Topics

16

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / Bat encounters and 7 glimpses

« on: March 27, 2017, 04:53:33 PM »

Since it's been almost a week since anyone's posted a catch report I thought I'd put something up...

I Got out a few evenings over the past week to some LA & VC AOs...Earlier in the week hit a stretch of CVC sand for a couple hours and ended up putting 4 surf bats on the sand all in the mid-40" range, no pics, nothin special...except first report of VC bats since before SNBF I suppose.

Thursday 3/23- LA, in the Bu...Had a couple run and drops and a night endinger that left me with an empty spool and missing 400 yards of line (65lb Powerpro slick8 at that, not cheap) Got lazy and dumb and wandered a few hundred yards away throwing an LC and by the time I did the 300 yard dash back to my screaming rod and reel there was only a few seconds and the last few yards left for me to feel peel off and snap off at the arbor knot leaving me looking at an empty spool and cussing myself for the bonehead move. At least I had a spool left to be looking at, could of been alot worse if it had been another 30 seconds before I got back to my set-up, or no set-up as would have been the case.

Friday 3/24, back to VC, got a line in while the sun was still shining, wow! Hooked into this girl that gave me an epic battle having a mostly rocky shoreline to deal with as high tide closed in, and only a few sand patches to steer her up on to. Got some pics this day...
Yes, the tripod on the rocks, with my reel tethered with rope for security.


Yeah, OK, this is about lazy as it gets...kinda like the old drive in movies but better.

and Random bat porn shots of my VC 51"





Notice no wire leader....


And then as the sun sets... (I dont want to dwell so real quick here) BTW, this is the first time in years I wasn't using wire leader, and of course, you guessed it! I get another screaming hook-up and on the initial run I think, "Hmm, that's not that strong of an iniatial run and hmm, is that head shakes I'm feeling? Then a run and this time no doubt about it, those are tail thumps I feel." I gain line and then see a huge tail breach and slap the suds, and I'm thinkin, maybe I'll be OK if my circle hook got set just so in the corner of her jaws, before she sees the rocks and takes off parallel to them on a good 100 yard run and now I just know it's inevitable and I can't even get her turned before I feel the dreaded but expected dull pop and then slack, reel in to find rig intact except for the hook missing from about 2 inches of where it's eye was tied into thew 100lb mono leader...Argh! Didn't expect this VC AO to produce a 7...found out the hardway, it has the potential to.

Sunday 3/26...Back to an LA AO...good conditions, good tide, not a bump except from a critter or two all night.

Thanks for perusing...
JOE


       

17

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / It's not always that easy

« on: March 19, 2017, 10:51:42 AM »

Hit the VC for a couple nights and a day...Fri night, hit a new to me AO in CVC, ironically enough ended up putting 4 VC Bats on the sand up to 46". Next morning did some light rodding and put a couple short butts on the sand out of the trough. Saturday night, the 7 hole. Surprised I didn't bump into any familiar faces. Primo conditions except for a slack tide...Not a bump in 4 hours of soaking, I dunno. Be back soon
Joe

18

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / Sunday Night after the fight

« on: March 13, 2017, 10:14:33 AM »

Had a bad taste in my mouth after losing a 50+ bat in the skinny on Saturday...so headed out Sunday evening on a solo sesh to rid of it somehow. This 90" VC female Sevengill did the trick...on 1/2 a mack, head section....Horrible pics from my emergeny cell, but they're pics. She gave a good fight making 3 strong long runs. I think I'm a tail rope guy now, so much easier when sand-handing it solo, but you do lose that added thrill of dodging snapping jaws.
She hit at about 8 pm in the pitch blackness, just 15 minutes before the full moon rose and lit everything up. Conditions were primo, couple of hours before high tide, low surf, zero wind, no salad, comfortable air temp, water like glass. You can see the 13/0 Circle hook got her in the front center of the lower jaw, which is odd for circles...

19

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / G-Morning from L.A.'s B-Cave

« on: March 02, 2017, 10:58:34 AM »

Decided to see if the bats had come in to stay for a while at a goto LA spot I've hit a couple times over the past week.
Before I had to go into work for the day, got a line in at the LA Cave by greylight and had this 49"er on the sand before sunrise...They have at least started to come in this year earlier alot earlier than the past couple and barring adverse surf conditions, LA won't get shut out again this year....Come to think of it, I havn't even officially joined a team for SNBF this year yet....VC or LA hmmmm?
 Which one is going to beat SD by the most, that's what I'm thinking..



Let's get it on!

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Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / Saturday Night Big Pig

« on: December 11, 2016, 03:00:20 PM »

Hit a new AO Saturday evening I've been scoping out awhile, was just waiting for the surf and tide to be right to make it fish able. Arrived a bit after sunset and a bit before high tide. Threw a half a Mack out into an obvious trough with eddy causing structure to the immediate left. I thought to myself, if I hookup I better steer to the right quickly. After about 20 minutes my rod tip slowly dips and drag starts zinging, tripod holds like a champ, I grab up my rod, tighten down the drag a bit and do a 100 yard dash to the right while 200 yards of my 65 lb braid gets peeled off straight out. What an andreneline rush! Blistering initial run, literally, because I go to palm my spool a bit but can't because it's too hot to touch! Finally I get it to pause and gain some line back before it starts the classic bat parallel to shore sideways run. Fortunately it comes to the right where I'm already 100 yards or so ahead of it which gives me the angle to crank it into the skinny where we go back and forth a few times before I can get the solo hand holds and drag her up onto the sand...Didn't have my tape in my pocket so instead of going back to get it while she was sitting out of water I opted to just take a few pics against my rod butt and mark the distance, get her back in the water quick, and measure the distance marked against my rod later. It measured a conservative 54".What a BEAST. She really put my gear and rig to the test.

21

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / Looked good but no go

« on: December 06, 2016, 05:51:36 AM »

Hit one of the VC 7 holes Saturday night about last light and low tide. Conditions looked great, just a breeze and almost flat surf. Started out casting from about where my bait usually sits the tide was so low. Spent the next 2 or 3 hours without ever getting a bait to set for more than 5 minutes max. Looking at the conditions I would have never guessed it but the floating salad and current was out of hand. Before I could even get my rod set up in a holder ilI would have a leafy stringer wrapped where my line entered the water dragging everything to the south quickly.Even 8 oz sputniks weeny holding for more than a minute or two and my line would end up parallel to the shore within 10 or 15 minutes. Only reason I gave it more than an hour is I could tell the hook was staying clean of salad most of the time, I was just getting wrapped up high where line entered the water surface. Oh well, twisted my own arm to put up a lackluster skunked post but the long term surf forecast looks good and will give it another go soon...
JOE

22

Fishing Talk / Tidal movement

« on: December 02, 2016, 04:46:07 PM »

I was just perusing over some tide chart graphs and saw that the biggest movement this year between the high and low (8.5') is going to happen on the 13th & 14th of this month (a 7.0 high to a -1.5 low) & then again on January 11th & 12th the biggest swing in 2017 will happen (6.8 high to -1.6 low)
Any thoughts on how to use to an advantage, if any, these big tidal swings and all the water movement they're going to create, while the opportunity is upon us? (Assuming the waves and weather will be behaving)
Of course some structure surveillance during the minus as well as exposure of the big juicy clams of Tom's dreams... but how to fish it? what locations types? Bay and inlet mouths?
On a side note I can't believe it took me this many years to notice the "low low" is always preceeded by the "high high", and never the other way around. It looks like the "high high" is always preceeded by the "high low", never the "low low"....
Like I said, perusing....

All I know is it's butt ass cold and windy up here right now and that means one thing...deserted beaches. At least it's an offshore, I'm thinkin I need to bundle up and hit the sand this weekend
JOE

23

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / Just a PB Grassy by-catch

« on: October 26, 2016, 09:14:45 PM »

Coudn't make any fresh bait before the sunset. Had to settle for some jumbo market squid, their mackerel weren't even worthy of my hook.Good conditions, just a little salad, not bad, dark with no moon, nice calm quiet night on the sand but also in the water as well. I knew if it didn't happen by 8pm or so it probably wouldn't with the tide draining. Just logged a couple more hours till 10pm or so cuz I had nothin better to do.
This brute, as far as Grassies go, is all that I got to stick.

   

24

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / Hit'er quick & quit'er

« on: October 21, 2016, 12:20:11 AM »

Shot straight over the hill to the Bu after work to get an hour or so of casting in before dark with a new 12' steelhead rod I picked up last week rated 6lb - 10lb, 1/4oz - 5/8oz armed with a LC 110 flash minnow on the end of a 12# flouro leader and some 18# Gliss I picked up for pennys online from Cabela's closeout stock. Believe it or not this is the first time I've ever thrown a LC.  Picked up a nice sandy in the first few casts and then walked the shore knee deep to a stretch usually not accessible but the tide was low and surf tame as well this evening. Fan cast in between exposed large rocky structure ,which is a bit hairy knowing there's a $20 bill on the end of the line, but didn't see the point of casting scared. It felt fishy tight to the structure. After a dozen or so casts I felt the LC get bumped so I paused my retrieve and gave it a couple twitches...and Bam, he came back and nailed it. After some drag pull got em to slide up on the sand quickly as I could manage. Didn't have a tape with me so after some quick thinking I remembered a cigerette is 80mm long, just over 3". He went 8 cigarettes long, for sure over 22" LoL. I only keep 1 or 2 fish a year for tablefare and this would be one of those. Didn't make another cast and headed straight to my truck carrying the butt by a gill lock and was home with it within 15 minutes. Used a old phone to snap the sh!tty pics and filleted it up, 4 nice ones will be tomorrows dinner. i think i'll try these LC things again soon.     

25

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / Between a rock and hard place

« on: October 16, 2016, 02:42:14 PM »

Hit the closest beach in the early AM with the light rod and castmaster to make some bait for the evening sesh. Picked up 8 yellowfin croakers from 6" - 10" in a couple of hours.Home by 9am. Decided to try a new AO based on surf conditions and also have been wanting to try since I caught a video on you tube put up by a free diver that had soupies and sevengill in the vid. I had a good idea where he was diving at by glimpses of shoreline I could catch in the background.  Got a line in before last light after about a half mile trek in with dark black clouds approaching from the horizon quickly in a stead wind. Set up in the break trench that happened to be in between a large rock to the left about yds 200 offshore and another to the right about 100 yds out. I thought, well, hopefully a hook up will run to the left and I can put some brakes on before it's 200yards out.Within an hour got a screamer that picked up a de-finned and scaled  8" whole croaker, made a blistering 50yd initial run, of course to the right, around the rock, vibration, and pop  . Line came back all frayed and roughed up on the top shot, shock leader and rig donated to the cause. Fished for another few hours with a strong wind and mist in my face with out a solid hit. I know , I know, but it was the obvious deep trench where the waves wer'nt breaking...At least I still have a few left over croakers for next sesh.
JOE

26

Tackle Talk / $79- 12' 4-8oz Battallion Spinner Rod

« on: October 09, 2016, 01:07:21 PM »

expired

27

Fishing Talk / Sharing post I saw elsewhere of interest

« on: October 09, 2016, 12:44:50 AM »

Damn!, wish I wouldn't have read this post on another site's forum right before I was going to bed for the night.Got me a little pumped up, now it'll probably be an hour or two before I can fall asleep.
I DIDN'T AUTHOR THIS. IT WAS POSTED ON ANOTHER SITE'S FORUM BY AN MEMBER UNKNOWN TO ME...
So here it is for those who didn't see it already there.

"New postPosted: Sat Oct 08, 2016 7:54 pm    Post subject: Heads up for VC shark fisherman    Reply with quote
I went out to SUP surf at solimar today and I paddled out just beyond the break maybe 30-40 yards out and I hear a lil splash, normally I don't care but the water was dead calm and Erie feeling. I look down and see a baby GWS or mako didn't get a good look but I did see his fin out of the water coming right to me a few feet behind my board. I pause and then continue to paddle and he's right on the tail of my board. I paddle In and he's cruising the shore back and forth up and Down fin out. It was pretty awesome. My wife saw a shark full breach maybe 100 yards out. And two ladies walking on the beach said they seen a few more fins out maybe 300 yards down the beach. The water was real sharky today. I waited 45mins or so and went back out didn't see anything back on the beach and he was back like he knew I was in the water. He stuck around for a long time. Go get'em. It was strange seeing them so close to shore fin out like in a movie. Oh btw this was around 2:30 when we got to the beach until about 6 ish

28

Fishing Accessories / I got your kickstand

« on: September 30, 2016, 09:42:43 AM »

I think I've found what Jim was referring to as a sand spike with a kickstand. It's made of aluminum so weighs less than 2 lbs, folds down to 40" to carry. Can hold 2 rods, be used just as a regular spike without the legs. extends up to 7 feet high and is fully adjustable as far as leg lengths and angles that it sits at. Can be used in the soft sand or on hard rock. It has a hook to hang a counterweight from under the center, like a bucket full of water or a sand bag  I'll be putting to the test on the sand this weekend and will post my feedback as to how it actually performs in battle conditions but....check it out.

This is it broken down

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Tackle Talk / Bait clips, proper pulley's and rotten bottom clips and IMOs

« on: September 14, 2016, 05:18:23 PM »

Time to tie up some more rigs, the package just arrived. I can't believe there isn't anyone in the States that sells any of these, I have only been able to find them in Australia, Italy or the U.K. ...If you order in a decent quantity the shipping cost isn't too bad if you find the right store that will combine items for a rate.....
Splash down bait clips ( For you guys that clip your bait down, these are much better then the imp clips or imp sheilds I think because they allow you to OTG, [off the ground cast] without releasing)

Proper pulleys (I didn't think these would be strong enough for big game but I accidentally hooked a 50in batray while using a pulley rig with one of these and it held, no problem, I was surprised, but I almost trust them now) [Ron!, remind me next time we bump into each other to give you a couple to try out on your pulley rigs]

 Rotten bottom clips (If you would rather lose just your sinker instead of your whole rig and shock leader when your lead gets hung up, these do usually work. They open up on splash down and release your sinker which is still tied to your end swivel eye with a short 6" - 12" length of mono that tests about 5 lbs lighter than your other weakest link, or point where you would snap off otherwise. To me it's worth sacrificing the 5 lbs less of breaking strain before I lose my sinker as opposed to losing the whole rig and shock leader if you do have to break off without a rotten bottom system)


Oh yea, also couldn't resist a good deal on this Ultegra 14000 (Not the 5500 you see everywhere) This is hard but not impossible to find in the States, not at the price I got it at. The 14000 has some serious line capacity (400 yards of 65lb braid, 330yds of 20 mono)
It wont be my main reel but will be a decent back up or secondary long rod reel at least. Time to decide what to spool this up with now...Besides, i don't think anyone could ever own to many reels or rods, right?

JOE
 

30

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / Troughs & Bars

« on: August 28, 2016, 01:10:04 PM »

Decided to give it a go during the daytime yesterday since the evening tide looked so dismal. I knew I was going to be up against the summertime Saturday beachfolk crowd situation most everywhere so it was going to take some doing to avoid that. Cast out from one roadside close spot first stop and got a SNGF , a -1, salad issues, and within an hour, here they started to come...the kids with boogie boards, the people with dogs letting them pee on my pole holder and get into my bait, the curious 300lb middle aged women passing by who stop & try to strike up conversation, etc.etc...I can't do this all day I said to myself, packed it up, and rolled down the highway with 15' & 13' rigged rods extending up over the cab of my truck...I thought of a spot that I knew was going to be a bitch to access, but with the help of my friend Google Earth mobile (cell battery drainge  ), scouted out a direct looking path in. Found a turnout on the highway in a small stretch without any "no parking" signs and decided to give it a go...Worst case, I know if can get to the mean high tide line and seaward, its public domain, by law.

The entry and approach-


Ah-oh, more signs...


Ahh I'm there....Set up shop here...

Didnt see one one person or one piece of salad the rest of the day

If I didn't know otherwise I would have thought I was in NorCal ,as even on this day of low surf, the swell, current and turbulance were very strong and just had that big feeling to it, that photos can't capture properly

This fool was anchored in the giant trough in his bahma bass boat, but he knew what he was doing, as I watched waves break out past him with a wall of whitewater approaching, lay back down into a swell again as they passed under him time and time again. I'm guessing this trough was 20' deep and 50yds across, just massive, with a huge sand bar on the far out side.
I found the trick here was not to use a sputnik and have your bait anchored but to use a 6oz flat and let the current and swell push it around until it would drift into and find a sweet spot by itself to rest in and would get picked up shortly there after.


Got some really big models of these after my cell phone battery died  5 for the day

and the bats here felt like they were supercharged or on steroids, imagine fighting bats in a big river, thats what it was like. Got 7 of these on the day ,all in the 40s except for a 53" brute on which was to be my last soak.

I know better from experience and should have had it well covered,but when I had to walk with the big bat down the beach 100yds or so, I look back and see a damn seagulls swoop down and pirate the last of my bait, I yell and wave my hands to chase them off, but too late, bags were empty, they gobbled down what squid and mack I had left >:
Was forced to call it quits before 6pm but all and all a great 10+ fish sesh considering it was all during midday as well. Got back to my truck which was still where I parked it without a ticket on the windsheild.Was home before it was dark, unheard of when I go fishing, so much so the GF came out in a panic wondering what went wrong.
Woke up this morning sore, sunburt and satisfied with still a little regret about the dying cell battery and thieved session ending bait but, it was a good fun day overall....
JOE