Topics

16

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / Fishing is Hard

« on: May 14, 2018, 10:45:52 AM »

My schedule got all screwed up because of a big party we hosted at our house on Saturday. Got the kitchen pass for Sunday AM as a reward for good behavior

So we hit one of our favorite spots that has been a salad bar for the past month hoping for the best. Near shore kelp monsters made hand casting anything from shore pointless, so we yakked out some baits. It was a constant battle cleaning the kelp from the lines, but at least with the heavier weights it was fishable. Fished from sunup till 1:30pm. We got 1 decent Leo, and that was it.

Hand casting from shore in The OC has been a struggle for awhile now. It's totally hit or miss, mostly miss

What's frustrating is that the fish are there. I know guys are landing a nice variety of big fish, it's just that most are not from the beach.

At times like these, it helps to remember the #1 rule of fishing, don't let it interfere with your beer drinking, you're going to have a bad time

17

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / Screw the Charts

« on: May 10, 2018, 11:01:07 AM »

Reading all the posts and looking at all the pics of 7 gills, yellows, bsb, and big rays being caught had me going through tug drug withdrawal. It didn't help that she who must be obeyed is killing me getting the house ready for a huge first communion party for our godson on Saturday. A quick look at the calendar and my honeydo list told me it was last night or no fishing this week. A look at the charts said don't even bother

Screw the Charts

The surf and the salad have absolutely sucked for me lately, so I decided to hit the bay at 6:00pm. Even the bay had a bunch of green stuff in it, but at least it was fishable. Got lines in, one with double pinned squish and a serious hook, and a critter rod with cut squish. Didn't have much hope, so I settled in with a cold one and a smoke to enjoy watching the sun go down. Didn't take long before my critter rod goes off with something actually pulling line! A fish! Not huge, but a cute little 24" bat to take the edge off my tug drug jones. Thought oh well, at least I got out and beat the skunk. Got another bait out hoping for a bigger model.

Nothing bigger. But I did manage to put three more rays on the sand before calling it at 9:00pm

18

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / Sucky Saturday

« on: May 06, 2018, 06:49:03 AM »

Hit the sand at 1:00pm. Salad, salad and more salad. And wind. 12mph my butt, that was at least a 3-4 club wind that never stopped. We retreated to spot B, which was salad free. Unfortunately it was also fish free. And the wind was blowing even harder there. We stuck it out for five hours for the stripe. Oh well, nice day to be outside, drinking beer and looking at all the pics of the cool fish everybody else was catching

19

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / Saturday Sharkin

« on: April 28, 2018, 11:49:27 PM »

After being tortured for a couple of days with pics of grinners on the sand and texts about the bite being WFO while being desk bound, we got our Saturday shot. SoCal Bill and I hit a new AO at grey light, but everybody else overslept so we went in search of coffee and little chocolate donuts. Properly nourished, we met up with the others and got set up. I am omitting additional details to protect the AO and the identities of certain members of this motley crew. Surf and salad were too big for hand casts, so we got some long lines yakked out and settled in. It was mostly salad and kelp maintenance. We fished the incoming, and hoped things would quiet on the outgoing so we could hand cast. No go. Finally some major kelp balls started grabbing the lines and we had to reel them in. We wanted to do one more bait set, but the surf was not cooperating, so we called it. We get down to the last rod and wouldn't you know it, it's holding a grinner. We get that on the sand, but during hook removal we have a 13 stitch reminder about why we should all be using de-hookers and side cutters. It's not my war story, so I'll leave details to the man with the stitches if he cares to share them. I'll also add, same thing could, or more accurately will happen, to anyone of us. There wasn't really a mistake, sh!t just happened, and we've all been there and done that.

Be careful out there kids! Safety first!

Tail Ropes, De-Hookers and Side Cutters save stitches   

20

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / Great Until the Salad Bar Opened

« on: April 15, 2018, 09:17:31 AM »

Hit the sand at 9am Saturday. Got the long lines yakked out and tossed in the surf rods. Conditions were looking good, surf was cooperating, no salad, tide going out. Game plan was to set up a good chum slick while we waited for happy hour before the low at 3pm. The critters kept us busy on the surf rods while we soaked up some vitamin D and waited for something with some real teeth to pay us a visit. Then around 1:15pm the red stuff showed up and it was pretty much party over. Even with 8oz weights, it wasn't more than a couple of minutes before our lines were sideways with the surf rods. We tried a couple more casts, but it was no use. Then the long line reels started screaming, but not with fish. Not really sure what was going on, but all of us got snagged hauling in the long lines, which is very unusual for this spot. After cranking down the reels and trying to walk the line backwards to break them free, you really have to wonder what kind of force a fish has to have to bust off 100lb braid with a top shot of 100lb big game mono.

So that was it, we loaded up and headed home for some cold ones and naps by 2pm.

[insert pics of small leos, bats, sngf, etc]

21

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / Plan B

« on: April 09, 2018, 07:27:28 AM »

Everybody sending me pics of monster grinners and rays while I was desk bound all week was killing me. Saturday is my day, so I plotted out the spot and time and even went down to scout the area in the AM just to make sure it was going to be fishable that night. Perfect surf and not a sign of salad before noon, so I confirmed with everybody and loaded up all the big gear with dreams of pulling on a monster. Got to the beach with everybody else at 4PM and sh!t, kelp monsters everywhere! We scouted the whole beach, it just wasn't going to happen. So we decided to hit our normal plan B spot when my buddy says, hey, wanna try a spot I used to fish with my grandpa near here? Sure, what the heck. So we gave it a shot. I don't like fishing from the rocks, but if you have to, this spot was pretty chill for a plan B. Got a couple of chewed up mac heads and missing squish, but nothing stuck. We were running out of bait, so I tossed 3 squid in desperation. This little piggy turd roller nailed them on a 10/0 hook. With an attitude like that I couldn't turn him into fish tacos, so he was released to go make more little piggies for another day. Not exactly what I was hoping for, but at least we found a cool new plan B spot and avoided the stripe.

22

General Board / Got Stung By a Bee

« on: March 08, 2018, 06:16:22 PM »

Where's My Beer was playing his normal Friday afternoon round when he got stung by a bee. It started swelling up so he headed to the club house for some first aid. When he bumped into the head pro, he asked Dave what the problem was. Dave said, "I got stung by a bee between the first and second hole." The pro thought for a moment then said, "hmmmm, your stance is too wide."

 

23

Fishing Talk / Got Home Late

« on: March 07, 2018, 04:51:10 PM »

Got home late from a golf outing and caught hell from the wife. Told her it wasn't my fault. Got paired up with Where's My Beer in our foursome and he had a heart attack on number 12.

"Oh my God, that's horrible," she said.

I said, "it was brutal, we had to hit the ball, drag Dave, hit the ball, drag Dave..."

 

24

Fishing Talk / Lobster Bait

« on: March 05, 2018, 09:29:38 AM »

The day after Where's My Beer disappeared in a kayaking accident, his wife answered the door to find two grim-faced police officers.

"We're sorry, but we have some information about your husband," said one of the officers.

"Tell me! Did you find him?!" she asked.

The officers looked at each other. One said, "We have some bad news, some good news, and some really great news. Which would you like to hear first?"

Fearing the worst, she said, "Give me the bad news first." The officer said, "I'm sorry to tell you, but this morning we found your husband's body in the bay."

"Oh my God!" she exclaimed. Swallowing hard, she asked, "What could possibly be the good news?"

The officer continued, "When we pulled him up, he had 12 of the best looking spiny lobsters that you have ever seen clinging to him.

We haven't seen lobsters like that since the 1960's, and we feel you are entitled to a share in the catch."

Stunned, she asked, "If that's the good news, then what's the great news?"

The officer replied, "We're gonna pull him up again “tomorrow."

Best bait ever!

25

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / A Bat Ray. A Bat Ray. My Kingdom for a Bat Ray...

« on: March 02, 2018, 02:04:18 PM »

Hit the OC Batting cages last night to see if any monsters have shown up and to try to make some bait for Saturday night. Water was clear, tide was ripping and we got absolutely nothing. I mean, Nada. Zip. Zilch. Schnay. Not even critters on the critter rods. Somebody said a mac head showed some signs of crabs, I doubt it, more like some scratches from being pulled in and recasted a couple of times. We could see some baby halibuts chasing some fry a couple feet off shore, but that was it.

Oh well, we'll go after something on Saturday night. Hopefully the grunion run stirs up some grinners

26

Classifieds / Free to a good home

« on: February 19, 2018, 11:10:22 AM »

I've enjoyed owning this guy, but the costs for his mental medications are going through the roof with no end in sight.

He's yours free if you promise to take him out fishing and feed his ego every once in awhile

27

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / Friday and Saturday

« on: February 18, 2018, 10:27:55 AM »

With a massive week ahead, took the chance to punch out early on Friday and do some OC Bat Cave recon. Fished from 2 to 8 with perfect conditions. Steady small shark bite, but that was it. If the monsters are back there, they're not playing until way after dark. Getting more reports of 30-35" bats from the surf, but nothing big. Did get a report of a beach closure because of something big, but that beach is almost impossible to fish until well after dark.

So we went in search of 7 gills on Saturday. Can't say where, I'm sworn to secrecy as these are locals only hallowed fishing grounds for 7s. We didn't get a chance to really give it out best shot. Plan was to yak out some big baits, which we did. We got out a couple of tasty bonito heads and waited for the chum slick to do it's magic, but about an hour and a half in some idiot races into the shore in his boat. Have no idea what he was thinking, but there's no way you'd want to be going that speed that close to shore in this spot. sh!t, there were so many rocks I was even leery about fishing it. Of course bozo gets both of our lines. We each lost so much line the shark sticks were out, so we headed to another spot better suited for shore casting. The guy that knows what he's doing swears we got 7 gill bites. Looked like lobsters to me, but what do I know? Are 7 gills really that big of pussies that you have to finesse fish them?

Of course while we were busy feeding the lobsters, we get news that another something big was hooked in our own backyard. It spit the hook after a minute, so not really sure
exactly what it was. Figures, we go on a quest and they show up at home. Also got word that there are Pacu in a freshwater SoCal lake. Confidence level at 80%. Might have to dust off the fresh water gear and give those a shot just for the hell of it. Seems kinda weird having to use 135lb steel leader with trout/bass gear, but then I guess that's kind of the point.

Probably going to get more serious about scouting for rays next Saturday, so if anybody wants to hook up PM me

28

General Board / Please Help! San Diego Go Fund Me

« on: February 14, 2018, 01:35:49 PM »

Ok Tom, in the true spirit of sportsmanship that is Bat Fight, I wanted to do something that would give you and San Diego a fighting chance.

You're Welcome 

29

General Board / San Diego Bat Fight Team Bus

« on: February 13, 2018, 02:59:19 PM »

Ok guys, we don't want a repeat of last year.

Please observe the bus rules:

1. Don't eat the crayons.
2. Only lick the window with your name on it.
3. Don't pick the Styrofoam from your helmet, somebody will eat it.

 

30

Salt Water Shore Fishing Reports / Saturday in The OC 2-10

« on: February 11, 2018, 09:51:53 AM »

Planned to hit one spot at O'Dark thirty, but plans changed and we ended up hitting the sand at 3pm to a rising tide with no surf or salad to worry about. Yakked out the long lines and then threw some from shore. Got a couple of chances to hear the clickers go off on the long rods, but it was just ass biters that never reached the hooks. Got a couple of pull downs on the hand cast gear, but again nothing stuck. Great night to be on the water, but the drought continues

But we did get some reports we're going to have to investigate after the rains this week