They may not have caught a bluefin yesterday but they sure caught the halibut today. Even though it was windy, Kevin Fogal and Mara and Mike Nursement fished Hog with live jacksmelt and ended up with seven halibut. Way to go, guys.

   One boat ran for tuna from here on Friday, spent 14 hours on the water, but caught only one blue shark. They saw several bluefin caught by other boats, including one guy fishing alone in a 17' Montauk that couldn't land the fish by himself. Another boat came by, the guys climbed aboard and let their boat drift off(!), and together they landed the fish. Then they ran to find the boat.  That's teamwork. Another guy caught one and while dropping the line back out he hooked another. This was all south of Cordell Banks around the big drop off.
   Saturday, five boats from here ran out. High boat had a skipjack. A couple of the boats saw a lot of jumping tuna but found no biting tuna. Even the sharks were missing from the area south and inside on Cordell. The best signs, the most jumpers and the most sharks (two out of three ain't bad) were near the Bodega weather buoy. There's some mako sharks mixed in with all of the blues. Be careful, the makos are kind of bitey.

   The squid seem to have moved on but the sea bass remain in the schools of anchovies and mackerel. One was caught on a mackerel under a bobber on Thursday evening at McClure's. A few were taken off of Salmon Creek beach on Friday.

95 pound bft 50 feet down mackerel 37 57 123 27 Nick Bauer

For a bit less pithy report, here it is: We went out this morning and caught mackerel, eventually.  For the record, catching more than you can keep alive is a bad idea. We killed 20 of our 24 in a  bait tank that wouldn't pump while the boat was on plane. Oops.  A blue shark ate another. But one bluefin ate one and the hook stuck just right. We went to where the Point Reyes waverider buoy should be and hooked up one mile inside of it. 

Others had bites and fish in the same area. Kapulani Chong caught a 45 pounder on a diving plug and Bob Brodsky caught a 40 pound bft on a live mackerel, all in the same area. Lots of blue sharks, so bring extra gear. At least four others were hooked and lost. We were lucky and hooked our big fish on big gear.  Better lucky than good, as they say. By the way, while I was cleaning this fish I rediscovered that bluefin is really tasty.

Here's a couple reports from yesterday in Tomales Bay. From Ed Parsons:

Here's one for you, my grandson Teo caught his first halibut today.  He said he had a great weekend, fish fry, watching Gage jump and a halibut!

And from Kevin Fogal:

Kevin and Kyle Fogal caught 3 nice size halibut today around hog island area. All on jack smelt.

So there's still some decent halibut in the bay.

   The weather outside was frightful, so inside the bay was where people fished this weekend. The halibut bit for most of them around Hog Island with catches of up to four landed on Saturday, three for the high boat on Sunday. There's better weather forecast for this week, so maybe we'll get to see some more silver fish before the year is out.
   The season-long derby ended and the winner was Don Mosby with his 56 pound sea bass. Second place was Gerard Fitzgerald's 32.5 pound salmon, and third went to Nate Smith's 47 pound sea bass. Another side bet between my son, Gage, and Ed Parsons, also was resolved when Gage jumped from the pier in his underwear, since Ed's 45 pound sea bass beat Gage's 20.5 pound salmon. A man has to follow through with his agreements, even when the water's cold.