Rpt-Wed.-05-18-16 Catalina Tails and Hali's!
Fascinated by the WFO Catalina White Seabass Bite last week, that quickly shutdown, I surely wanted a shot at the Ghosts. So I went fishing, Wednesday, 5-18-16 with Jeff on his 24’Skipjack, the “Kolamono” with crew Jamie. I set the alarm for midnight, needing to be at Jeff’s place by 1am, when Ghost fishing “sleep” is optional?
So we locked and loaded our gear and launched at Davies Landing in Alamitos Bay at little after 2am, after stopping to fill up the boat gas tanks. We checked out Nachos, all quiet, and no squid sign up. So we headed up to San Pedro for bait and picked up some enormous Sardines, and almost all died by the time we reached Avalon in Catalina.
The light boat Long Beach Carnage was loaded with squid, and we purchased a generous scoop. He told us the squid floated at West Cove, so we set a course for the west end, another hour of travel before arriving at 5:30 am. There was a bit over a half dozen boats in the area. A few had hook ups. It was barely grey light and Captain Jeff positioned us between the other boats, and started a drift.
I selected my dropper loop 40 pound outfit with an 8 oz. torpedo sinker. I placed two live squid on my 8/0 Aki Twist hook and dropped to the bottom. I reeled in my slack and was absolutely hammered. The big fish took quite a long run. Can this be a really big WSB? I gained some line and then the fish took a couple more nice runs. The obvious tail shakes told me this was not a Ghost, but a good size Yellowtail. The fish fought hard and took me a few minutes to bring to color. Yep it was a big Yellowtail, and Captain Jeff stuck him nicely with the gaff.
No scale on board, however, we estimated the weight at between 26 to 28 pounds:
Still in shock and recovering from lack of sleep:
As you can see it was still grey light and the fish were on a serious chew? Everywhere we looked anglers were hooked up on other boats. Captain Jeff was hammered and again the big fish took a long run. Unfortunately his fish got tangled in the anchor of a nearby boat and was lost. Jamie got bit and also had hooked a big fish, darn it unbuttons.
Jeff decides to anchor up and then I get bit again. I fight the fish to color, another decent size Yellowtail, and darn it finds our anchor rope and is lost. Gad, that’s a bad start to our day, 1 for 4 on the Tails. We hook and land a couple of 4-6 pound Yellowtail in the next hour. We pull anchor and run into the beach to try for some Ghosts. It was a waste of time and we return to the Yellowtail area.
The Calico Bass and Perch are on us bigtime. We see a few more right kind hook ups on other boats, and then it went dead. We stuck it out for another hour and only saw a couple of more Tails caught. So we ran up the backside and took a look at several likely spots. We continued on to Farnsworth Bank, hoping for more Yellowtail. The bank was loaded with red crabs and we released a few rockfish.
We moved inside east and passed the Pursuit, which had a few hook ups. We set up a drift and were rewarded with numerous small Yellowtail. Jamie was fishing the bottom and hooked a heavier fish that did not put up much of a fight. Oh boy a 12+ pound Halibut:
As we were drifting into the island, we had to make a move back outside. The small Yellowtail were loving the squid. They bit fly line, small slider sinkers and dropper Loops on the bottom. We kept a dozen, and released well more than a dozen. We kept hoping for a ghost or more Halibut. Then Captain Jeff caught this Halibut:
We released one more Halibut, barely legal and more small Tails. It was 3pm and the winds came up. It was time to call it a day. The ride home was a bit gnarly, with over 20 knot winds and washing machine seas.
Thanks so much for the fun day Jeff, we missed on the targeted species, but what else is new for Ghosts. We did not hear of anyone getting them. Jamie, great fishing with you again.
Hook up! Cory
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Only because I wasn't there. Looks like the Fishing made up for the rough night.
Originally Posted by webmaster
