Secret Lobster Report October 2012

     Went Lobster fishing for a weekend at  an undisclosed time, to a pair of uncharted islands in search of large marine insects,  The plan was to go to an ultra-secret spot at an island we'll just call Cantina  We intended to fish for bugs all night and then leave at dawn the next day for another island I'll nickname Roberto Clemente, because he is my favorite baseball player of all time. 

      Our secretive Skipper (let's just say he wouldn't be a starter in the NBA)  took us to a spot that had been producing a late night crawl.  The sky was clear and swimming with stars when we got to this enchanted isle after a pretty bumpy ride across the San Pablo Channel.  I (call me Ishmael) was third in command behind our experienced big game hunting Dentist (we'll just call him the Extractor).

     We tried to get live squid from the San Pedro and Long Beach guys, but everyone was fishing them commercial style because they were getting $700 per ton for the dead ones and they can keep ten times as many dead as alive.  Therefore, no one was selling to the few fishermen with low enough self-esteem to take it in the face for that nocturnal channel crossing.  We got a scoop of trout sized sardines instead.

      After we arrived we put out our hoops in 15 to 35 meters of water, baited with Laguna Tuna and Rushdie heads.  We then commenced to hammering our way through seemingly unlimited supplies of Kentucky Fried Chicken, Mountain Dew and extra hot Beef jerky.  The first few pulls were pretty sparse, with lots of ruby red crabs that tried to pinch us as we released them.  We got about 8 legals in the first 40 pulls, as well as twice that many shorts (and not by much).  Things started to heat up around midnight, as we worked out way into the second day of our three day bug hunt (multi day permit).

      We fished until about 4 am when we pulled into a mooring at Valhalla Cove, where we enjoyed a pleasant nap for about 45 minutes before going ashore for the Extractor to deliver a huge dose of internal emancipation at the facilities next to the green pier.  We also got some much needed coffee for the ride  over to Roberto Clemente Island.

     The ride proved to be pretty rough for a dawn patrol crossing, and we were grateful to get to the shelter of North by Northwest Harbor.  We kept chasing bird schools diving on breaking fish with our trophy sardines and surface irons, but all we caught was more lobster bait.  We tucked in for  some big calicos and sheephead along the front side.  It was our intention to fish south toward triangle cove, where we would lobster fish all night at this pristine location.  While working our way down, we noticed thousands of commercial traps, which could prove to be a serious hazard for working a string of rave lighted hoop buoys in the fatigued darkness. 

       When we got to the Sphynx, we took a look around the corner and saw nothing but deadly buoys, so we made the hard decision to run 60 miles back to the front side of Cantina, where we set up at our previous spot about 4 pm. We set out our hoops before dark, but were soon joined by the always oblivious divers who weaved their boats through our well lit buoy line, dispensing humans with flashlights and bags.  One of the boats had no lights, but that did not prevent him from parking his boat in the middle of our string (probably because it was a source of light) while his divers worked around our hoops.  We had several meager pulls - again with the ruby red crabs and a few shorts, punctuated by occasions for hope in the form of a legal or two. 

    We were getting pretty punchy and at one point the Extractor managed to board the drifting  dive masters as they bobbed by us.  He flung himself onto their deck and rolled inside their cabin to release a few KFC -powered farts that sounded like Klaxons.  Their crew was terrified and climbed, with their eyes watering, out onto the foredeck to escape his presence, as well as his presentation. He jumped back onto our boat after telling them they were free to go back to the mainland if they hurried. 

       When the derelict dive boat finally left before midnight, things started to happen for us.  The bugs crawled even later this time, while we consumed a six and a half foot sandwich that the Extractor purchased from a war surplus store for $2.75.  It was like the loaves and fishes all over again. 

     We rolled into San Pedro just before dawn and collapsed into a sleep that lasted a couple of hours - long enough to down a couple of red bulls and get the boat cleaned up.  We caught 38 legal bugs for 3 dudes, so it was close to limit fishing once again on Secret Skippers boat.

      I happened to be staying with my family of seven at the local Residence Inn in Dana Point, due to huge flood created by an unfortunately large species of feces left in a running commode by one of our sleep -over surfing house guests.  Because of that lack of housing, I said I would bring this bounty of the sea to my Mom and Dad's house for a big family feast.  I stopped off at the market to buy some steaks, where I perceived the discomfort of others at the fishy cache' eminating from my clothing.  I wiped my self down repeatedly with those sanitary moist towelettes that all of the stores have at the door and got out of there as quick as I could, with the intention of getting in a shower and sneaking a quick nap at our under construction home before heading over to extended Familyville. 

      We were in the middle of a substantial heat wave and I had been glad for the free air-conditioning at the Residence Inn (A great place to stay, by the way).  When I activated the garage door to our house, I was blown down by the incredible stench of our outside refrigerator, which was surrounded by all of our belongings in our garage.  Our house was in the custody of our contractors and the breaker for the garage got tripped by power tools.  The freezer, containing tuna, squid and salmon, was now in the bloom of a week long cooking  contest.  The warm liquifaction that I got to clean up made the lobster bait scent I was wearing seem like Chanel.  I got it all cleaned up and after a week of several bleachings, scrapings and gallons of high-powered cleaner, I finally got that fridge (for which I had just purchased an extended warranty) back into good enough condition for our contractor to load it into his truck and take it to the dump.

       We are back in our house now, though it is not done.  We have all new toilets, as befits our station in life.  We enjoyed a fabulous surf and turf dinner with all of the family, my folks and my sister Mary Lou, thanks to the efforts of Secret Skipper and the Extractor, so it worked out.  I even used my Iphone's camera feature to snap what I thought was a photo of my bride and two youngest posing with the bugs before i slaughtered them (the lobsters).  You can see from the attachment that I really know what I am doing when it comes to devices like I-phones.

 

    Well, next week I am off to Colorado to try and shoot something majestic and tasty, so wish me luck, or don't, if you give a shit about the beauty of nature.

Enjoy your pumpkin, because after all...

These are the Days

Halloween surf fishing report

I took Tommy, my 7 year old (David declined) down to go surf fishing yesterday morning and it was a very glorious day at Salt Creek Beach.  The crowds were thin enough so that we could get a late start at 8:30  and get to productive water ahead of most beach goers.  The lack of waves also contributed to getting a pretty swimmer-free zone with which to work.  The water was surprisingly clear, the incoming tide was just right, the wind was slightly offshore and the waves/seaweed were not a factor (often the kelp blowing back and forth in the surf makes it unfishable).

Tommy is getting pretty independent at surf fishing and can cast and retrieve, as well as catch sand crabs for bait as he fishes.    Yesterday, he did not need to stay right  next to me me as we worked back and forth along a stretch of beach.  He caught several large perch that he only needed help releasing.   At the beginning of summer Tommy could not cast and would only reel in if someone handed him a hooked up rod.  

                  It was a very remarkable day to actually get to see fish in the water.  Tommy was able to spot fish cruising the shallows and identify many of them.  We saw leopard sharks, corbina, perch and various rays.  Tommy claimed he saw a white seabass that was bigger than he was (I have never seen that, but they do cruise the beach and can get absolutely huge).  We saw the most corbina I have ever seen in one morning.  They come into water that is less than 6 inches deep and sometimes get their backs out of the water as they  coast in on the foam to feed on sand crabs before flashing out underneath incoming waves.

                  Anyway, we were catching and releasing many pretty good fish for little crowds that stopped to watch us reel in.  Folks are usually surprised when you catch fish right off the beach like that.  I handed off to Tommy what I thought was a big corbina (the prized surf fish above all others), but it turned out to be a shovel nosed shark that screamed off line and took him all over the place before we beached it for the crowd and heaved it back into the sea.

I managed to sight cast ahead of the largest corbina we saw that day (very line shy fish) and saw him disappear toward the cast, after which I got bit and ended up landing one of the biggest ones I have ever caught in my life.  It took close to ten minutes to bring it in as it made several runs and then would stop and frame itself in the lens of a forming wave, which made it look really big. I would like to think he was the one I was casting to.  They are really good to eat, although I have not kept one in twenty years. It was two feet long and we released it to the approval of onlookers. If our kitchen had been put back together, I might have brought it home.

             I did not bring my camera, as we were in the surf at times.  This is the main type of fishing we have done this year and we have had some real good days (as well as days when conditions made it impossible) but this is probably the best conditions we have fished in all year.  We left them biting in the sunshine at noon.

Happy Halloween.  We are still not sure what we will be.  Something with swords, I’ll bet.

These are the Days

Grapes of Wrath Family Vacation

I just got back from my Grapes of Wrath family road trip vacation.  2280 miles through the northern California forests with my bride and five kids in our  165,000 mile Ford Expedition.  That car ran like a champ with a full roof rack and hitch hauler. Visited friends, watched forest fires, went river rafting, wakeboarding, shooting, fishing, hiking…. It was hysterically fun, even when we were arguing on the sometimes long legs of our journey between stops.  We reinforced something we always knew about each other, which is that our family will fight about ANYTHING.

"Look, a squirrel!"

That's not a squirrel.  That's a chipmunk."

There is no such thing as a Chipmunk in California.  The ranger told us that."

"Yeah, those are called California ground squirrels."

"No they're not."

"Yes they are.  I shot two of them with my pellet gun at our last stop in Truckee."

"You asshole.  Why would you shoot a chipmunk?  How does shooting one make you in charge of what I call them?"

I didn't shoot a chipmunk.  I shot a California ground squirrel.  Why are you so stupid?""

"Hey, shut up!"

"No. You shut up."

"Mom!  Isaac said he shot a Chipmunk"

"Isaac, you did not shoot a chipmunk, did you?"

"They are ground squirrels…  and No, I did not shoot any.  I just said that cuz Sarah is bugging me."
"Hey, FUCK  YOU Isaac."

"No, Fuck YOU!"

"Get your shitty pillow off of me."

" Don't kick me. Your feet smell.  You should see a doctor about that."

"Mommy, the big kids are using bad words."

"Am I going to have to stop this car?"

You'll be just fine America, once we bring back the good old days

Lobster report for January 16, 2010

FISHING REPORT FOR JANUARY 16^th, 2010

     Larry, Dennis and I went to Catalina on Larry’s new Parker 28 on Saturday afternoon to try and hoop up some lobster before the storm came in.  It was a smooth ride out and we were at the island by the low tide at 4:22 pm.  We baited Promar Ambush, Eclipse, and Danielson nets and had them in for a soak by 5 pm before a 5:22 sunset on a moonless evening.  The standard 100-foot lines were all set in 75 to 90 feet and we had three long lines down between 100 and 150.  Water temperature was 59.8, the wind waves were down to nothing, and air temperature was warmer than we expected.

     We lost a weighted, small-float, deep-rigged Ambush to a combination of seal joyriding or tidal movement right off the bat. We spent some time in a futile  effort to snag the gear with a jig that broke off when we momentarily had it close to the boat in deep water beyond a steep shelf.  This adventure made for a long initial soak when we picked up the remaining set of nine after 7 pm.

     This was my first opportunity to use Larry’s auto-puller, which is the third generation of a design that Larry has been testing.  It is called the Bagram, after its inventor-builder.

    It consists of a pipe-framed arm which extends a suspended pulley through which you pull the line before feeding it around another shaft-mounted wheel and then looping back up to take in the line from the top of a powered fly-wheel.  The large sliding floats are rigged to leave slack in the counter-weighted tag end of the line.  By pulling the float back to the weighted end, you can feed that length of slack through the wheels before hitting the power switch.  This allows you to start the ascent without yanking around the mainline first and spooking the bugs.  At first, this notion about slack turned out to be more theoretical for me than intended, but I got better.  The swift tidal current defeated some of our program by pulling the float to the lead counterweights on the tag end of the line past the sliding float

      The heaviest movement of the tide hit about 6:30 pm, which was when it started actually getting dark.  We pulled 7 legals out of the first set as the tide began running hard.  We also pulled 30 shorts. Three of the hoops had 7 or more in them as they came over the side.  We sent the hoops right back down as soon as we got them emptied out, not realizing that the tide was now running much faster than when we had placed them at slack tide.

     We hit the set again when we noticed that several of the floats weren’t sailing correctly and seemed to be migrating.  Several of the hoops were not in contact with the bottom as the buoys drifted. The situation was compounded by seals grabbing the small float above the hoop.  They would drag the net out as they tried to get at the bait.  We had one bait cage get pulled off, but we had a half-size spare cage.  The upshot is that until we figured out the situation, we made a couple of sets that resulted in chasing down mostly empty nets during the big tide movement.

     Until high tide at 10:45 pm, we had a very slow four hours during which we pulled in one more legal and 20 more shorts.  Shortly after the high tide slack, we dropped a longer soaking set at 55 to 75 feet, with the two deep rigs in about 115 feet.  We started getting a few more to keep us stoked on making more drops until we made a couple of final sets that cashed in on a post midnight crawl.  We had 17 legals before we pulled up our last set after 2 am for two more.  We were too beat to hang out for any more sets and figured 19 was enough.  The size ranged from barely legal to four pounds.  We had six nice ones that all looked over three. We caught well over 50 shorts. There was no obvious advantage demonstrated in favor of  Eclipse, Ambush, or Danielson rigs on this trip.

     Larry’s twin 250 four strokers got us home in about 35 minutes on a calm and clear ride back to San Pedro.

     I got home at 5:30 am with six live lobsters (one short of a limit) in the ice chest.  I showered and fell into bed ten minutes later. When she woke me up at 7:30am, Wendy Jo suggested that I was a pussy for not toughing it out long enough to bag that seventh lobster, but we invited our neighbors over for surf and turf anyway.

     The kids always like to see the live ones, but Tommy and Davey grew concerned that we weren’t doing enough to protect their totally fearless G. I. Joes, who deployed onshore to bring guns and butter to these uncivilized invaders.

          Isaac gave them even more cause for alarm when he threatened to air drop a couple of the biggest roaches behind our lines.  The boys asked us to pull their guys.

              Fortunately, our brave fighting men were victorious.  They joined with us to celebrate their conquest and our consumption of the enemy.

       These are the days    

Catalina Halibut 2010

Fish Report for June 2010

     This report really starts with the last Saturday in May, when Kevin Sage and I took the Fish Finder out in the early morning to try and coax up some local white sea bass.  The weather forecast was for a 7 to 10 foot south swell and westerly winds building to 25 knots.  After we turned the corner to the west after loading up a scoop of really nice anchovies mixed with a few dines from Everingham’s in Dana, we found ourselves in offshore wind conditions that pushed us up toward Laguna. Big south sets rolled into the beach with the spray blowing back off the breakers as the surfers got stoked.  With the forecast for a big wind change, we decided to stay close and cheat toward the west, rather than heading down toward Cottons.

    We bounce-balled in 50 to 70 feet of 63 degree water outside the kelp at Dana Strand and Salt Creek Beaches for nada with squid and sardines. No one seemed to be doing any good and the current ran from stern to bow for the boats trying to anchor up.

     Eventually, the wind started to blow in the opposite direction and steadily gained force.  We were then able to anchor up with the stern into the kelp in about 50 feet of water in front of the Ritz.  We caught bass and mackerel deep in the kelp before I hung a legal halibut on a split-shotted anchovy on a wire hook tied into a 30 inch shot of 20 pound fluorocarbon over 30 pound spectra.  The fish went about 9 pounds and was a pleasant surprise on a pretty slow day. 

     We thought the tide might be turning for us when one of our whole squid on the bottom screamed line off the reel.  We had the perfect kelp-cutter rig and I felt like I was doing a great job of sawing it free, stalk by stalk, from where it had burrowed into the forest. As soon as I allowed myself to think that it might be the WSB we were targeting, or the mother of the halibut we had boated, it revealed itself as just a thirty-pound Batman that pulled like a tractor.  We gave it an honest effort past noon and got off the water as conditions deteriorated from the west.

    We all had halibut for dinner that night, as well as the following day, when the wind blew 30 out of the northwest and closed the ocean off to everybody.

     On Friday, June 4^th, I joined the Sage brothers, Kim and Kevin, along with their buddy Ed Sidelinger in San Diego.  We took the Sages 36 foot Egg Harbor, Fiji Girl, to fish the Southwestern Yacht Club halibut tournament the following day.   We had great conditions, a beautiful tank full of big, seasoned sardines from Everingham Brothers and 64 degree water as we headed out to South Coronado Island.  We caught some junk that night in clear water that was most noticeable for the complete absence of current.  It was easy to hold straight up and down with ½ and ounce of lead, with a bounce ball rig behaving like an anchor.  When the current changed (slightly), Ed hooked and landed a nice 8-10 pound halibut on light gear and we thought the bite was on.  It wasn’t.  That was the only one we got.  We spent the rest of the morning drifting different beaches at the islands and middle grounds before slow-trolling some mackerel where the yellows had been popping up and sinking out below the birds.  We got one short bite and that was it.

      When we got in for the weigh-in, it became clear the real action was off Imperial Beach in 40 feet of dirty water where it mingled with a red tide at the river mouth.  The ticket was fishing big ‘dines and mackerel just off the bottom.  Many guys had several legal halibut. The winner weighed 18 pounds.  There were even a couple of brute yellowtail (32 and 34 pounds) that bit the halibut rigs.  That bite went on for over a week and may still be happening as I type this.

       On June 10, Isaac and I joined Larry Marks on board his 28 foot Parker, Legal Limit, to head out in big seas and strong winds to fish Catalina.  Prepared for the worst, we had a pretty uneventful channel crossing against a westerly wind and swell.  After picking up a sparse 50-piece scoop of live squid (despite a 20 buck tip) from the Carnage off Avalon, we set up around 6 pm at the Palisades in about 80 feet of water over some pretty good marks.  There were a couple of light boats and small private boaters to the east of us in the 64 degree water.  As the evening wore on, the area between the Vees to the east and a bit to the west of us filled in with arriving sea bass fishermen.  The current ran uphill, but not that hard.  There was a lot of bait in the water as the squid boats lit up the island.  We had no boats inside of us.  The bite did not happen for any one we were aware of as we fished multiple rods with short flouro top shots over Spectra tied off to white jigs, lead-heads, sliders and dropper loops.  Isaac was able to hit the hay, while Larry and I fished hard all night, getting only pecking perch, mackerel and a bat-ray that got us excited for a few moments before giving us some tangles with which to busy ourselves as the darkness dragged on.

     At 4 am, the wind, which had been blowing out of the west in a traditional way, changed abruptly and started blowing us to the west.  All of the boats swung completely around.  The wind was noticeably colder. At about 4:30 am, I got slammed on my newly wrapped 8 ½ foot Pacific Bay graphite stick while bouncing a white Christy 2, which I had sweetened with two squid. The fish came to the boat after a few head-shakes and short runs.  Larry laid a perfect head shot with the gaff as we got a nice halibut over the rail and into the fish box about a minute before it went Berzerko and tried to break out of its fiberglass mausoleum.  The noise woke Isaac up, and he joined us on the deck. We thought maybe the tide and current might fire up the bite, but as gray light gave way to daytime, more boats fired up their motors and decided to look elsewhere. We did too.

     We worked our way up west, fishing various spot where we thought we might scare up a yellowtail.  The southeast wind picked up and the current really did not get going.  We threw every kind of bait that we were able to make – big sardines, Spanish mackerel, greenback mackerel and squid, as well as jigs and slugs, but it was slow going.  We slid on a bird pile outside of West Cove and I got stopped on a deep cranked Salas 6x Jr. I fired toward breaking bait.  It turned out to be a horse mackerel.

            We finished up the day catching calico bass on the front side, with the most productive spot being near the Red 2 buoy at the Isthmus.  By the end of the day, we were all pretty tired.  I was also pretty sick of fishing spectra with such a short topshot of mono.

          The ride back was kind of sloppy/lumpy as the wind blew harder and crossed up with the west swell. We were back by 4 pm on a trip that lasted about 24 hours.  I did not get the impression that others had much better luck than we did on Saturday.

          Here is a picture of the halibut.  It taped out at 37 inches and weighed 20.7 pounds on Larry’s digital scale. The green water has produced halibut on each trip so far this season. When I got in, I heard that the bluefin and albacore are starting to bite down south, so I am looking forward to spooling more mono onto my reels and heading for blue water. 


These are the Days

Rat shoot

Well, there has not been much to report.  Tuna fishing was a major bust, other than one successful albacore trip in July followed by half a dozen high mileage trips to skunkville in the offshore waters off San Diego for the remainder of the season. I did not get out for the quail opener and I have not made it out for any pheasant shooting at any of the local clubs, much to the dismay of our pointer, Victor the Magnificent.  We have not made it out for lobster season and the word is that the scene is getting more aggressive than fun at our favorite spots anyway.

     On Sunday, October 24th, we returned from a visit to Wendy's folks in Long Beach to our rain soaked residence.  We had recently experienced signs of rat activity on the roof.  We had set traps and purchased those electronic devices designed to make the rats leave the wall spaces where they have been making noises adjacent to Lizzy's bedroom near the roof connection that seemed to be a point of access.

     When we went to the side yard to take out the trash cans for the Monday pick up, Isaac noticed a rat near the roof gutter on that side of the house.

      We quickly sprung into action.  I went upstairs to remove our trusty .22 pellet guns from their place of locked storage and silently pushed past the  neighbor cub scout  and his father who appeared at our front door to solicit funds at this very moment of invasion.  Perhaps our armed rudeness startled him, but we left Wendy to deal with them in a more civilized fashion.

       Isaac and I cocked and loaded our single shot pest control devices and lined up simultaneous shots when the rat poked his head out.  Both shots made one sound as we counted down to achieve a double hit.

     I climbed up a ladder to remove the first course of roof tile when we heard another one scuttling along a barge rafter to the edge metal below the tile.  He stuck his head out and we lined up another quick shot that ended his curiosity.  We got one more in a 15 minute killing spree.

     We all hate rats, but usually catch them in traps, which is gratifying, but not nearly so cool as taking them down in real time with the family tools of the trade.  The little boys (Tommy and Davey) were  impressed with our marksmanship, the girls were horrified, but grateful, and the cub scout learned a bit of suburban game craft that may come in handy against a common enemy.

      We have recently gone into an experimentation with a vegan lifestyle, so our victims were not treated in the usual culinary fashion we apply to creatures we shoot, but it was a great day just the same.

Here is shot straight out of Fred MacMurrays suburban dream.  Find your fun where you can, because

These are the days