Sunday, January 17, 2010



I wanted to take one last shot at the surf before the storm of the century made it way to the beach. Picked up a few shrimp using my coupon (thanks again J for the link and your great site www.scsurffishing.com ) a few grubs and a couple pieces of Gulp sandworm. The surf was a bit less consistent today and even though it was big there were considerable flat periods. I knew that as the tide rose the swell would be a bit smaller and break near shore giving me a better chance of finding fish in the trough.

No biters seemed to jump on the hook right away but I knew by the shape of the beach that perch were not far away. Any time you see the beach with these peaks and valleys or points and bays you can be sure the perch are just offshore in the small rip tides that each one creates.

It wasn’t long and we had a nice bite on perch. Some came on the grub and Gulp!.

A few more on the shrimp

It was near 9:30am and I knew high tide wasn’t far behind (mainly because I had been soaked by a couple of waves!) There was a down coast drift that was carrying bait from a small sand bar into a nice trough. I had one shrimp left and cast it out. My bait hit the water and immediately drifted down stream into the trough. The line pulled tight and then ran offshore in a hurry—I was into something now…

We lost another spotfin croaker a bit later on my buddy’s last bait so we know that they are still there. It’s just the foot of rain and 15 foot surf that might slow us down—but who cares I’m going for it again anyway…

Next week we have some great tides but the heavy surf and rain will make fishing impossible. At times like these I work on my equipment, tie leaders and make plans for future fishing trips. Fish get hungry just like us--so when their food is hard to get they get really hungry. That means that if you're ready once these storms go past and things calm down a bit you can be sure to have some unbelievable fishing.
The perch bite up and down the entire California coast has been great this winter. It is sure to get better as the fish are now preparing to spawn. We are seeing quite a few pregnant females so it won't be long before the really big fish move in.

Have a great time fishing for these monsters and remember to let them go gently after catching so they can have another load of perch that we can all catch in the future...


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Sunday, January 10, 2010


I was super busy this week and didn’t have time to try for bait. I did have a few clams left so I stopped by Big Fish in Seal Beach and picked up a pack of ghost shrimp. I’ve been using the great coupon for SCsurffishing posters that can be found on the site. It gives us 15% off surf baits—and I can use the money!!

You can find it here:
Discussion: http://www.scsurffishing.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=44129&highlight=fish+bait+tackle+coupon

Coupon:
http://www.scsurffishing.com/scsurfcoupon1a.jpg

Anyway, I went down on Friday morning just before the big surf hit. The current was ripping, as expected, but I did manage to get a couple nice perch before leaving.

The next day I returned to try it again but the surf and the current were so strong I finally gave up. Check out the difference one day can make…
Here's a look at Friday (top) and Saturday (bottom)


Some good tides are moving back in this week. If the new storm, that’s supposedly on the way isn’t too big, we should have a great week of fishing. Good luck out there!!

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Saturday, January 2, 2010



Made my way down earlier in the week to gather the usual characters for bait. Super low tide helped open up some new areas that hadn’t been raided by the poachers.

I decided to try to fish the over/under—i.e. the last day of one year and the first day of the New Year. Went down to my local tackle shop and surrendered the cash to the state. Rolled down to the beach and found some pounding shore break and epic sand erosion. The astronomical tides made bait catching good and hopefully surf fishing would follow.

Started at one end of HB and found a good bite on walleye. But that was it, so I decided to move to a spot that has produced nicely over the past few weeks. Bait out—game on. Yellowfin croaker jumped all over the bait.

The outside trough was full of fish and produced a few 14”-22”spotfin that pulled drag and ran your heart up to full speed.

The highlight of the day happened when I was fighting a fish in through the shore pound. A wave picked up my fish and slammed it up the beach at my feet. The amazing thing--it was accompanied by another spotfin right next to it!!

Must have been the mom? This is the first time I’ve caught two fish on the same bait—ok so maybe it caught me!!

This upcoming week has some nice tides for both bait and fish catching. I’ve noticed that the fish are spread out along the coast. Fish a spot and walk until you find bites and thus the fish. The fish really seem to be in schools that are moving so once the bite stops move again and try to find them. Be sure to line your self up with a marker so that you can come back a bit later (to the spots you found bites) and try again. Also look for cormorants—they will always tell you where the fish are!!!

Hope everyone has a great New Year and a super surf fishing year to come…


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