Mike274
07-02-2012, 12:10 AM
Hit the beach with a buddy as it opened. Fished the area to the left of the entrance just north of the RV parking. The morning started a little overcast but warm, with an incoming tide, very strong south current, very manageable surf but lots of salad. I am just getting my buddy into the surf fishing gig and he loves it. Better that paying $20+ dollars he used to pay to get into Irvine with better results. Plus, the beach is closer and you don't feel like you have to stay all day since you payed the $$$$$.
Anyway, I used pile worms and sand crabs while he used the Berkley crack. This was my second time using the worms as I was introduced to them the last time out and thought I would give them another go. The catch rate with the live worms was very good! however, they are a pain in the a** to hook and they tend to come off easy. To tell the truth the Berkley sw's have a much longer hook life and the catch rate is roughly the same. So long story short the real deals are not really worth the money ($8) per container or the hassle.
Shortly after arriving the surf picked up significantly which made the bite much tougher. Okay results with the worms, and not so much luck with the sand crabs. The ticket seemed to be the threaded worm tipped with a sand crab. The crabs were plentiful. Most were small with some laaaaarge models thrown in. The smaller ones seemed to work the best today.
The sun came out at about 8am and the washing machine conditions came with it making it tough to keep up with the line therefor missing a lot of bites as well. As a result the fishing slowed greatly. I did hook into something very large that had me going for about 10 minutes. This thing was very difficult to budge coming in, but did like pulling drag. At first I though it was just a large plastice bagfish or seaweed, but the current was strong to the south and this thing was walking me north. Hmmm! Anyhow it finally straightened out the hook and hit the road. Dang It! Drag puller for sure, but didn't feel a lot of head shakes. One other fisherman said he caught 4 halibut there this week so maybe a large hali or more likely a SNGF. Though I haven't caught a SNGF that far south. Most of mine have been in the Sunset / Surfside area but who knows.
The catch of the day were several BSP and WSP. Caught more WSP here that in previous years as well. All in all I think it's going to be a good year to fish the surf!!
Mike
Anyway, I used pile worms and sand crabs while he used the Berkley crack. This was my second time using the worms as I was introduced to them the last time out and thought I would give them another go. The catch rate with the live worms was very good! however, they are a pain in the a** to hook and they tend to come off easy. To tell the truth the Berkley sw's have a much longer hook life and the catch rate is roughly the same. So long story short the real deals are not really worth the money ($8) per container or the hassle.
Shortly after arriving the surf picked up significantly which made the bite much tougher. Okay results with the worms, and not so much luck with the sand crabs. The ticket seemed to be the threaded worm tipped with a sand crab. The crabs were plentiful. Most were small with some laaaaarge models thrown in. The smaller ones seemed to work the best today.
The sun came out at about 8am and the washing machine conditions came with it making it tough to keep up with the line therefor missing a lot of bites as well. As a result the fishing slowed greatly. I did hook into something very large that had me going for about 10 minutes. This thing was very difficult to budge coming in, but did like pulling drag. At first I though it was just a large plastice bagfish or seaweed, but the current was strong to the south and this thing was walking me north. Hmmm! Anyhow it finally straightened out the hook and hit the road. Dang It! Drag puller for sure, but didn't feel a lot of head shakes. One other fisherman said he caught 4 halibut there this week so maybe a large hali or more likely a SNGF. Though I haven't caught a SNGF that far south. Most of mine have been in the Sunset / Surfside area but who knows.
The catch of the day were several BSP and WSP. Caught more WSP here that in previous years as well. All in all I think it's going to be a good year to fish the surf!!
Mike