting caught, but not many, and this is July when it should be many. Yesterday we saw almost no halibut come in, but the almost fish was 33 pounds. The big fish was caught by Colton Millel of Kenwood and was hooked "straight across bay tucked against far edge of channel, 9am, redrum tube." Very nice job on a difficult fish during a difficult time. There's been a few stripers in the mix as a few roving "wolf packs" have been showing up here and there from the bar back to Hog. There will be a flurry of action and then back to the usual nada. Tough times, but the water is warming and the bait is here, and while it may never get epic this year it will get better. And then get worse. Such is fishing. I love it.

 

     Here's a Ron Johnson submitted Wednesday report: "pics from today fishing  on the Bar. I mean Hog. My son Eliot visiting from Oregon and I fished with Miller Time." Yes, the San Francisco bar isn't the only bar with halibut on it. Nice work on finding the fish, gents. The SF bar has way more halibut on it currently, but Tomales has some, and those some will be heading further into the bay to hopefully re-energize the fishing at Hog. It needs it. Bait catching is still difficult but there's a few smelt in the outer bay and along selected weed patches. There are also some schools of small anchovies at the yellow buoy that can be fished with small single hooks. Gage and I tried the bar this morning around the turn of the tide and had eight bites with two fish landed in our first four short drifts, Then the incoming tide brought in cold, clear water and we had no more bites. We left when the water dropped below 50º. As the forecast calls for much less wind and a more summerlike pattern, the water should warm back up soon and the bar action should fire back up. Soon....

 

     Tom Brodsky sent me this report last night but I missed it. "Willy, took my friends grandkids fishing the last 2 days. Here's the lingcod Noah caught in the outer bay yesterday. Today 40 Rockcod in 1-1/2 hours off of 10 mile. Sorry no photos." A flat ocean and poor halibut bite is surely bad news for the rockfish. So is Noah, by the looks of it. Nice work of the rockfish. 

     Tom was out after the rockfish with a new crew today and both he and Ron Johnson sent pictures of this fish to ask if it was a cowcod. It is a tiger rockfish and they aren't very common around here. Most importantly, it is also a keeper. 

 

   David Cerini was having some trouble catching a fish, as the fishing has been pretty slow. So what does a killer do when he's having trouble killing things? Up your game. Mr. Cerini jumped in the water yesterday, along with John Morozumi, and they looked for halibut. Ten feet of visibility showed them....no halibut. But, while on the edge of a school of needle head (what's smaller than pinhead?) anchovies, across the bay from the Boathouse, Davey saw a gray shadow emerge from the gloom. After determining that the hoped for white sea bass was actually a thresher shark, he started to lower the speargun, as generally, spearing a thresher is a great way to get dragged through the water for a long time or maybe get bit. But, the thresher, sensing Davey's need to kill, turned sideways and paused in front of him. When a forked-horn buck leans up against the barrel of your rifle during deer season, well, you shoot him. You can get past the smell of burned fur. Davey shot, and for a second the shark was stunned and he thought he got away with it. But threshers are built out of speed and power, so Davey couldn't get past the dragging and wrestling part. But he won. The thresher weighed 36 pounds gutted. He's smiling in the picture, but there may be a longer pause before he pulls the trigger on another thresher shark.

     The fishing has been slow, partly because the wind we've had has finally blown a plume of 48º water into the bay. That will slow things down on the north end of the bay for sure. The southern 3/4 of the bay has still had fish biting and a few people have even limited out. The fish in the back aren't big and you must carefully sort them as most aren't keepers. There were a couple of halibut caught on the bar today in that cold water, so more may be lurking there and be even bitier when the water warms up. Time will tell.

    

 

        Mike Mack caught this 28 pounder yesterday. I don't know what bait and where he caught it, but I suspect a jacksmelt and near Hog Island, as that has been his method as of late. That's the largest halibut of the year here so far. 

     Cannon found another one today. This one weighed 14 pounds if I remember correctly. This was the only fish for the Doghouse today. If Cannon is only catching one, the fishing is pretty slow.

           Vance Staplin texted me this photo today. Apparently the happy kayaker pictured here wanted someone to take his picture. I guess Cannon missed another white sea bass. It appears that there's a few around.

 

    Cannon didn't fish yesterday so there was no reason for me to post anything. Here is today's obligatory Cannon photo. Not pictured is the striper he caught in the afternoon after jumping on a jet sled with some striper whisperers. There are fish out there for other people to catch but Cannon has first pick while he's here.

    Oscar and Angela Aceves found one that Cannon missed. The white sea bass weighed 15 pounds and bit a trolled bait near Marconi. I've heard about a couple of these being caught in the last month but this is the first one hung on the scale here this year. Nice work, Team Aceves. The WSB's don't come easy or often.

     It wasn't as windy today as yesterday but it sure wasn't the weather anyone wanted. Still, the fishing wasn't as bad as the wind and the first few boats back had a couple of halibut a piece. Yesterday there weren't too many boats out fishing but only a few fish were caught. Oscar Aceves had a pair of halibut from Marconi and Gage and I caught three halibut and a striper at Hog but I heard of no other action. Gage and I were able to catch our bait reasonably fast but we used a lot of oily chum. It turns out that freezer-burned bluefin is actually good for something. We left a slick behind the boat, and I had difficulty holding anything after, but the jacksmelt approved. 

 

     Catching bait was really hard today. Catching halibut was hard without live bait, but Cannon Brunkhorst found one that liked dead bait. This one weighed 20 pounds and was hunkered down in 47 feet of water. There were other halibut caught today, mostly on dead bait and jigs, but nobody from here landed one as large as Cannon's. I did hear that there's a couple of large ones that got left behind. Tomorrow is supposed to be windy but the worst is supposed to pass by Friday. I imagine there will be plenty of fishermen trying the bay this weekend. Please try to make space for Cannon. And his head.

 

     Quinn and Dave came out to see if the surf had any stripers in it. Dave caught a couple almost immediately and released them, but after Quinn fought this 29 pounder for a half hour, Quinn decided to keep it. That's a big striper for here and a huge striper for for here in the surf. Nice job, gents. 

    Cannon Brunkhorst had only just arrived here when Quinn dragged in the big striper. Moments later he found himself jumping in a Whaler with Gage and Cameron to try fishing the surf from a different angle. Cameron and Gage didn't catch but Cannon connected to this 18 pounder. It took him around the boat a couple of times. The last time may have been a victory lap to tease Gage. Nice job, Cannon! Not pictured today are the majority of striper fishermen that did not get bit. 

    Tom Brodsky and friend gave the rockcod a try today: "Hey Willy,

Limits of rockcod up to 5lbs today down off 10 mile.

Yesterday 17 rockcod and 14 Crab in outerbay." The halibut fishing was slow again today, so taking the opportunity to fish the ocean with the good weather today was a darn good idea. I bet it seemed like an even better idea when they ate fresh rockcod tonight.