I was forced to go fishing without Gage yesterday. Hard times. I took Jerry Knedel instead. We started on the bar for two stripers and two missed bites over 90 minutes. The fish didn't show for us like they did for Gage the day before, but we weren't Gage. Oh well. We then went looking for schools of bait, bait that we heard was "black-out-the-meter"  for miles and miles, especially on McClures. So to McClures we went, and by McClures we lost all hope of getting any baitfish. The previously ubiquitous bait had vanished. We were lucky to score four large jacksmelt and get back to the bar just as the tide turned. We pretty quickly scored three halibut out of five bites in two drifts, just before the current sped up and the water cooled off. There were some other fish caught but not many. Today the wind blew and the catch numbers got even worse. Bait is hard. Fishing is hard. Fishing in the wind is even harder.