Marlin Club Monday Fish Report   Marty Morris    7/30/01   7:00pm
San Diego Marlin Club - First Marlin of the year.  Congratulations to Ed Waldman, Caught on his new 29' Blackman, the Moonshine Too, at the Rockpile on his way up from Ensenada. The fish weighed 119.5 pounds, caught on a Mean Joe Green Zuker Zipper...   landed in 25 minutes on 20 pound test....   Dave Verdugo was the closest picking 8/1 for the first Marlin Club Marlin ...

Ed Waldman will always remember the first whopper to hit the deck of his sparkling new boat, the Moonshine Too.

Waldman checked into Point Loma just before dusk last night with the first marlin of the season for a San Diego Marlin Club member. Waldman weighed in a 119.5-pound striped marlin he caught at the Rockpile, below the Coronado Islands, 24.5 miles off Point Loma on a 158-degree heading.

The San Diegan not only caught the fish, but also gaffed it while his skipper, Garven Herring stayed at the wheel of the Moonshine Too, a custom 29-foot Blackman built locally by Don Blackman.

"I'm 73, and Garven is 82; yes, we're an experienced crew," Waldman said.

The marlin hit a Zuker's Mean Joe Green lure on 20-pound test line, and Waldman had it to the boat in a quick 25 minutes.

Waldman's old boat was the Sunshine Too, but he switched to Moonshine Too for a reason. His construction material business is Sunshine Supply, and all his previous three boats, all named Sunshine Too, were tan in color. But this boat is gray, thus Moonshine Too.

A Marlin Club member since 1978, Waldman said this is the first time he weighed in the club's first marlin of the season. "I've tried many, many times before," Waldman said.

Dave Verdugo, back for his third year as president of the Marlin Club, said Waldman's marlin is the fourth caught in Southern California waters this summer. Two others were caught and released, including one on the Dawn Patrol by San Diegan Kirk Mitchell last Thursday, and another was kept and weighed in at Avalon. None of those fish was caught by Marlin Club members.

Off to the secret spotted bass spot and first two drifts hook a few nice ones, so set the anchor. Serious spotties, every few minutes for the next couple hours. All fish legal. Mixed in short halibut. Courtney becomes the halibut princess, because every drop she brings up a short. Erin becomes the bass queen, because she catches the biggest spotties and then a nice 18" juvenile white sea bass. After a while, the bass slow down and we get a lot of short strikes which look like halibut. I tell Michelle to let them take it for a good 10 count before setting the hook.

Now, taking three young girls is a serious commitment to being the ultimate deck hand. I’m baiting Erin’s hook when it gets quiet on the other side of the boat…..

Daddy…., DADDY, DADDEEEEEEE!!!! --- I look over my shoulder and Michelle is pinned against the rail. The fish is stripping line. She finally get’s control and we work on pumping it up. She gets walked around the boat a couple times and we finally get color. - Huge halibut. At least 36". Finally, get it up to the side and release it. Very nice fish. Michelle’s pooped and sits out fishing a while to recover after being crowned Halibut Queen. Great job!

Pick up another legal and a couple more shorts, then move for a few more bass and short bite halibut. All fish released in good health.

Great day on the water. As good as any wide open Albie bite. Watching them get so excited was wonderful. Now if I can just get them to bait their own hooks…..

Tight lines! 
Scott

Sunday SD Off Shore    GatoGordo   Allcoast     Jul-29-01, 09:12 PM (PST)
Hey Guys,  Here's the story... 
Grabbed a decent scoop of mixed baits at the barge and cleared the point at about 5:30 AM heading straight into a 1-2 foot mixed swell. I pointed it toward the Butterfly and ignored the bouncing. Swell wouldn't have been bad, but we had to run right into it to get to the fly. Anyway, about 12 miles short of the fly we stumble on a smaller kelp and throw a few baits. Nothing. Then after soaking baits for about 5 min, my buddy gets bit. From then on it was pretty much WFO for QUALITY Yellows ranging from 15 - almost 40 pounds. Most fish were a solid 20lbs. except for one small fry at 8 lbs. We drifted 1/2 mile off the kelp and brought the fish wish us. Also trolled up a couple albies in this area. Awesome.  We got a limit of Yellows in the boat by 9:30 and decided the Bfly sounded slow so we would run to the 421/390 area. About 5 miles short of the 421 we hit another decent paddy with breaking fish all around. More YT. We released a few of those and trolled the outside of the paddy hoping for a BFT. Then the rapala line goes nuts, doesn't sound like an albie or YT. I'm hoping for a BFT or BET. After a couple of minute fight, I land a 40lb Mako and quickly released him.

Nothing going on the 421, we were the only boat down that way so we packed it in and headed for the 371. Started trolling a few miles short of the bank for nada. Just as I was ready to pull the lines, Jigstrike. We land 2 nice big albies and decide to call it a day.    All told 140 miles, 40 gallons (I love my 4 strokes), 10 YT (many released), 6 Albies, 5 rat blue sharks and a little Mako (released).  Also, we saw jumping and boiling YFT and tried trolling and baiting with no luck. There is a ton of fish on the banks just waiting to REALLY bite. Should be a fun summer.  I'll try to post a pic of the big Yellow that my buddy Dave caught tomorrow. CYA,  GatoGordo

East Butterfly Sunday  TailChaser   Allcoast    Jul-29-01, 09:34 PM (PST)
Bloody decks and boiling chickens!   I'm exhausted. Short story today. East butterfly, 19 albacore, mostly jig fish. Three anglers. (yeah yeah...no need to open a debate - we were in the US legit -and all of the fish will be consumed by happy friends and family) Fish were everywhere, just keep trolling. Boilers in the afternoon for a couple bait fish. Water temp 67.3 to 67.4. Standard colors in 5" to 7" jetheads worked all day long. Seas sloppy but no real ground swell to contend with. Made 20 knots out - 35 knots on the way back.   May your rod bend with the weight of a thousand fishes.  

"Knot Now" tuna 7/28   SWAG     Allcoast     Jul-29-01, 11:38 AM (PST)
Ran way down South trying to connect on big Bluefin but we failed you OB1  The weather early was a little swell and alot of wind. The drift was very rolly-polly. Later in the day it was still windy but the swell subsided some. Water temps 66.5 to 67.5 before my temp guage went nuts and displayed 99.9 degrees. We did have some very good Albacore fishing and did get 2 Yellowfin around 18lbs. The Albacore were not as large as the Buttefly Albies but a nice grade of fish 15-20lbs. Thanks to "Happy Hooker" and "4Tuna" for sharing the information on the Bluefin. They had a very good day with some very nice Bluefin.   Please see the "XXXX-no spam-XXXX" for the location details. The purpose of that board is to keep the information about Bluefin from the seiners.   At first light we had a hook-up on 20lb ablbies and got one bait-fish but farmed some and they sunk out. We did not get into the action again until around noon. They came up chewing and it was very good fishing on the Albacore. We found a paddy early that yielded two yellowtail but the rest of the paddies were completely dry. Ran Northwest still looking for the Bluefin and got a good Zing on the Jigs that turned out to be Yellowfin. We got a double-jig strike and pulled in one troller for an Albacore. I tossed some bait and ZAP, good pull, but doing that characterisitic zig-zag that the yellowfin often do. We had left one hanging in the corner and at color those 2 decided to do a flag pole dance around the prop. The skipper started shouting some rather incoherent babble, something about a cluster**** in the corner. The crew thought the skipper had gone insane and in fact he had - for a moment. The skipper proceeded to unravel the prop like a mintstrel playing the fiddle. A few moments later and two fat yellowfin are flopping on the deck.   Total score: 15 Albies, 2 yellowfin and 2 yellowtail

Saturday......More Albies..     Smelt_one   Allcoast   Jul-28-01, 10:36 PM (PST)
Quick report here.....a little tired. Went on a 225 heading and ended up going 50 nm. Spoted breaking fish (tuna) at 15 nm, 20nm, 25nm, 30nm, 35nm, 40nm, 45nm, 49nm. Well maybe exaggerating a little, but not much. Caught plenty of albies, but no yft or bft. We just lost so many on the bait, I can't remember if we even boated a bait tuna. Most on jigs, and many bait fish farmed. Best spot was 42nm@225 approx.
http://www.momentoffame.com/snapshot.html?id=7985
Good night now!   Chris

BFT     SeaShepard     Allcoast      Jul-29-01, 01:48 AM (PST)
Landed 5 BFT from 30 to 40 pounds all on bait and farmed 4 (Rookies) at 31.37/117.37 These numbers are just south of the doble 220. We also landed 3 albie on the jigs from 15 to 20 pounds. Quick note If we would of had more bait we would have put more BFT on the boat they were just going on a chew for the dines. Sorry for the short report but going out again tomorrow and need to get some sleep. Last but not least a big thanks to Pat on the "Got Bait" for calling us in on the epic BFT bite. Tight Lines Jason

Friday/Sat     divedemo    Allcoast     Jul-28-01, 07:29 PM (PST)
Was going to head down to the upper 500 and heard the Butterfly was going off so we went out there on Friday. Not wide open for us but lots of fish out in the area of 32.22/118.03. Sleepy time on the boat friday nite and get underway at 0100 on Sat. Allready a line at the bait barge, not a good sign. Headed out to those same numbers and it was a steady pick of albies to 40lbs most of the day. I was going to head out again on Sunday but decided I needed some rest and my GPS quit working on the way in as well. I am sure the fish will be out there again. Seas where a little bumpy out there today but very fishable. Keep it reel.

Butterfly-302      SeaDancer      Allcoast     Jul-28-01, 04:02 PM (PST)
Short Report:  45 miles from Pt Loma: Albies, yellowfin tuna, yellowtail, bluefin tuna in area of East Butterfly.
Detail Report: Thanks to other Allcoasters for their reports, which always makes it easier to at least where to start and where to avoid, since I don't get out more often than every couple of weeks or so. Also, Bites On.com and Terrafin charts for good data. Craig and Ed fished Friday on the Sea Dancer, 26' Sea Ray. Launched Shelter Island about 4am. Bait receiver had only sardines, no anchovies (they ran-out 15 minutes before we got there). Ocean flat calm, no wind, warm, no humidity. Overcast all day, which was nice. Last trip was Victory at Sea, so this was a nice change. Ran out to the area about 5 miles above the 302 to start, worked to the east butterfly area. Scratched-out a few albies from about 6:30 until 12:30, trolling. Stopped on a few paddies - got nothing. Also worked a few porpoise schools for YFT - got none. Saw quite a few small yellowfin tuna schools popping-up that would go down as soon as we got close. Would not hit any feathers. We heard of other boaters getting them to hit on small, stainless steel/chrome type rapalas. Anchovies would probably work also, especially if you had enough to brail and bring them back up.  Albies became wide open from about 1pm and on. We did not get any on sardines, only jigs. Best for us were Loose Cannon mini jigs, also black/purple Zukers (regular-size) and Zucchini Zukers(regular size). Ended up with 15+ albies, from 20-30lbs. Lost one albie at the boat between 40-45 lbs. Heard of others over 40lbs from other boaters.  Heard radio reports of others in the area were getting bluefin tuna to 50lbs, yellowtail to 25lbs, and yellowfin tuna to 35lbs. The yellowfin tuna that we say jumping and boiling only looked like 10lbs or so. Yellowtail were caught on the paddies. Also heard of one dorado, but not sure where.  The best fishing (albies, BFT) was within a 1/2 mile radius. About 10 boats or so were working the area. There were no party boat in the area and a couple of six-packs. Mostly just private boaters/skiffs.  At one point, all boats around us were hooked up at the same time. About half a dozen boats were drifting with live bait, and getting hooked up also.  Started cleaning fish on the way in, and we were still catching jig fish when we decided to stop and head-in, at 30 miles. Flat seas and able to run in at warp speed.   Closest fish were caught at 30 miles off the point, approximately 240 degree heading.  
More Specific Details: 
Center of 1/2 mile radius of wide open fishing:   32.20N /118.00W   We did best in the afternoon. Not sure how this area was at first light and through noon since we were somewhere else, but not too far away.      Craig Gilbert    Sea Dancer    HB

BFT    me         Allcoast     Jul-28-01, 08:34 PM (PST)
Just said no to the 'fly crowds and went towards the double 220 for an epic stop on BFT off a tiny little kelp. Three rookie anglers aboard the "got bait," along with me and my GF managed to get into a three hour stop on the 30-45 BFT (we actually used a scale), plus a few albies to 30 pounds and a 22 pound yellow. Drifted 1.7 nautical miles. Got ten BFT, lost count of the ones we lost. I probably hooked fifteen, and handed them to my guests, who weren't really ready to pull on these fish on 25 pound. The BFT stayed with the boat the entire time, boiling and splashing around. Passed of the spot to Sea Shepard, and watched him get four or so. He probably had more later. I'm sure he'll report. Funky chop in the morning backed off as the day wore on!   Lots of extra mileage and fuel, but the quality of the fish couldn't be beat, and no aggravation from the weekend crowd.  31 37   -    117 37

Mex Limit for two on Friday    geofish     Allcoast   Jul-28-01, 10:06 AM (PST)
Left MB at 3:30 with nice Chovies, no dines. Arrived at 302 at graylight and set the dark feathers, trolled to 230, headed SW and got a double (albies - both purple/black zukers), then landed 3 baitfish (farmed one). Last one a 23pound albie on 12 pound test (corsair reel on a bass stick). Fun, but a lot of work. Saw dodos, but no takers. Headed for the 371, got another double and 3 more on bait. All this by 9am. Felt good, saw breaking Yellowfin between 230 and 371, I never saw YF leaping out of the water like dolphins, amazing....really gets the heart pumping......no cigar.....tried everything but the kitchen sink....  Trolled all morning trying to land the first YF of the year. Started patty hopping, few and far between....Found one yellowtail, landed one and lost two......  Headed for the barn....  Numbers of two jigstops:    32.21.047/117.42.223 &  32.19.433/117.42.603  From the sounds of it, we got lucky. tightlines, geo-fish  

Butterfly friday     Rhandfield   Allcoast   Jul-28-01, 09:57 PM (PST)  
Sorry for the late post... I hear that it was was WFO again on Sat. North east of the east Butterfly. Tons of fish. Great size....all 25 plus...and a 34lb yellowtail and a 31 lb bluefin. All the albies you want and plenty of other stuff mixed in. Digital camera took a S*#& but I will have film done in a few days and I will post. Plain cedar plug took the bluefin and the albies were biting on everything. They chewed the sardines but not as well as I heard the guys with anchovies.  Go Get em! 
Total:  7 Albies ( over 80 lbs of meat when dressed)  3 Yellowtail (one 34 pounder)  1 31 lb bluefin. Rick "Sniper"

You guys don't wanna hear this report 27th July 2001    kepdawg     Allcoast   Jul-27-01, 03:03 PM (PST)   
Fished the 302, 230, and all around for 5 paddys and 3 yellows and my buddy farmed one of them. Really fishy areas and some right kind of meter marks, just no jig fish on the troll. NO eye ball fish, and the radio sounded really dissapointing in the way of hookups. There were some eye ball fish closer to the afternoon out around the 230, and I watched a boat catch 2 dorado (nice grade of fish too) off a really small paddy north east of the 230 at about 5 miles. Don't pass up any paddys no matter how small. There was a mother of a paddy that some guys got 20 yellows off off of before the small blue sharks took over. Seems like every paddy had blue sharks on it.  Our last paddy 4 1/2 miles from the point we got our last yellow. Kind of seeing the transition from albie to yellow fin happening just like a few years ago. Lots of 68-70 degree water and those same jelly fish down 15-20' deep.  I saw the same sea monster today, it did not want to get close to the boat for a good I.D. but now I belive it was some kind of small sea turtle.   Anouther good sighn that a warm current will invade our area.  NO JIG STRIKES.   Hmmmmmmmmm?  The radio also said nothing at the 425, 302, 230 except one or two fish, and paddys being the mainstay. Some yellowfin on the porpose out past the nine, and some breezer tuna around the 230 in the afternoon. I'm 1010 or upper 500 bound tonight, maybe even the butterfly. Will report general info if I'm allowed to-----LOL-------- Good luck you local bank's guys this weekend and be kind to eachother. Most of all come home safe and post your report PLEASE. Kep

The 2nd Annual Dana Point Mako Madness Tournament was an outstanding event and very successful keeping each team vying for positions, points, whilst searching high and low for the tagged mako and the big one to claim the $ 50 000.00 cash reward for the released Mako. In addition to beautiful Ford Truck F150 from Sponsors Burch Ford which was on display tempting each team.

Saturday mornings Shotgun start went without a hitch and all 39 teams checking in for the start racing out to their secret spots. The beautiful 35ft Cabo Express was loaned by Cabo Yachts to the tournament as the official tournament boat filming this event. First Hook up came at 6.34 am and will receive a special reward of a beautiful signed original Mako artwork from Boyce Images, one of the tournament sponsors.

The tournament channel 71 was non stop from this point onward with teams calling in their hook ups and releases all day. Many tournament boats reported double and tripple hook ups. Then came the first boated fish for the day called in from Team West Marine also a huge sponsor approximately 66 inches (100 lbs) creating a buzz at the weigh station.

Leading Saturday for the most releases were Team Huh-Dad (9) from King Harbor, Team Line Dance (9) from Marina Del Rey and Team Joan Boat III (9) also from Marina Del Rey. The word soon got around Team West Marine were coming in to weigh their fish which weighed in at 110 lbs and rocketing them into first place with the extra 410 pts.

The story of the day left Team West Marine in first Place overall on points but they had not entered all the daily side pools and were kicking themselves for not. The success of the release format saw 147 released mako's and one landed fish on the first day keeping all very busy and the teams on edge with each hook up, proving that we can all go fish a tournament, have fun and release fish.

Leading for Saturday heading into Sunday were:

1st Team West Marine 410 pts
2nd Team Joan Boat III 400 pts
3rd Team Line Dance 360 pts

Sunday got off to a good start once again with the Cabo Yachts tournament boat in chase filming the whole start, hook up's and releases. Sunday at 6.30 am saw Happy Times from Marina Del Rey with the first hook up of the day and releasing the fish at 6.41am.

At 1.41pm Team Tamara called in and landed their fish at 1.48pm and were heading in with a large mako which was brought to the scales weighing 199.2 lbs pushing them into first place with 597 pts. A radio transmission was relayed that the Boat Goat II was coming in with a 600 lb fish and sent the whole dock a buzz with press, media and the crowd swelling in anticipation. The tournament Cabo raced out to meet them while they were heading in dragging the huge fish behind the 24ft Skipjack at 21 knots and filmed the fish been towed in. Everyone was rooting for them to see if they were going to make it in before the 6.00pm cut off time since they were +- 23 miles out after 5.00pm.

The huge mako was brought to the scales and took several ppl to hoist this massive fish out the water onto the docks. Now Dana Fuel owner John van Dixhorn had a challenge, could this fish actually be weighed in this size since it looked larger than the 600lbs and ropes and pulleys were adjusted accordingly to try and make it fit. The first attempts failed and the fish had to be lowered again and all adjustments made.

The huge mako was caught by Tom Brooks of Torrance with his two sons on board Toby 16 and Tyler 14 weighed in at 832.6 lbs, 125 inches in girth and 68 inches around, this had placed team Goat II well into first place and set to claim the Burch Ford F150 Truck.

Several teams filed protests which had to be reviewed and considered in the meantime the first 3 placed team Captains had to submit to lie detector tests which were conducted on site immediately by a leading independent Polygraph specialist. Whilst polygraphs were conducted all tournament participants enjoyed

Listening to the Blues- Jazz band " Limited Vision" which was fantastic while the Claim Jumper Restaurants served up an incredible BBQ Baby Back ribs, BBQ Chicken etc with their famous desserts.

The Claim Jumper staff and food were a highlight of the whole tournament with very hungry tired contestants waiting out the results. A big thanks to Claim Jumper and all our sponsors for making this event as successful as it was.

Sundays unofficial standings pending protests and polygraph results were

1st Place : Goat II 2539 pts
2nd Place : Joan Boat III 1120 pts
3rd Place : Line Dance 640 pts
4th Place : Tamara 637,6 pts
5th Place : Trolling For Skirts 600 pts
6th Place : Team West Marine 450 pts
7th Place : Happy Times 440 pts
8th Place : Lucky Devil 440 pts
9th Place : Fish n Chips 400 pts
10th Place : Corina Corina 360 pts
Team TNT 360 pts
Team Chapparal 360 pts
Team Breakwater 360 pts
Team Cheers 360 pts
Team Wine Cooler 360 pts
Team Fits The Bill 280 pts
Team Marimac 240 pts

The polygraph tests conducted were a tournament rule signed for and acknowledged by each and every Team Captain and once the results were in and all protests concluded the official results are as follows:

1st Place Team Line Dance Captain Russ Witman from Marina Del Rey
2nd Place Team Tamara Captain Ben Travis from Dana Point
3rd Place Team West Marine from Dana Point
4th Place Team Happy Times from Marina Del Rey

The winning Team Line Dance will be sent to the qualifying IGFA Rolex World Championship in Cabo San Lucas May 17th -19th 2002 to compete against all this years tournament winners from all IGFA qualifying events.

The success of Finnseeker's release format has resulted in sponsors already requesting to sponsor next years tourney which will be held the last weekend of July 2002 for the 3rd Mako Madness Tournament out of Dana Point Harbor. The sponsors made the tournament a success said tournament Director Chris Badsey and all the participants acknowledge this was the biggest Mako Tournament and most successful ever to be held out of Dana Point with the 2002 tournament slated to be even larger. Since both the Ford F150 Truck and the $50 000.00 tagged Mako were not claimed we are hoping to do this again next year. Proceeds from the tournament benefit Make a Wish Foundation which we hope to once again be supporting.

We have proven that we can all fish in tournaments and enjoy ourselves by releasing fish to conserve our fishery off our coastal waters said Chris Badsey and he hopes that all future tournaments would follow his

Lead in making their tournaments follow similar guidelines and formats. We had 239 released fish and only 3 weighed in at the scales which proves it works. We would like to thank David Holts of the Scripps

Institute for attending and accepting the reproductive organs for research donated by Mr.Tom Brooks and Mr.Keith Poe for making Shark Tags available to all participants.

Photo's Below
Tournament waiver copy
Tournament rules attached
Chris

7-26 albies, yt   sushiholic    Allcoast   Jul-27-01, 10:48 AM (PST)   
started out MB at 4:30...only chovies for bait. Got around 4 dines. Started at the 3o2, trolling west-south west got 5 single stops around 6 miles from the 302. 5 on a large natural cedar plug, one on a small black and purple feather. went to the 371 got two stops 3 miles short, one cedar plug, on the same feather. two unbuttoned, so we had 5 nice albies to 25 lbs in the box. trolled north towards the inside of the 302 for YFT, but found a nice paddie (3rd of the entire day) got 5 yellow tail to 20lb plus, farmed almost as many. had to head for the barn, but ran through fishy 68.7 water to get to mission bay. Weather really nice most of the day, but fairly choppy running in. covered a total of 113 miles on the GPS ~ 40 gallons.  All in all a great day. The fact that my trailer brake seized (again) on the way home, and my cummins did not feel it, well thats another story (talk about a flat spot )  -Sushiholic Fishing is so much better than working  

Upper 500 7/26      Bravo 6    Allcoast Jul-26-01, 09:32 PM (PST)  
Went to the upper 500 area. Started at 68 statute miles from Mission Bay went as far as 76 miles. By 8:30 a.m had two 30lb class yellowfin and about a dozen Albacore. Finished the day with 16 tuna and 7 yellowtail. Albies were 15 to 25 lbs. Could have fished more and caught more, but no sense getting too greedy. Tired, more later. All numbers were provided to me the night before off the 976 tuna members page.   Gary (Bravo 6) P.S. YFT ate the sardines, What a rush on 20lb test.

Thursday West of the 302    Jezebel Affordable Marine July 27, 2001 05:16 AM
My crew never showed up. Finally I decided to go it alone. Cleared MB Jetty without bait at 8am heding for the 230fa spot. Put the line in at the 224. In 56.5 degree water got a double on smaller albies 6 mi W of the 302. Boxed and figure 8ed the area for 2 hours and ended up with 10 albies up to 30 pounds. Trolled 1 mex flag and 1 mjg and 3 pb. All got bit well but half the fish came from the 6 fathom short lines.   Henry on the WorldCat, Jezebel.

 Thursday's Report       J.D.'s Big Game Tackle      
-317 held some Albacore this morning,
-4 1/3 miles west of the 302 looks good waters clear and blue, seas are nice, sun's just coming out.
-302 is 65.6 degrees, got to go, 11:27am
-Boats working around from the West end of Clemente Island found no fish, working to the southern end of Clemente for a couple of fish just South of China Point 6 miles, the better bite developed towards the Butterfly Bank or off the 118 line below the 43 Fathom Spot
-From what I heard there is a better bite (Albacore) on the Butterfly Bank
-13 miles outside the 302, Marlin just released, on a tuna feather! 11:30am
-We're at 32:38 / 117:58 we're picking at them, a jig strike every fifteen minutes. One's about 40lbs, funny we haven't goat one bait fish and all our strikes are on the short flat line. they're all around in about a four or five square mile area. 11:50am
-32:21/117:40 more albacore.
-Avalon bait barge lot of anchove good hook size, open all night, Newports Bait receiver open all night, anchovies, San Pedro/ Long Beach also has cured anchovies and sardines.
-62.8 degrees along the coastlind from Newport to Huntington Beach, spotty red tide, slow fishing so far this morning
-14 miles from Clemente Island down the ridge, 32:34;800/ 118:08;300 breaking schools of Bluefin , we've taken two on the fish traps, slow trolled a long ways back, one fish we caught is about 50 lbs. approx 8.6 miles from the 43, 240 degrees. (12:56pm)
-Very good fishing for Albacore on the Butterfly this morning
-32:23 /118:00 for a two hour stop! 1:04pm
-the 43 fathom spot was quiet this morning
-Beautiful weather out there today
-we been getting one about every 20 minutes were up to about 11 now, weathers nice.1:45pm
-The VHF radio reception was not that clear today,
-32:21/ 118:01 from 8 am on, we ended 25albacore, 5 bluefin and 2 yellowfin, in about a mile area, we left them biting!, We had a jig strike on a yellowfin that turned into a hour long bite on the albacore and ended up with a 40 bluefin. The CD 14 blue mackeral backed Rapala , it was the only thing we could get them trolling.'
-The front side of Catalina, leeward side and to the west was slow.
-66 albacore, 5 bluefin,1 yellowtail, all on rent rods, we lost a bunch of them,
-Sounds like good sand bass and baracuda fishing off San Onofre
-69.3 off the Avalon Bank, not much happening there either, a few birds, life. tide changes at 3:24 this afternoon we'll see what happens then.
-70 degrees on the 181
-16 miles south of the 43 we killed them, 32:22 / 118 .00 From 30 to 40lbs even Yelowfin, we ended up with 10 fish Green/ back feathers or the purple/ black Rapalas, meter marks, breaking fish. most of the fish came this morning then after noon it was a scratch

The 43     chugey Affordable Marine July 26, 2001 12:39 AM
43 was pretty slow today, nice break, no fish, found some yft 10 miles SW, but not very interested, hope this helps Chugey

RPT-7-24-Prowler Albies, BFT,YFT,YT   Visserc  Allcoast    Jul-25-01, 06:35 AM (PST)
Taking a day off from my intensive Job Search, went fishing on the Prowler Tuesday and slayed em, bunch of albies and I caught my first Bluefin of the year, 15lb fish. I know this is for PB'ers, but wanted to give my PB buds some info, just in case your going fishing soon and could find this helpful, as you have all been so terrific to me on this board. Fishing with 30 other folks the boat landed 110 albies to 40 lbs, 8 YT, 3BFT, and a YFT, 25lbs, we lost a 40lb yft at gaff. We were fishing SE of the 295 "31.35 117.13" about 70 miles from Point Loma, last stop was 62 miles for 12 fish at 3pm. Fish had moved east and in from Mon. from 80 miles, that's 18 miles in 2 days, so tommorrow could be different again. Our heading out was 172 degrees, back 354, since the fish moved east new heading for today would possibly be 165 for 62 miles, east and in north of the 295. We had Water temp 66, no breaks, deep purple, got to get out of the murky stuff north of the 295, temp was still 66 at 45 miles? We had 17 jig stops and everyone had bait fish, we put the jigs in at 5:50 am and didn't get all the rigs out before we were bit. All colors working today, I trolled twice and caught a fish each time on a Blue @ white jethead. Old reliable for me, my hot jig this year and last. The fish only wanted anchovies, mostly 20 lb test and a #1 or 2 hook. We had only big dines and were rationed on the chovies. Many fish on the slide, I could not get bit on the fishtrap, but several folks did catch some on traps. I stopped using it as everytime I through a chovie I was bit. Could of caught a lot more fish but couldn't chum as the bait barge from short on choves and had to ration them out. Chummed with dead and half dead bait. Crew was asking everyone to save their bait after using and put in a bucket for chumming, that's how bad it was. The dines were simply too big and the albies didn't want them. Until 8:30am we didn't go 5 minutes between stops, then it was 15-20 minutes. Fish bit all day, longest between stops probably 30 minutes. As always the crew and accomodations were outstanding on the Prowler and saved many fish from tangles, etc., they worked hard and furious. Fantastic day, overcast, 12-15 mile wind, some whitecaps, 3ft swell, very fishable. Hook up! Cory "tunaslam"

Un-official results:
1st Place : Goat II 2539 pts
2nd Place : Joan Boat III 1120 pts
3rd Place : Line Dance 640 pts
4th Place : Tamara 637 pts
5th Place : Trolling For Skirts 600 pts
6th Place : Team West Marine 450 pts
7th Place : Happy Times 440 pts
8th Place : Lucky Devil 440 pts
9th Place : Fish n Chips 400 pts
10th Place : Corina Corina 360
Chris

Pictures: Vicyory At Sea !!     JerseyBro  Allcoast     Jul-23-01, 08:23 PM (PST)
Don't forget this shot John.   http://www.momentoffame.com/snapshot?id=7910 Jersey Bro.   Jimbo

Go Baby Go!!

I think the Mrs. and I departed around 10 PM to get a little shut-eye before I had to be back on the dock at 5 the next morning to work the tournament. Sure was tough all weekend being on that Teal/Turquoise 35 foot CABO EXPRESS. The boat hauls A$$ and came out of the water a few times, and has to be the biggest puddle jumper I've ever been on. Anyway at 6 AM the 59 boats were sent-off in search of Makos, and were checked in just prior. Throughout the day you'd hear so-n-so boat say "hooked-up" then they'd get a confirm number, take a picture of the fish and then a picture of something else. This went on all-day. I'd guess 75+ Makos caught and released day-1 and 1 fish weighed-in by HBhardcore/Chris at, if I remember correctly it was 109 pounds. Just a hectic 1st-day trying to get everyone checked in at the FUEL DOCK, but the owner John did an outstanding job of coordinating and then allowed the tournament folks the use of his skiff to run some 2nd-day check-in packages to some boats in the harbor. By 6 PM everyone was in, but the boat that had caught and released the most Makos. They had 11 and heard they were DQ'd for not being back in by the 6 PM cut-off. OUCH, but rules are rules!

Saturday morning about 8 AM we decided to hit the Mello Bros. bait receiver, and much to my surprise I was called by my first name by the owners wife who happened to be working the receiver. I thought 'how did she know my first name?' Uhhhh must have been the hat that said FloMar on it. LOL! We grabbed a bunch of Sardines and Anchovies. I was pleasantly surprised to see a very good quality of Sardines and Anchovies loaded into both of the 35 CABO'S bait tanks. I was also given a "Thank You John" as we departed to do a little paddy-hopping. Later Saturday evening Sam Mellos wife and I would discuss and talk about STUFF. I found her very positive, and very easy to speak with. I also counted 24 individual receivers that they now have. That's a bunch IMO. If we could just keep those Party Boats from getting bait there would be plenty for US Private Boaters. LMAO!

We did a lot of filming of boats and fish being caught and released. We did a lot of driving around in that 35 CABO EXPRESS. I'll post some pictures tonight. One fine boat, but the 700K+ price tag is just a tad out of my league, just a little. The owner of the Fuel Dock (John) is a great guy, met him for the 1st time Saturday morning, and the rest of the guys working it were also pretty cool to us over the weekend. Allowing us to do whatever (well almost) and whenever (well almost). I did fish the dock briefly Sat/PM catching one short Butt, and farming 2 nice fish, well minus a trap rig though. LOL! Boy did Chris/Finnseeker let everyone know that FloMar farmed 2 nice Halibut from the dock. Thanks Chris! Yelled at Jimbo/JerseyBro on the water in the harbor and he came over and said hello to Chris and I. Next thing we knew he'd put HIS boat away and was down with us on the 35 CABO EXPRESS, and then was invited to go along the next day.

The Mrs. laid around the pool all-day at the hotel. She deserved it IMO! She also needed the rest. Later we'd head out for dinner and then back for a movie. Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeehahhhhh! A little shut-eye and then all over again on Sunday.

Sunday morning arrives. I slept in until 5 to make the dock by 5:30, extra 1/2-hour woohoo. The Mrs. again stays behind to bask in the Sun around the pool all-day.

Arrive at the boat with everyone there but me and being told 'Let's go now'. Out to the barber poles again for the count down start at 6 AM, a little filming of a few of the boats, and then back in to Mello Bros. for some bait and a shot at a few paddies. Saturday's 3 kelp paddies produced NADA, huge paddies, but nobody home. How nice to be sitting up in the 35 CABO EXPRESS tower and looking for paddies. Just felt like being on top of the world. Anyway we hit the receiver and were greeted with the same friendly smile from the owners wife as we'd been greeted with on Saturday. We grabbed some very nice quality Sardines AGAIN, but not before going back to the dock and grabbing MAKO tournament T-shirts for all the workers on the bait receiver, and then we headed straight towards the 277 to begin looking for paddies. We found a bunch. Jimbo and I were picked up once on separate paddies but never had a chance to swing. We saw 2 different big fins with Chris telling us they were Makos, and he baited one with no success. We also saw something go under the boat that was huge and White. I still don't know what it was, and we were later told that there had been a 20+ foot Great White Shark in the area. I know the camera man saw it too, and I'm not sure if he has it on film or not. It was FN HUGE! We ended up at San Clemente Island poking around briefly and found a motherlode of Kelp paddy a mile off the island. I was dragging a bait back to the boat when Chris screams "look at the Yellowtail", but they had lockjaw. We ran 2/3rds up the front and then angles back towards DP. I decided to take a nap and was in LaLaland when I'm almost thrown from the bed. Then again and figured that was Chris' way of saying time to get up. Personally I think an alarm clock would have worked just fine. LMAO!

More filming of boats and released fish on the way in. Seems like we couldn't go anywhere without seeing one of the tournament Black-Flags. Everyone on the water was having a good time, and being very courteous & professional IMO. A lot of boats relaying other tournament boats info back and forth to MAKO CONTROL tournament headquarters when people were out of range. Working together, it can be done. A lot to be said for that IMO. Once again I fished the dock with Jimbo/JerseyBro who'd thrown the lines out while I was up doing STUFF. I came back down, jumped on the boat, and one of the 2 rods is side-swiped. Of course I grabbed it, and a couple minutes later I was on the swim-step of the 35 CABO grabbing a nice 23 inch Halibut. We put it in the tank to get an accurate measurement, and then a few minutes later I released it after a few pictures were taken. Then I caught a nice WSB, not legal, but close. Then Jimbo would catch one. As I turnaround the owner of Claim Jumper is standing on the dock and we say hello. I walked him

up to meet Chris, and then we chatted about STUFF for a few.

We'd heard at least 2 fish that needed to be weighed-in, and then all of a sudden we hear "I have a 600+ pound fish to be weighed-in" and of course being the Black Belt Pessamist I am I thought 'yeah rite'. Then we hear the guy has it strapped to the boat and will be heading in. At 5 PM we decide to hop in the 35 CABO EXPRESS and go see for ourselves, and at about 7 miles out we spot the boat GOAT II going 23 knots with what appears to be a HUGE MAKO hog tied and roped to the stern. We get close enough and all couldn't believe it, but there it was. We all let out screams of joy and gave them a thumbs-up. Filming it them tow it in as we were side by side for 5 miles or so was really pretty neat. We then headed in as there was work to be done. As I got back to the dock there was a Mako waiting to be measured and weighed. I measured and weighed with the help of Frank (nice to meet you) and then hoisted it up. I believe it went 199 pounds. Then another was hoisted up, forget the weight, as I was watching the PIG Mako being lifted onto the dock. It took a bunch of guys and a couple tries but kerplunk there it was. The fish was measured at 10 feet 5 inches. The fish was hoisted by a bunch of folks, but it was leaning against the dock with the scale bouncing around 825 pounds. We decided to bring it down, make a few changes, and then hoist that PIG up there again. Just unbelievable specimen hanging there, and when I finally shouted out the weight the crowd that had gathered cheered and went nuts. 832.5 pounds. The band playing in the background, Claim Jumper cooking Chicken and Pork Ribs, and just a festive atmosphere developing. 

As the Shark hung there waiting for a representative from SCRIPPS in Sandy Eggo to arrive to measure the girth properly, and then cut it open, what looked like a small Sea Lion was making it's way back out the stomach. Originally as I examined the Shark it looked like a gunny sack, but IMO it was fur and a small Seal Lion that the Shark had eaten.

Then DINNER! Oh Boy. I never saw so much BBQ sauce on so many peoples faces in my entire life. IMO Claim Jumper caters events like this LIKE NOBODY ELSE CAN. What a spread of food!!!!! BBQ'd Pork ribs, BBQ'd Boneless Chicken Breasts, their private stash of Potato Salad, fresh Watermelon, and then those 3 inch thick Brownies to top it off for desert. Plenty for 2nds and 3rds too! Nobody that fished the tournament or was involved with the tournament was turned away from the food. Just loads of it. I'm eating Pork Ribs today for lunch! Let me also say the owner of Claim Jumper had his apron on, and was handing out food to all. Down and dirty with BBQ sauce in the trenches. You gotta Love it, I know I did. All the Claim Jumper staff was extremely friendly and went out of there way for whatever we needed.

Also the Burch Ford truck looks like it may have been won, not sure yet though. Minimum weight was 250+ for that to be done, but with a few other teams lodging a few protests I believe it's up in the air for the moment. Many thanks to Marty for his involvement once again, and Don for driving it down.

This was a 100% charity tournament with all proceeds going to the March of Dimes. Chris can fill in the fine points and details. Personally I had a blast with the film folks Alan and his wife Shiela, Jesse, Frank, Chris, Jude, Ivan, John, and many other tournament staff folks. My wife and I were put up for the weekend and enjoyed ourselves immensely. As I drove her back to house this morning

before heading into the office she said, "boy did I need that weekend!". I felt very satisfied at that point, even with her broken toe she was a trooper all weekend.

Chris thanks for allowing me to help and participate, good to see some friends, good to make a few new friends, and Chris relay to Jude that she did a great job IMO with this tournament.

2 hours and counting until I eat more of those Claim Jumper Pork Ribs. I CAN'T WAIT!

Thanks to all the sponsors, especially Claim Jumper. Thanks! I smell BBQ sauce.

I'm out.    John.

W of 302 & 43 report  Sea Hag     ALLCOAST       Jul-23-01, 08:38 AM (PST)
Fished with Gaffer Ron yesterday on his 20' Skipjack Paddy Patrol. This is the boat Formally Known as Lawfortuna. Last owned by Dennis Allen of AMS & his partner. Needless to say this little baby is one fine running machine. I met Ron here at Allcoast and he just so happens to live in the same area only about a mile away. Ron's a cool guy & needs to do more posting & less lurking. We started our day out by launching from Dana Shore's. I think? Forget the exact name. Only after we made sure both alarms were set on the truck and the trailer was cabled, chained, locked and nailed to the parking lot. Bummer that our society forces us to these extremes. Picked up bait about 0300 and were on our way. Reached the 302 around gray's light set our gigs & patterns and started trolling West to about 11 miles off the high spot. But no hookups so we trolled & trolled & trolled but nut-n-honey. Stopped off on a few paddies but nut-n. Now were starting to get that kinda it's going to be a Sushiholic type of day feeling. So we start working our way towards the 43 with about 15 other boaters all spread out in a huge pattern in hopes that someone will get bit. At about 10 miles off the 43 most of the boats have spread way out finally we come across a small school of breaking fish stop the boat almost on top of them and start to dump all our bait most of it is all dead anyway. Pinned on a Nice Sardine and let her fly. Looks like the fish have sunk out. A few minuets later I get picked up set the hook and I'm on. YEEEEEE HAAAAH! Then Ron gets picked up and he's on and we got a double going YEAH BABY! These fish feel like a nice grade and fight hard but we need these ones bad and are not about to loose them. Ron gets his to the boat first on 30lb. and gaffs it himself. Mine takes a little longer with 20lb. Ron gaffs it for me not a very clean shot for a guy that calls himself Gaffer Ron. But the fish is in the boat a couple of twin 30lbers. Nice. High fives and our day is saved. We work the area for awhile longer but it looks like the school is pretty much gone. So back on Troll all the way to the 43 for nut-n. Let’s wined them up were out of here. C-ya.     Ron, I had a great time thanks for the ride.

832.6, and lbs Mako on the Goat II     Keith Poe    ALLCOAST     Jul-22-01, 10:02 PM (PST)
Caught on NEW FISH ALL CHUM at the 172 56 NM run at 22 kts.  Gotta love them SkipJacks their Mako machines.  Congratulation Tom.  Keith

W of 302 & 43    ReelBruin      ALLCOAST       Jul-23-01, 12:46 PM (PST)   
That's how we did too - 3 big albies in 2 1/2 days Friday and Saturday all generally west/nw of the 302/224 area. We did see two big spots of breaking fish but couldn't get bit on those. We did box an area of breaking fish and get one to hit a fish trap! trolled way back, but it didn't stick. Ended up with 3 albies 25-35# (weighed them, biggest 35.8#) all caught on a Zuker's black and purple with a lime head in a daisy chain with black/purple mini-squid dealies (hoochies I think) ahead of it. Hoping to go next weekend, maybe gonna try for a pinnochio next time. We'll see. Josh Reel Bruin GO BRUINS!!! 

7/21 albies W of the 302     Johnny      ALLCOAST      Jul-23-01, 09:11 AM (PST)
Sorry for the late report. Left at midnight 7/20 headed out to the 302 from O'side. The red tide looks awesome at night; disturbances in the water make the plankton (or whatever the tide is made of) glow a phosphorescent blue. The wake from the boat glowed dorado blue for the first mile or two out of the harbor.  Almost collided in the middle of the night with a couple idiot yahoos who had programmed numbers into their autopilot and BOTH gone to sleep.

Got to the 302 area about 6 am, put jigs into the water and started to troll. Saw some jumpers right away and boxed the area for nothing. Could see 10-15 boats around us at any given time. Around 9 am we finally got a jig strike for a good 25 pounder, followed by another single jig strike for a 12 pounder. I soaked a dine down deep and got bit just as the troll fish was boated. Landed a nice 28 pounder after a few minutes, and we started to troll again. Had a short strike on one of the outriggers, then another short strike on the same lure, then a third strike that stayed on. I figured that if there were that many fish wanting that one lure, there must have been some volume to the school, so I threw the bait kind of heavy, and they came up really good. Never crashed the corner, but every bait in the water was a bite for 5 solid minutes. Might have lasted longer if I hadn't forgotten to keep chumming.

Never did get another jig strike after that melee at about 10 am. Trolled north inside the 43 into 68 degree water and decided to call it a day and run home at about 1 pm. Great day on the water, ended w/ 9 albies and 4 yellowtail off a paddy we stopped on in the morning...  

 J.D.'s Big Game Tackle       Saturday, July 21, 2001,
Lasted reports, 7:00 am, Albacore and Bluefin 6 miles 32:43/118:22. approx 6 miles off China Point, San Clemente Island, Another area outside of that held most of the sportboats out of SD, at 32:40/118;37, If I was going tomorrow I'd go to that spot off China , Prime time 9:30 - 10am , lots of bait fish taken, we got 41 fish, there must have been 75 to a hundred boats out there.
-67 DEGREE WATER AND i SAW TWO BIRDS,
-33/57 WE JUST HAD A SINGLE JIG STRIKE, 3 on bait, three or four boats stopped, we could have done better we lost a few, 8:22am
-Five minuets ago we had 5 fish hooked up, ended up with two, pretty nice weather it's backing down a bit, look better, 8:45
-Great color break, we've got several on board 32:24.0/ 118:13.091
-One swordfish baited off the 181 fathom spot, 10:50.am, high tide today 11:16am, yesterdays marlin that was seen was on the tide change also.
-Another marlins lost on a jig strike in the albacore grounds, 10:51am
-boat five jig strikes in the past mile, caught 13 fish were at 32: 20/ 118: 03 .6 1:30pm
-Solid jig strikes this morning from dawn till10 am, Some fish up to 46lbs! most of the fleet fished south of Clemente Island or even 12 off the head towards the 43
-We found a paddy with a dozen , no 20, no 50, no a hundred yellowtail, not one took a bait, lure, jig, live anchovy, sardine, mackeral nothing, they just weren't hungry!
-70 degrees on the 181. Very few kelp paddies found near the offshore banks,
-Broadbill Special, Fish for Broadbill Swordfish during a night time drift aboard our 46 sportfisher , Trips forming for next weekend, give us a call for booking, $200.00

Yellowfin On The 302   Affordable Marine    Date: Sat, 21 Jul 2001 23:03:04 EDT 
Hi Dennis, Just got home from cleaning the boat. Very tired. There was a big spot of Yellowfin Tuna piled up on the temperature break (67.3 rapidly down to 66.9) just outside the 302. Here are the numbers...32.26 - 117.34. Alot of fish breaking surface in a 2 mile radius around these numbers. The bad news is they were really finicky. We did see a couple get landed on the troll. We scratch up only one on a sardine in the middle of breaking fish. The one we landed went 30 pounds. Ass kicking fish compared to those albacore. Trolled south on the other side of the beak and didn't get any albacore until the water dropped to 66.3. Scratch bite at best for us (2 albies). We did manage three nice big yellowtail off a patty (all three we 30 pounds). All fish were taken within 30 miles of Point Loma. Slow day but nice variety and excellent quality. Hope this helps someone for Sunday.   CodFather     

fish report Sat. 7/21      Affordable Marine    Date: 21 Jul 2001 19:51:40 -0700 
We left San Diego bait reciever 12:00am. Headed towards 390. Got there at 4:00am and shut her down on some meter marks and got some sleep. Woke up and fired up the fish finder, there were fish stacked under the boat. Started to throw bait and got a good bite going on choves. Then a blue shark came and shut the bite down, eating our chum and baits. Started to troll and as soon as I put the jig in the water I got hooked up while still letting my line out. I couldn't get more than one line in the water without getting hooked up. What a wonderful problem! We ending getting albie limits by 8:30am. Little sloppy out there in the morning but the ride home was nice. Most fish were small,but we did get a 30 pounder. Tight lines and bloody decks, Deep Colour

BIG ALBIES . W. 302    FishLounge    ALLCOAST     Jul-21-01, 08:47 PM (PST)
Short: (9) 24-30# Albies with tons of meter marks west of the 302. Launch SI at 3:45 and the day didn't start good. Half way to the bait barge I notice my bait pump is not working. Tried fixing that in the dark with every other boat zooming by creating a wake. Not fun! Fixed bait pump. Vapor lock I think. Finally got some horse dines and left the bay. Go straight or turn right to the 43? Decided to run to the 302 because I had some buddies ahead of me going that way, Good choice. Reached the 302 a little after graylight. Metered fish everywhere. Put lines in and headed west and within 20 mins saw jumpers and a Single and one lost bait fish on 15#. 5 mins later saw more jumpers a another single with 2 bait fish. One being 29.8# Still metering tons of fish, another 15 mins and a double and one bait fish. All fish in the area were above 24# . Bite slowed but the fish finder was still lit. Traveled to reports at 10 miles west of 302. On the way picked paddies for 2 YT and 1 dodo (1lost dodo also) Then heard WFO bite 8 miles south. Ran to and pick up several more Albies. This grade was a little smaller

West of 302    Boiler Maker    ALLCOAST      Jul-21-01, 05:26 PM (PST)
Spent about 8 hours (grey light to 1300) trolling the area due west of the 302. All we caught was two nice 25 pound albies. Water temp was 68 at the 302 and gradually went down to about 65.5 at the 117.50 line. This is where I caught my first fish on a green and black feather. I wanted to work the area but the wife wanted to be back home by 1500. Had to start working back . At about the the 117.44 line there were several boats hooking up. I caught my second fish here on a daisy chain with a plain cedar plug at the end. Possibly one more short strike but that was it for me. The weather was nice and the seas were fairly calm for my bayrunner. Talked with Land Shark throughout the day and he had two fish on the boat somewhere south of the 43. I just know he's gonna report the bite went WFO in the afternoon.I heard the 390 was the place to be to catch small albies. A boat called Deep Colour limited out by 0800 in that area. Also heard some nice YFT were caught in various area. Story of the day seemed to be the fish were around (I saw several jumpers and boilers) but didn't want to bite. Most boats only scratched a few or got skunked in the 302 area.  Good Luck,  Jerry on the Boiler Maker   

7/21 hotspot       bry       ALLCOAST     Jul-21-01, 10:06 PM (PST)
The butterfly was very hot today. It was as many fish as you wanted. Hot colors were the Abortion With a brush tail. Blue/white and cedar plug. It took a while but by 10 am It was wide open. Good grade 20-35lbs albacore. Also caught a bluefin.  L8  bry

WFO Albies 7/19/01      noworries     ALLCOAST       Jul-19-01, 07:48 PM (PST)
Short version-10 fish-Chris will post #'s when he gets a chance.  Instead of fishing Friday I wound up fishing with Chris (Yachtsman) on his whaler23. I met him promptly at 2:45am, and realized I forgot my backpack full of all kinds of goodies. Oh well, we decide to go w/o it. So far my "start the tuna trip by doing something stupid" good luck tradition is in full effect. (last time on the tunacious I locked the keys in the head)  We pull up to the bait receiver and I wake up the bait guy(what great service!). We get one of the last of Newport's chovies, and head to the 43. It was too rough to sleep flying at 29 mph. We get down south and start trolling. We get about 5mi south of the 43 into some nice 64.3 degree water. Jigstrike--Chris's fish--nice one, 23lbs. We work the area for nada, and then wind up fishing a kelp paddy for nada. Start trolling south again and wham, jigstrike, I get this one, and Chris get's a bait fish. All fish over 20lbs.  One more fish and we might as well go home (since I have the 4 fish jinx). We hear somebody give some numbers that are about 8 mi away, saying it's wide open. We pull the lines and run to the numbers. We get close and see a small fleet trolling. We're putting out the spread and wham hookup! Another 20+lber, and we've got 4 fish in the box. Good #'s! I tried fishing the spro at this stop for nada.  It's getting late, we're far from home, and we're low on gas, so we start trolling away from the fleet towards home. WHAM the port rigger gets hit, and comes off. WHAM the starboard corner gets hit, comes off. WHAM the port corner gets hit, and we land fish 5. Woo hoo five fish, we broke the 4 fish curse!  So we reset the lures and keep trolling towards home. It's about noon. We are far from the fleet. We get a double. Every man for himself! This turns into an epic bait stop. I get my first pb bait fish, line breaks. I throw my 15lb setup out, wham hookup, snap line breaks. I tie another hook on and get another bait fish--it almost spools me on 25lb Big Game. After a long, grueling fight, it does the same thing my BET did on the Indian, rolls over and pops the hook. ARGH! I hook another fish, fight for a while, then get sawed off! ARGH! I keep losing fish!!!! Chris keeps throwing more in the boat. I end up landing one bait fish on Chris's rig. Blood everywhere, fish thumping, back hurting, there's no room in the fish hold for any more. We ended up doubling our fish from 5 to 10 at this stop. Shoulda been more, but hey, I'm still a newbie.  It was amazing seeing these big albies come jumping out of the water. They were milling around the boat, you'd throw a bait and watch them come up and take it!! Everyone was hollering on the radio during this time (around noon), it sounded like anybody in the area was seeing similar action!   No fish under 20lbs. Home by around 4pm.   So last year, I got my first albacore on Chris's boat. This year, I got my first WFO bait stop. What's on the agenda for next year? Maybe something over 50lbs? I'll be there!  I apologize if this is incoherant. I am barely awake as I type this. Slept during the red lights on the way home. Trying to stay awake long enuff to eat some albie grilled w/ ginger teriyaki!   Thanks Yachtsman!   No Worries

Numbers      Yachtsman        ALLCOAST    Jul-19-01, 08:38 PM (PST)  
First - I would like to say that it is a pleasure to fish with Jason, he is helpful, cleans the boat after stops, helps clean fish (and does a better job now than last year) and is just an overall pleasant guy to be around.  With that said, out first stop was at 118.01 32.34 - we were called in on some numbers - 117.49 32.32 and landed another. Saw alot of boats stopped here.  Our best stop - and there were a few knock downs before they stuck - was 117.46 32.36. It was a great stop, the fish hung around the boat forever on just a little chumming.  Weather was great. Will post a photo of Jason and the catch after I get some ZZZzzzzzzzz.  Yachtsman

7/18 @ 43 – Albies   entropyGain   ALLCOAST    Jul-18-01, 05:52 PM (PST)    
30# class albies @ 32.26.9 x 117.57.5 approx 4-5 miles south of the 43  Launched mission bay with my buddy Jean at 3:30, sardines and chovies, then out the channel by 4:00. Headed for 43, but called south by Money Pit who had found the herd. 29# and 23# albies on jigs. Saw others boiling but couldn’t get. One 25#+ came unbuttoned just before being gaffed. Pulled a yellow off a paddy. The Scripps Flip up research ship provided a landmark for all, and heard many reports both on the 43 and south, of fish being caught and boiling fish. Good place to start tomorrow. All reports were of quality fish in the 30# class. For you marlin nuts, saw two jumpers near 117.37 x 32.49 on the way back in. Couldn’t mess with them as it’s the wife’s birthday and I’m out fishing?! Had to get home to cook her some nice albies and make some hamachi sushi. Also saw a big whale, finback or blue(?) at the north end of the nine on the way in. Very large and very light colored, white underside. Good luck to the rest of the mid-week croud. Scott

Latest marlin dope for those out today or tomorrow, 65 degrees and off color on the Mackeral Bank, look towards the "Dome" off San Clemente Island, as tight as the shrimp gear!

Albacore
-We've got 8 on board, three different stops, using small purple and black jets, I don't know exactly where were at right now, approx, 10 miles west from the 302, these fish average 30lbs big fish. 8:45 am
-6 1/2 miles S/E of the 43
-32:32/ 117:58
-We've got one in the box, just got to the 43, couple pf boats stopped around us, we just got started, 10:15am
-A couple more nice sized 20/25lb White Sea bass came from 60 ft of water off the Huntington Power Plants, good sand bass fishing up the line off the Huntington Pier.
-It was choppy earlier this morning but it's nice now! 10:30
-"Breaking fish right in front of you!", "They're going off right now"
-Albacore report off the backside of Clemente, by 10:00am it was scratchy for most boats working west of Northwest Harbor, although one cattleboat had some 65 fish so far but many of the boats had only a handful
-Still selling Squid off the East end of Catalina Island, White Sea bass still being caught in the dark off Ship Rock tight to the beach .
-32/48, 32? 52 we just had a triple, lost another one, 12:25pm
-"They all over the place!! All you want, come and get em"!
-Over the last hour the fish has come up, maybe an hour after the change of tide, same thing yesterday and the day before.
-Another Swordfish was baited this afternoon, in the lee of Clemente Island, casting four times the fish it took a swipe at the second bait knocking in off the hook , ignoring the third and forth baits, "Got the blood rushing!" 1:20pm
-At little afternoon bump between the channels, some white cap, but good traveling
-260 degrees 15 off the West end of Clemente was where some of the San Diego cattleboats were fiishing
-we just got another 3 on board, yea, we've got about 20 so far, two different stops on the way in, we're still getting strikes now, 2:20pm

The Albie bite was wide open on large fish from 4 miles outside the 302 and out another 10 miles. A good bite was also reported around the 43. Today I fished the 267 and the water temp was 70.1 with big kelp paddies holding big dorado and big yellowtail, I have just got in and heading out again tomorrow morning. 

While fishing we had a big Mako knock down, big enough to break the pole holder, clip and take my brand new custom rod and brand new Shimano  Tiagra LRS 50 wide with it......if you catch it its mine I want my $ 1500.00 rod  reel and equipment back please. This was the first time it was ever out on the water, guess its doin a good sea trial now. Boy was I upset with my buddy for loosing it after telling him so many times I have seen this happen and .................

Oh well I am out again tomorrow getting those dodo's and yellows so short and sweet Oh the numbers : 33 17 and 117 49 are the dorado under the paddies.  Chris  

Jugged West of SCI 7/15    Whaler27      Jul-15-01, 11:15 PM (PST)
Wondering if I will ever get my boat finished this season, but thanks to my brother and cousin I have been able to fish on some great fishing machines this year. After what seemed like 20 hours preparation, with pulling the deck, running a new transducer, pin pointing a gas leak, etc., etc. we set out of Huntington Harbor on Gary Hughes's Whaler25 (my old boat) @ about 1:00am with two scoops of Chovies. A little lump for the ride over put us with the fleet on the backside of West SCI. A one degree break had us dropping back the jigs with the b/p rapala cd-14 going off before the pattern was set. This stop rolled on with a nice pick on the bait fish for a total of 12 on the deck. I got three bait fish on this stop with 30lb Seaguar flourocarbon leader & a #1 Gamagatzu hook.  We basically boxed the general area in for good pick and scratch fishing with a super grade of fish, most from 25-35 lbs., with two twins going @ 38 on the hand scale. Had to stay on top of things as the swell, wind, & waves keep us hopping. Stayed for the start of the afternoon bite where we finished up with another 10 fish bait stop @ 2:30 before heading for the barn. Ran home @ 24 knots, with the channel between Catalina & the mainland laying down real nice for us. Lost count after 35+ fish, throwing back anything under 25lbs.  

7/15 Albies   Patr     Jul-16-01, 09:31 AM (PST)  

My friend Bruce was out Sunday in his 32' custom aluminum "Bad Influence" They fished W/ the fleet west of SCI for 21 fish up to 33 lbs. Fish bit any color feather with 1 or 2 on bait after each jig strike..........Pat  

Clemente Albies 7/15   cookie Jul-15-01, 09:40 PM (PST)
Met oozacgt and Joefisherman at our house at 3:30 left got to bait barge at like 5, gave us great bait but almost too much bait (Nacho). Nice calm weather until we got just past the east end of Cat. then it just turned nasty, wasnt no wind chop or anything just big swells close together so slowed down after we thought about turning around but kept going. Calmed back down after about 4 miles past the east end of cat but not calm just medium. We were following the Capt. Hook but couldnt keep up, got to the west end at 9:00 put rods in 1/2 hour later "HOOK UP" a nice 36 pound albie but no bait fish, kept going for about an hour till we got to the fleet of boats (every overnighter you can think of plus yachts) then my dad gets excited and puts in his fly rod to troll with and boom soon as its out he gets hit nice 32 pound albie trolled around with all of the bigger boats for a while getting jig strikes, then started heading in and 1/2 hour later hook up 1 jig fish and 3 bait fish. Cleaned fish and headed in for a rough ride at 2:00. WE were definetly the smallest boat out there that i could see but ohh well we were there and catching fish. All in all great day of fishing with medium to rough seas with 9 albies from 22 to 36 pounds.  Dream Catcher  Josh Koch

Fishing        Affordable Marine         Sat, 14 Jul 2001 14:40:45 -0700
Hi Dennis, well here is what Andy and I did at the 371 this morning...we were home by 12....gotta love those short days...  Micah

Fishing 7/12/01      Affordable Marine         Fri, 13 Jul 2001 12:55:48 EDT
Dennis: We left the bait barge at 2:30 AM with a slight breeze. The trip to 32 04 117 21 was not bad arriving before greylight. Trolling for 2 hours in the area was non-productive although there was a large school of porpoise around us. The wind continued to pick up from the NW . We started trolling north and were called in by two boats in the area of 32 03 117 28. As we joined in we had a double troll hookup of small albies with no bait fish taken. One of the boats 200 yards away had a double jig strike so we ran large circles around them without success. After that there were no more fish caught in the area by any of the three boats. The water temp was about 66.5, dropping to 63.8 nearby. We returned north at about 9 knots in "Sloppy" seas.

Report, Avila Quick Run Down       Bellybuster      ALLCOAST   Jul-07-01, 10:28 PM (PST)
Very tired and a long story but wound up with 4 20lb fish today out of Avila with more than that farmed. Fished a bit too far South. We were 10 miles Northwest of the weather bouy. If your going look at the Terrafin map and try a bit further North than we did in the splotchy 62 degree water. Sounds like that's where the hot spot was today. Some were getting counts in the high 20s. Good quality in the upper 20lb range. Two other Allcoasters did better than we did with around 8 fish each I believe generally the same area we were in. Like I said, further North sounded much better!

Terrafin Map   http://www.terrafin.com/sstview/samples/freesocal.htm
Ken with Albie  http://www.momentoffame.com/snapshot.html?id=7589

Osborne Albies, 7/7-7/8      Over The Edge       ALLCOAST    Jul-08-01, 05:07 AM (PST)    
Left CIH at 3:00 pm on Friday with my son for an overnight stop at the SBI Landing. About mid-way down we heard Bill (WJW) talking to VA and checked in with him to find out that he was limping home from the Osborne to CIH with damaged running gear. We offered assistance and monitored his progress via VHF in case we had to intercept him. Fortunately, he made it back in to CIH OK. The SBI Landing was quiet with only a few boats laying over for the Osborne fishing.

We left SBI at around 6:00 a.m. for the more southern numbers (around 33 08 X 119 05) and started trolling in about 3-5 miles above that area. Immediate strike on a purple/black feather for a 27# that got the juices flowing early. Picked up another as we entered the area. Broke out the Coronas for an early celebration as Todd picked up his first ever tuna. There were quite a few boats in that area but spread out pretty well. We worked it for about 2 hours without another strike and the traffic was thinning out (for obvious reasons). We talked to Tom & Donna on Double Vision and found out that they were knockin' them dead (20 in the box) about 9 miles North of us. We went up there to find the bite slowing down but managed to pick up another one on blue/white as the sun tried to break through the cover. Just as the bite was shutting down at late morning, Todd picked up another and it came unbuttoned near boatside as it dove into the running gear. That was it for us but we did end up with 3 nice quality fish in the box. Back in the slip at CIH by about 2:00 after a smooth ride home. No complaints but next time I gotta pay more attention to the activity and temp breaks. We should have been further north from the start. We'll be back. Walt

sat 7/7 osborne albies     Jollyroj      ALLCOAST     Jul-07-01, 08:52 PM (PST) 
-quick report, I'm beat, but I owe you guys for all the info you gave me.
-Left king harbor at around 6:30 am, took about 30 min to get bait, bait was large anchovies, most of them survived.
-got out to the area around 9-9:30. Was aiming for the middle of the coordinates I've been collecting from the board, something around freddie's numbers or maybe a little more south, something like 33 08 x 119 06, I think.
-Drove past a bit of the fleet just short of that, but didn't want to stop. Sometimes suckers stop early just because another boat is stopped there taking a leak, you know? so we drove on. We should have stopped.
-Caught one around 10 on a mex flag. Heard from jim day around then and drove back NW toward the fleet we had seen, picked up a second on a bright daisy chain in the area jim was fishing. By then jim's boat had 8, I think. The good area was around 33 14 119 02, if I remember. Sorry. I wrote it all down but left it on the boat.
-First fish we got weighed 25 after it was bled, second was 15. Jim said his were bigger, all his were on daisy chains, and he had some good bait stops. Our fish had anchovies in their stomachs.
-Water was around 67.8 the whole time, never really saw any big breaks.
-Bite shut off for about everyone around 11, it seemed. Jim got one around 1, and that was it. Worked the area until 3, but no more luck.
-Water was flat. Amazing morning. Wind picked up a bit in the afternoon, but not much, just starting to whitecap when we left.
-Roger     23' Mako "Skunk" out of King Harbor

FRI-7/7-San Nic Fat Alberts      Whaler27     ALLCOAST      Jul-07-01, 07:00 PM (PST)       
-Short version as were still cleaning fish/boat/etc.
-Left Huntington Harbor @ 12:45, loaded up w/3 scoops of excellent choives.. 1st stop 3308.08 x 11902.45 trolling w/blue whales, grease water, green/black zuker for a 36lber.
-Moved up the line toward the outside of San Nicolas Island. Again trolling w/ Whales for a triple & eight bait fish all 25-35lbers.
-Moved up behind the Island for another triple & ten larger bait fish. Ended up w/ 32 fat boys, dumped a couple and straighten out a few lite wire mutu's. Huntington Harbor Albies, we'll go anywhere the fish are biting. More later, I smell like fish!!

Osborne area albies 7/7    cabofish        ALLCOAST    Jul-07-01, 10:27 PM (PST)    
Launched the "Okoboji" out of MRD this morning at about 4:30 and left for and area about 13 miles south of the Osborne. Bait was mostly good sized dines which looked great for a while. When we got out to the area, we realized about half of it was dead. Started trolling and got bit on the black/purple and then one on bait about an hour after we started trolling. Then 15 minutes later we get a single jig strike with no bait fish on a red/black. Troll some more for a double jig strike and one bait fish. The troll fish were on purple/black and red/black. Then before we can clear the dech off, we get another double on the troll and two on bait. Now we're into a quadruple hookup with four guys on board, major confusion, and mine by the way is on a 15# baitcasting setup which waklked me around the boat 5 times. We landed 3 fish off this stop and lost our only fish of the day. Jig strikes were on zuchinni and purple/black. Then about 15 minutes later, we get another double on the troll and one on bait. These were much bigger fish, all about 30 pounds or so. These troll fish were on zuchinni and black/red. We now decide at about 12:30 to stop fishing, and just eat some lunch while we drift. Well after getting bored of this, we just start to soak a couple of dines, and what do you know, we pick up another albie, with another one chasing him to the boat. Now we really have enough fish and stop fishing for sure and head in. Hot lures for the day were purple/black, red/black, and zuchinni. All bait fish were on sardines. All of the fish we caught ranged from 22 to 30 pounds. If you are heading out soon, what you might want to try to chum cut-up sardines very heavily on every stop which i fell helped us a lot. Our GPS coordinates were 33.00.44 and 119.01.30 and all of our fish were taken within a half mile of this spot. Overall, another great day of fishing with 13 quality albies and heading for home by 1.     David

7-7-01 Osborn albie's and #'s       yeswefish       ALLCOAST     Jul-07-01, 07:13 PM (PST)    
Fun day!!!   Went to the area several miles south of the Osborn from    Channel Isl. 55mi. on the gps. 33.16 x 119.02 trolled a box area around that. 7 fish total: 6 troll and 1 bait   headed home @ 11:30 and hit harbor @ 2:15 {super ride home.}   sm. fish 21 lbs and the big one 32 lbs   1st albie red decks for my boat so I'll be wearing a $h!t eating   grin for a few days.   Time to BBQ    Spencer G.  

San Nic Albies     jj         ALLCOAST     Jul-07-01, 07:57 PM (PST)    
Fished same numbers as everybody else. Can't miss all the boats. We ended up with 20 and quit by 11:00-11:30 or so and then cleaned fish. Released a few and farmed a few more. Nicer grade of fish. Weighed only one of the bigger fish and it was 29-30lbs.  Bite was kind of scratchy for us. Only had two good bait stops and they were just before we quit. One was stopped when a sealion ate my fish. Bummer. They were even eating the dead chum. Both these stops were away from the fleet btw.   In some areas there is lots of eel grass and junk in the water so check your lines often. Water was pretty calm especially in the lee of Nic. Fish were plugged with tiny squid, and what looked like anchovies along with larger ones.   First few troll fish were caught on rootbeer and a dark multi colored feather. Small p/b yozuri didnt' get bit but the larger blue/whitish color did. But interestingly enough only after a p/b cedar plug got bit first and the boat was taken out of gear. This happened twice and on the same side. Actually saw the fish come out of the water as it hit the yozuri.   Total distance traveled was 150 miles.

June 6 Upper 500     Bravo 6      ALLCOAST     Jul-07-01, 10:43 AM (PST)    
I'll make this short. Left Mission Bay around 12:30 am Friday. Had talked with Bernie (Divedemo) by cell on the way down to Diego. Bernie fished the day previous and had really whacked em' close to some numbers that the 976 tuna website said was holding fish. Plan was to start in the general area where Bernie had left off ( 3200 11730 ) although we over ran it a bit trying to find a good break. Also had talked to Jason (Sea Shepherd) several times by cell phone to outline our plans as we planned to buddy boat. Put the Jigs in about 53 miles from Mission Bay just before sun up. Sea shepherd was about 6 miles Northeast of us when we started. Before noon we had limits of albies (15) for the 3 of us, plus 2 yellows and 2 bonito. Bonito and one of the yellowtail came off a paddy that Jason called us in on. Decided to run inside to the warmer water to look for exotics as we didn't want to get caught exceeding Mex. limits on the Albies. About 20 miles West of the Coral we saw hundreds of breaking YFT (football size). Tried to set up ahead of them but they were real boat shy. Just couldn't get them to go. What a show though, watching those tuna jump out of the water. A few minutes later we came up on a sleeper. Didn't have any mackeral so started switching all the tuna jets to Marlin lures. Kept my eyes on that fish while my crew was re-rigging, when suddenly he woke up, thrashed around a bit and then came all the way out of the water. ( estimated 150 lb. Striper ) Boxed the area for 30 minutes. Lots of life, 71.5 degree water but couldn't get that marlin to come up. Decided to run to the Coral for more ice. (Started with 80 lbs. but it wasn't enough) Grabbed some ice got some tacos and started towards the upper finger. Finally heard on the radio that Sea Shepherd was finally getting some better luck up north. Let me know how you finished up Jason, Sounded like you were nearing limits after a slow start. Picked up a couple a big barracuda and the biggest Calico I've ever seen. Great day. Bravo 6 (Gary)

7/7/01 on the "43"   ReelBruin    July 7, 2001
Nothing new here...caught some good sized albies on the 43 until 9 AM or so in 69 water, and then nada. Albies were up to up to 30#. The only thing I have to offer, and this is probably not new news, is that I have a theory about where the albies went at 9 AM: the bellies of the ablies were full of baby squid, so I bet the albies gorged on squid all night and followed them down deep during the day, since we were metering them deep all day. Who knows - I thought full moon/squid jinx would have been over by now.  Josh and Mike Burnam  "Reel Bruin"

7/7 Upper 500   hardrider5         ALLCOAST   Jul-07-01, 09:20 PM (PST)   
Left Shelter Island around 1:00am this morning. Headed to the Upper 500 & stopped about 5 miles short of the 500 on a Jig Stop. It turned into a great bait stop & if not for the 2 inexperianced (my partners two sons) anglers with us, limits would have been easy. Other boats were in the area including the Producer. Total count:   12 Ablbies, 2 Yellows, 2 Bonita. Most of the fish were on the small size with Albies going under ten on up to two fish in the 25lb class. The bigger fish were mixed in with the smaller fish. This first bait stop could have easily been american limits had we had the talent onboard. A second jig stop & three bait fish is when we called it a day & started back in. Water temp in the area was 68.2 to 68.7. Water temp acaully increased as we continued to the 500.  The new angler had a great time & hung pretty good. The wind was blowing a little with white caps even in the morning but still a pretty confortable ride.   Talked to others at the dock that indicated they went to the 43 & didnt fair too well. The DFG guy in the parking lot indicated he thought we were high boat so far today but that most guys had some fish.

7/7/01 Between 43 and 267    birddog        ALLCOAST     Jul-07-01, 08:15 PM (PST)   
Draw a line between the 43 and 267 (aka East Butterfly) and start 12-18 miles south of the 43 and that is where we got into WFO albacore fishing on the Seabitch. Single jig strikes all morning and double, triple and one quadruple hookup on bait fish. One stop was good for 10 fish with quality anchovies from Mission Bay. Mixed bait was great, with reasonably sized 'dines. A little snotty on the way in, but small price to pay. We had our fill and put on marlin jigs and the albacore hit a mean joe green at 10 knots. Sparse paddies, but thanks to Hoochie Mama calling us in, we were able to boat one yellowtail. Ended up with 40 albacore and one yellowtail. One stop had the better grade of 20 lb class fish, the rest were 12-16 with occasional rat. We also used rock salt and ice water in one fish hold and got great results. The fish chilled very quickly and then we transferred them to the other hold before filleting. Hope you all get some. Heard of a few dodos, even one as far north as the 181. Sounded like the 425 and points south were also producing with mixed species. Still rocking and rolling from the long ride, but fresh fish is on the menu. Good luck.  Mike

albe report 7/6    rcklbstr       ALLCOAST   Jul-07-01, 08:38 PM (PST)   
we left mission bay to the 43 spot .I was in my friends 21 foot center consol WHATEVERITTAKES .upon arrival 67-68 degree water lots of dolphin .1 double jig strike 10 -12 pound fish .1 bait fish hooked and farmed .lots more trolling excellent weather .made a move southwest of 43 67 degree water .double jig strike on smaller daisy chain hoochies trolled far back .bigger unit fish 25-35 pound fish 6 more off these on this stop which lasted about 40 minites .hit 25-40 line sardines and anchovies for bait .trolled rest of day toward mission bay no more fish few kelps not holding

7/6 Pt Loma/302    Eric C. Meins     ALLCOAST    Jul-07-01, 08:02 PM (PST)
Micro version: Afternoon Pt Loma kelp= nice calicos. 71 degree water + paddy 7 miles north of the 302 = 1 fat yellow. Water from 67-71.5. Spots of red tide from the kelp out past the 230.  Here are some pics of the day. http://castanet.freeservers.com/ImageExpert/July_07_2001/index.htm
Fished Friday 7/6 out of Mission Bay with my Dad and Daughter. Headed towards Pt Loma and anchored up off the kelp. Morgan immediately starts feeling bad even though she took some bonine the night before and early in the morning. I strap the relief band on her and wait. Once I got the boat moving towards offshore she started to feel better. Later in the day she took the watch off for a bit and after 20 minutes wanted to put it back on so I think it works. She never got sick after she put it on and felt great and had a good time. I ended up doing some exploring offshore and ran into mostly warm water. Started to slowly cool once past the 230 but didnt go more then 5 miles or so past. Found a paddy north of the 302 and pulled a 25lb yellow of it, but nothing else. Ran into fish the same spot of Pt Loma that we fished in the morning and now the calicos were hungry. Kept a few for diner and let the one in the picture go. Morgan caught a cute johnny bass and had it for dinner before passing out for the night.   Not many boats along the Pt Loma, 9 mile, 302, 230 route. Saw some dolphin, spots of red tide and only 1 paddy. Mostly warm water with a couple temp breaks but nothing with cool enough water to pull in the albies that I could find. Was hoping to find dorado under some paddies in warm water but only found the 1 paddy with a yellow.  Looking forward to the next couple of weeks for the next stage of water temp development.  Eric

7/6 Osborn Area Albies     Fair Warning       ALLCOAST   Jul-07-01, 04:54 PM (PST)   
If you had not heard by now, good volume of 20-30# class fish are holding at the ridge E-SE from San Nicolas at about 15 miles. 64-66 Deg. water and blue with plenty of fish holding at 10-20 fathoms until they get hungry. Got bite all day and through the afternoon, and on a day of the full moon....go figure.  Fish ate the smaller variety of trulled feathers and clones. Ate the anchovies, and the rubber on the slide.  RED DECKS!

7/6 S. Osborne Albies    BigFishH       ALLCOAST     Jul-07-01, 04:28 PM (PST)    
Left Davies at about 0330 and got a huge scoop of chovies from Nacho. Took off for some numbers south of the Osborne bank we got from 976-TUNA. It was a little bumpy on the way out especiallly coming around the west end of Catalina so it took about 3 hrs to get to the area. Got into a nice temp. break and trolled both sides of it for nothing. Felt really weird as there were no other boats around the whole trip out, and the early part of the morning. I guess everyone was sleeping in late. Called out on the radio to see if anyone else was around and hooked up with the "Camel Driver". He got a jig strike and called us in to his numbers and shortly after we got our first jigstrike. It was a triple and I farmed mine so I instantly threw out some "rubber" and redeemed myself with the biggest albie of the day estimated to be around 30lbs. We got another on bait and that was it for that stop. Thanks to the Camel Driver for calling us in with the numbers. Boxed the area for the rest of the morning for nothing. I heard the rest of the fleet was fishing a bit further south but range was limited due to fuel concerns. I guess if I had to, I could have stopped at Catalina for some fuel for the ride home. Anyway it was a fun day out on the water with a few nicer grade albies to show for the effort. I was originally planning to run out of S.D. but changed plans at the last minute due to the reports of better grade of fish further up. Of course the thought of running downhill coming in and the shorter drive home made it that much more appealing. Until next time, BigFishH out.

7/5,6 All you want Albies!   tj       ALLCOAST    Jul-07-01, 03:12 PM (PST) 
Headed out of Alamitos Bay at 6 am on Thursday for an area around the Osborn. We were going to saty in Pyramid head for two days and fish down to the 43 but changed our plains at the last minute. Picked up 3 healthy scoops of chovies from Bills and ran the 66 miles to the grounds. We were approx. 25 miles behind the west end of Catalina on a 208 heading. We were the only boat out there that I could see for miles. Put the jigs in 8 miles shy of the numbers that I had. Within 5 minutes a triple! Threw bait and boils everywhere! Landed two of the jig fish kept one hanging and the 3 of us pinned on one of those hot chovies and were hammered! What a cluster ##### we had. There was blood and fish everwhere. We keep them around the boat in time to land 8 fish on the first stop. Cleaned up and trolled for another 5 mintues then a quad jig strike! Here we go again. Threw bait and boils everywhere. Right next to the swim step. All the fish landed were 25+ pounds with the big fish at 34.5 pounds. This went on until we were loaded up the fish holds. No more room! Total for day one 25 albies all 25 to 34 pounds!!!! With many farmed fish! We did not even get into the area until 9:00am! Done by 2:00. Left them for another day. You could have had as many asa you wanted!!!! Ran to Catalina spent the night at Two Harbors. We were so happy with that that we were going to fish around Catalina the next morning. Woke up on friday at 6:00 am we all looked at each other and said how often are albies 25 miles behind us wide open with that type of quality. So off we went to have some more fun. Plus we still had a healthy tank of those great chovies ready and waitng to be used! Same thing but we stopped at 15 fish and said enough is enough we were tired and we had plenty of fun! Set the auto- pilot for Alamitos Bay and we were 65 miles from home. Total for the two days was 40 Albies for three guys with about 12 fish farmed. Nice quality fish and they were not line shy. We were using from 15 to 40 pound mono. Jig color did not seem to matter. The basic colors. What a trip!!!! Great bait, Great trip, Boat ran perfect and had good company! If I were going I would search on my own and stay away from the fleet. We caught all of our fish alone with not a boat in sight. Thursday we tried to call in boats to share the fun but no one was around. friday the same thing and by the time they got to us the bite was gone! Water temp was 65.5 to 66. Not sure if my temp gauge is right. I would start and 22 miles on a 208 heading from the west end light of Catalina.  TJ TailChaser

A long, long day   WJW      ALLCOAST    Jul-07-01, 02:16 PM (PST)   
How ironic, my best albacore bite ever on a private boat, and my worst mecanical problems on the same day. Met my regular fishing buddy and Jay (Boswell) at C.I. boat ramp at 3:30 a.m. to make the run for the albacore. Because of the swell direction we were able to run in the trough of the little 3 foot swell and cruise at 26 mph the whole way out. There's a large area of 66.5 degree water on the 17 Spot which we bypassed to get to the known fish. The water jumped up to as high as 68.6 on the way down past the Osborne.  The fish are in the areas everyone has been talking about. Just look for the fleet. As we got to our numbers just after greylight we could see several sport boats working the area and we came across a temp break that went from 68.5 to 66.5 in about a 1/4 mile. The break was 68 statute miles from C.I. Harbor. We just about to put the jigs out when I spotted a small paddy. We motored over to that and fly-lined a couple of baits. We were all immediately bit and hung on quality fish. I threw about ten baits as chum and they charged the boat with big boils going off as close as a foot off the swim step. We kept throwing one or two baits every thirty seconds and were able to keep the school on us for obout 45 minutes. Any peice of chum that was thrown was immediately boiled on. Approximately six fish landed on bait with the largest going 33 pounds, seven ounces. Nothing under 25 lbs. Lots of fish farmed, pulled, lost to tangles. We were fishing 20 lb test and the fish really pulled against that stuff. Jay came to within about twenty yards of being spooled by one bruiser. At the end of that bait stop the boats was covered in blood.  Put the jigs back in and over the course of the morning put another six fish on board divided equally among jig and bait fish. For us it was definitely a morning bite as we couldn't get bit to save our lives between 11:00 am and two.  The weather was beautifull. A little 3 foot west swell in the morning which eventually flattend out to almost nothing by noon. At two o'clock we decided to start back to cover the 65 miles back to the harbor. It was so nice that we were cruising at 29-30 mpg and it was flat enough for Jay to go to sleep in the bow. We were still 45.5 miles from the harbor when I heard/felt a lout thump as something glanced of the bow and then hit the outdrive HARD.  For about three seconds everything sounded o.k. and then we could hear soemthing let go in the outdrive. I throttled back and we we idled along for a few hundred feet lstening. I then started hearing funky noises coming from the outdrive AND the engine. Lots of knocks, clanks, and vibrations.  Due to the distances involved and the fact that I could make six knots (the speed they would tow me at), Vessel Assist said to just try and keep making headway under my own power and they would periodicly ckeck in with me.  The best we could do was about 5-6 mph without it sounding like things were coming apart. At one point about twenty five miles out the engine started running noticably rougher. I checked the gauges and saw that the temp was pegged at 240 (There's no hi-temp alarm). I put it in reverse and then neutral and raised the outdrive and some kelp floated off. The motor cooled down agan but continued to run very rough. The outdrive sounded like it let go completely when I put it in reverse as I pulled up to the launch ramp. It would no longer engage.

When we pulled the boat out there was a bunch of kelp wedged up into the rams. This morning when I went to flush it, the motor sounded very, very ill and barely runs. The lower unit looks like it went through a war. There is a large hunk taken out of the leading edge of the skeg and there is a big crack on the side of the lower unit with a little stream of oil leeking out. The little grates over the intake where the cooling water goes in was all smashed in and there was kelp/grass up in there as well. I'm guessing that the grate was knocked off in the impact which resulted in kelp being sucked up in there and overheating the thing. Based upon the clanking coming from the engine after the impact, I think there's also damage on that count as well. Something tells me I'm doing a re-power right in the middle of the tuna season "". At least it got me home and the weather was nice. We made it back to the ramp at 10:15 pm.

Talked to several Allcoasters and other friends on the radio. Thanks to Tiburon, Wild West, Mega Bite, Double Vison, Over the Edge and others for the concern and offers of assistance. A special thanks to Wild West for swinging by to pick up Jay and take him back to the ramp at high speed. (Jay was doing a family weekend in Santa Barbara and there was no sense in ruining one of his two nights with his family. Despite his loyal assertions of wanting to tough it out with us I insisted he take the ride back to salvage his weekend.)    Bill 
P.S. We trolled at five to six knots the whole way home from 45 miles out for nothing. I don't think there are fish at the 17 spot as we trolled right over it. There is a lot of good water and lots of life. Water temp was 66.5 in that area.

Quality Local Albies    freddie       ALLCOAST   Jul-06-01, 08:41 PM (PST)
There are so many albies in small and different size schools southwest of the Osborne Bank, that any break is a break. Don't waste your time looking for pure breaks to prime albie temps. Headed out from MDR to averaged lat-lon of all posted albies areas off the Osborne and arrived well short of it at 9am with 2 buddies aboard. At about 53 miles a scary 68.5 water broke to 67.5, and I was metering fish. A break is a break. So in went the lures, and before all could be set out a green and black feather goes off and its a tough fish, 31 lbs., top for the day. We chumbed with the few pinhead anchovies that survived the trip, and got boils and double on a bait and swimbate on the sink. 28 and 29 lbs! more quality than we could hope for. For the next 3 hours we worked a one square mile area and got 8 fish, the smallest 22 lbs. What a load of fish. Headed for the barn in beautiful conditions and the cleanup and filet up. It is easy pickens for anyone with the range. They ate green and yellow tuna clones, cedar plugs, green and black feathers and assorted swim baits, seem to prefer chovies over dines althought some were stuffed with dines when we cleaned them. Explain that!  Saw what must of been a humpback whale come almost completely out the water, and crash back in with water displacement that looked like a bomb explosion. A good day all around and a major albie fix. Also saw the Fury out there, a boat I fished many times as teenager. So check his counts.  The core of the area where we got all the big albies: (33.14.420, 119.05.584).  Good luck to all you PBers who go this weekend, but I don't think you'll need it. Freddie

ensenada report    captain      ALLCOAST    Jul-07-01, 10:19 AM (PST)  
banda bank had a pocket of 66.5 degree water in a small area we boxed this area and limited in 2 hours for 2 guys we decide to troll on the way in because we had been through some 69 degree water on the way out and it paid off with a nice dodo on the purple and green feather. the albies were solid 20 to 25 lb fish with one that i think was pushing 30. the bait situation was favorable with nice medium sized sardines. people were saying that the albies were not really going off on the bait in the morning but i did not find that to be the case. saw alot of yellowtail back at the corral fish cleaning station. but i could not find a paddie to save my life. but on the same note not too many folks had the albies that day either.  225 heading from the light house 12.5 miles sorry no #s i was busy 

7/6 San Diego islands/offshore    Livingwater      ALLCOAST   Jul-06-01, 09:46 PM (PST)  
Started the day off at south coronado island, for 2 big yellowtail 30lbs, and 2 white seabass, 20-28lbs. My buddy boats a yellowtail and a smaller white seabass. Around noon we head to the 425, first paddy produces 2 dorado for me, 8 and 11lbs., plus one more quality yellowtail, 27lbs. More paddies, a couple more yellows for my buddy, then we find a large sea turtle. Swimming tight circles around the turtle is a nice bull dorado in the mid 20's....dorado # 3 hits the deck, and we head in, checking paddies holding yellowtail, but no more dorado. South of the 425 about 10 miles the water is very clean, and some boats did real good on albacore. Water temps 68-71. All fish taken by speargun, bait and jigs tried on the paddies first for no bites.

DODO/Albies 7/5 43ish   tre   ALLCOAST    Jul-05-01, 08:20 PM (PST)
Left Newport with 2 scoops of chovies and a few mixed in denes en route for a spot that has been productive for me @ 10 miles West and @ a mile South of the 43. Dropped out our spread and got a 7 lb. albie at 9:45 AM on a blue and white feather. From their a nice squall showed up- rain and wind @ 20+ knots with white caps everywhere. @ 12:30 we picked up a double jig strike - 8 and 12 lbs. and added 1 small bait fish- 8 lb. Soon thereafter the sea calmed down, wind stopped and we picked up a 12 lb DORADO- female on a yellow/green jet head. Headed for the dock at 3:30.

The radio chatter today was one of frustration- didn't sound like much catching going on, and fish seemed to be small. Water stayed @ 77 where we were. A few dorado were seen here and there via the radio chat, but didn't here of any taken.  The ride home was choppy and a little uncomfortable- and to make things worse we ended up with 100 gallons of gasoline in our diesel tank back at the fuel dock........ uh oh!

bluefin sw of 43      hermit     ALLCOAST    Jul-05-01, 08:25 PM (PST)
went out yesterday(the 4th) from oceanside for the albies AGAIN. seemed like the small ones, 10-15lbrs moved back in around the ridge outside of the 43.. caught a nice 20lb bluefin to add to the fishholds! small one,but caught me off guard..hit a small chrome head jig i put together w/ purple,blue,green,black,pink,combo w/ stripes to add for good measure,and with 3 skirts trailin in front of it-was my leathal jig for the day as most of the albies hitched onto it also...buuuuttt,lost it to something w/ teath,possibly a dodo as mono showed some nicks in it after being cut off on one jig strike! anyway, about 38 miles out from oceanside(on the way back in) found a paddy that had yellowtail..i was in the vacinity of the 153,and in 70 degree water.. caught two off this nice blue,silver,black spotted,crippled herring lookin jig i got i walmart...buuutttttt, lost that to a third yellow which took me into the pad.....anyhow, was great to see the yellows moving in on up the line.. bluefin was caught about 9 miles outside of 43 with the albies in 68.3 degree water. thank god i didnt buy bait,,,,,caus it would have rolled the 1st mile out of the harbor!!

Pics double 220 on down    Jim Day     Jul-05-01, 09:28 PM (PST)
Stats: 50+ Albies 10 to twenty pounds one Dorado. 
Syn:   Lots of fish on a current break just south of the double 220.  Fish should be heading north and on the 10/10 by the weekend.  Since it's a new body of fish, still small, I'd say we are in for a long season. 
Story:   Fished the Fourth with Dennis on the Aluminator. The plan was to head south...way south and find some "differn't" tuna. Hopefully YFT or Bluefin.   Hit bad traffic on the way down and was late. Got to the dock sometime around 10 and met the other guys Dennis2 and Al. Dennis2 does the home page for the Marlin club. Great guy with some great Marlin info.  Also ran into SWAG hanging around waiting for some Allcoaster. A nice guy with a really nice Blackman. We are talking sweeeeetttt. I was afraid to touch it...the thing was clean.  Anyway the plan was to run down all night and start on the Double 220 at first light. Good conditions for the run except for some electrical storms inside. We gave them a wide berth.

First light we were 70 mies or so down, sixty five degree water. A steady pick of singles for the first few hours then we found a great current break just loaded with fish. All rods loaded up in a mutiple jig strike. A number of bait fish etc. Dennis knows better but I'd say 10 miles south of the Double 220.  It was so wide open I put my daisy chain in close and tried to get a strike picture. Here's the best I got: 
http://www.momentoffame.com/snapshot.html?id=7562 You can see the foreward jigs pulled up and a little of the splash as he hits the last jig in the chain. After fifty or so fish we got burnt filled the cooler...
http://www.momentoffame.com/snapshot.html?id=7564    .... cleaned up...  http://www.momentoffame.com/snapshot.html?id=7561   .... then started back up. You can tell by D2's expression we're still getting bit.

Steady jigstrikes up to the 220 then it shut down. 10/10 was dry for us except for a single blind strike Dorado that hit D2's marlin rig.  Beautifull fish: http://www.momentoffame.com/snapshot.html?id=7563   Cold water there (67) a little chilly for Dodo's

Found a few Paddies one which I lost a decent Yellow to and another we practically ran over scaring the locals 1 big Dorado to other locations (other then our deck )  Ran in just before dark 19+ knots the whole way. Here's a couple shots of the proud owner on the run in.....  http://www.momentoffame.com/snapshot.html?id=7566    http://www.momentoffame.com/snapshot.html?id=7565  
....and some sunset photo's at the point.
http://www.momentoffame.com/snapshot.html?id=7560
http://www.momentoffame.com/snapshot.html?id=7559

All and all it was a hell of a day. I love fishing with Dennis he's just a great fisherman and a pleasure to fish with. His boats better then ever with the new motor. Like I said a great day with great guys. Now if I coud just lay off the Dennis's Kessler when we get to his place.... wheeeeeewie we're a talking a major headache on the ride home this morning Thanks for the trip and the place to stay.... Dennis you've got it down. Tight lines Jim  

7-4-01 SW of the 43     Javahead       ALLCOAST     Jul-04-01, 08:26 PM (PST)
Left Dana at 5:30 with Bob (Lawman) on his 26 Striper, arriving south and west of the 43 about 0745. Ride out was kind of snotty with 3 foot seas that got more closely spaced about 10 miles from the 43. Trolled for a couple of hours before we finally got a double on a couple of dinky 10 lb'ers. A little while later, Bob gets a single on the troll that was a nice fish, 24 lbs. Pretty sure it's a bluefin but perhaps someone can check out the pics and let us know. Obviously not an Albie and doesn't quite look like a yellowfin either, although it came from 68 degree water. Numbers were 32.35, 118.04. Anyway, the rest of the day was a slow pic. Seas flattened out nicely as the day went on. Never did get any baitfish. We had large chovies from Mello's but most rolled and the rest were weak. Seemed the fish were widely scattered. The radio indicated there were guys out in the same area that did much better than we did today. We ended up with 7 Albies and the BFT. Biggest Albie was 21 lbs. with another going 17. Really hard finding any water colder than 68.1 with lots of 69 degree water out there too. Water seems to be warming fast up here. Hope they stick around a while longer.

http://www.momentoffame.com/snapshot.html?id=7529
http://www.momentoffame.com/snapshot.html?id=7530

That fishy came from 68.1 degree water at 32.35.050, 118.04.528. It was a single on a Zuker, black with green head. No bait fish. I thought bluefins had the spotted belly like this one? We got our larger Albies here: 32.28.385, 117.51.083. Don't know how good these numbers will be for very long, though.

wahoodad      ALLCOAST       Jul-04-01, 09:32 PM (PST)   Report 7-4-01 SW of the 43"   Yellowfin Tuna for sure. The YFT pec fin bent forward will just cover the eye. The BFT pec will not reach the eye. I'm guessing YFT, plus the markings are more common on YFT. Nice model, hope theres more on the way.

albacore fishing 7/4      ALLCOAST     Wed, 04 Jul 2001 23:12:14 -0700
Headed out from S.I. at 0100 with a scoop of chovies which of course died. Got to the 43 in a considerable swell which we attacked head on and only managed 10 knots. Got there at 0430 and crashed out til 0530. Put the jigs in and by 0930 had managed 6 smallish albies to about 10 pounds. The bite shut off after that. Temp was from 67.4 to 68.9. Worked mostly the area SW of the 43, as opposed to right on top of it. Seems many other people saw the bite shut down early as well. Got back to S.I. at 1630 to find a boat called Double Limits skunked. I consider us lucky for getting the six fish that we did. What happened????? Lots of red tide to 15 miles out. Got bit on zuchinni, green and yellow and black/purple daisy chain, and one on the slide on my own home-poured purple and blue swimbait. I really thought we were gonna knock 'em dead. Oh well, that's fishing. Oh yeah, hooked up with a boat call Elizabeth and she followed us out. Her skipper saved me from being decapitated by a tow boat in the harbor which was towing four different crane platforms in the dark all at once. I didn't know that three white lights stacked vertically meant "tow". On the way out I paid him back by saving him from being broadsided by a huge freighter, by calling him on the VHF and letting him know it was about to blindside him if he didn't back off the throttle or gas it to beat him. It sure is hard to judge distance and size of other vessel's lights in the dark. I actually thought we were going to get run over by that thing. It was ENORMOUS!!! That was my day. Again, the buddy boater/buddy system kicked butt and saved lives. Thanks for the heads up vessel Elizabeth. Michael owner/operator Paddy Raid

albacore fishing      Affordable Marine       Wed, 04 Jul 2001 15:29:17 -0000
Left harbor island at 11pm on friday 6-29 aboard the "Billy Mac". When the sun broke the horizon had to get some shut eye. Just layed down and zzzzzzzzz zzzzzzzzzzzzz hookup! @ man a guy cant have a minute to himself. Landed a 20 lb. yellow tail no patties around. Then spotted the biggest boil I have ever seen nearly 1/2 mile circumference! Trolled by it and zzzzzzzzzzz zzzzzzzzzzzz zzzzzzzzzzzzzz triple. the whole day went like that until we had 5 limits . We set out the sea anchor and crashed. 4:30 am pulled in the sea anchor and checked the gps. Didn't move and inch so we set out the poles and zzzzzzz. Called in a bunch of boats and we had 30 or 40 boats around us in minutes all hooking up. By 1pm we had 5 more limits. All filleted by 5pm 300 lbs of fillets. Back at the dock at 6:40 . They are still out there. This coming weekend we will target the yellowfin . Our position in the frenzy was 117:12 31:57. thanks dennis for a great site! Paul!

Albies      Affordable Marine       Wed, 4 Jul 2001 06:32:14 -0700
Fished west of the 43 spot on 7/3 for football sized Albacore. A few were in the 20lb size most around 8lb. Here are numbers from one of my jig stops 32 39.12 & 118 04.35. I trolled feathers and Rapala all were bit but the feathers were best. The Albacore are full of squid so I trolled a daisy chain with small plastic squid and it was hit also. Brian on the "FISH-N-TIME"

Wedesday's Report    J.D.'s Big Game Tackle    
Calm Seas, a light southwesterly , fishing continues fair on the albacore grounds, near the 43 Fathom Bank. Full moon and barometer changes led to the bite.. Catalina Island gave up some limits of White Sea bass yesterday off the East End, Sand and Calico bass remain the high catches for the cattleboats out of Long Beach and Newport fishing the Flats off Huntington Beach. Shark fishing for many of the high spots off the coastline and even great Rock Cod fishing for those working the depths.

-No Reports of Albacore on the 14 Mile Bank yet, but there's birds, bait and life there as well as the 209 and 277 Fathom spots, something going to happen there today around 2:49pm, right after the turn of the tide Stand By!-
-Thresher Sharks begin chasing bait off Laguna, 2:14pm
-"There's chovies all around here, I'm metering a lot of bait. There's something around here". 2:42 pm
-Grunion run tonight, 9:05pm, lunar eclipse 4 am tomorrow morning.
-Cattleboats counts out of SD, 85, 117 albacore due in from 8 till 10 pm tonight.

7/4 SD    Landshark       ALLCOAST     Jul-04-01, 05:55 PM (PST)
Got straight dines from the receiver at 3am. Clouds covered the full moon,so it was a dark ride out.All the boats were heading towards the 43.I was headed south and didn't see any boats until daylight. I kept wondering if I should be at 43 also. Somehow the bait pump got turned off on the ride down and by the time I noticed it there were only about 20 dines alive. Started trolling at 6am. Saw 5 or 6 boats on the radar in a tight pack a few miles south.This was about 45mi. south on a 178 heding, Started getting singles and a couple doubles when we got in that area. Had 5 fish each at 9:30. Pulled the jigs and found a group of kelps 3 miles above the sportboat area. Got 3 yellows and 2 released albies.We farmed so many yellows here-we just couldn't turn them around. Left for the ramp at 11am.  Had a great day.No bait line,fishing area wasn't very crowded,ramp wasn't a circus and the freeway was wide open. And caught fish as a bonus.I wish I could do it again tommorow!

7/4 Albies on the 43      flp     ALLCOAST    Jul-04-01, 03:41 PM (PST)
Just got in after leaving point loma for the 43 at 10 pm the night before. My boat doesnt like head seas so we took it slow and when we got there we drifted for a couple of hours and got some sleep. I went out with a father and his three teenage kids. None of them had fished before. We started trolling and picked up a triple jig strike within 15 min at 32.31 and 118.03 We also picked up 3 bait fish on the same stop. It was classic to see the eyes on the girls get big as these nice fish were gaffed and then proceeded to bloody up the boat with their thrashing. We boxed the area and picked of several more jig strikes and bait fish. The kids did real well and we only lost one jig fish when it came unbuttoned. We put out the numbers and we quickly had 13 fish from 15 to 20 plus pounds. Water was 68.2 and the fish were hitting purple and black and green and black and green and orange in the mini jets. People that were looking in the cooler water were not doing as well. We then trolled west for nothing for about an hour and then we returned to the original area and then on towards home and we started to get jigs strikes in the 32.31 and 117.59 These were even bigger and we had them boiling all around as we picked several more bait fish. I had to pull the plug on the kids at 10:30 as were already had more fish than they would know what to do with. This last group of fish were in 68.6 water and there was a lot of life around. We just drove past it and started cleaning fish. Final count 23 nice albies. Home at 2:00pm. No sport boats from San Diego I watched them all head south. Light boat pressure. One final note the kids loved to watch the red tide light up the water at night as we worked our way out. Seas were 4 foot and closely spaced.  Floyd

500 WFO     SWAG      ALLCOAST      Jul-04-01, 09:19 PM (PST)
Met up at 0300. Bait was smaller anchovies but good stuff. Ran down the line in great weather. Found some heavier grade of Albacore today 15-19lbs. Fished the area about 6 miles Northeast of the 500. It was wide open on bait...quite a thrill. Had two people out for their first whack at the Albies this season and they were really Jazzed. Quite a 4th of July Celebration we had. The Weather was perfect (a few drops) and the water temp was 66.8 to 68.2.  We also decked one Dorado that jumped on the troll. 

7.3.01 SW of 43     good enough       ALLCOAST      Jul-04-01, 08:49 AM (PST)
Left the o'side bait reciever with a scoop of chovies at 0500. Dropped the jigs in at 0845. First strike at 0910, a double for 2 smaller albies. About 35 minutes later, another double, but the reels are screaming. Landed 2 nice 35-40 lb. yellowfin or bluefin. I don't know how the tell the difference. A little later we had triple for 3 more albies and one on bait. I farmed another on bait. Total for the day 6 albies and 2 other tuna. Headed back for o'side at 1130. Great weather and great fishing.  I'm gonna try to figure out how to post a pic so that maybe someone will be able to tell what kinda tuna I got. Maybe someone can tell me how to post a pic?  Got bit on every color jet head except the blk/pur. Kind a weird, but that's what happened. The zuchini jet head was bit on each stop. Water was about 67.5 degrees. Sorry I forgot to post the numbers. Here are the numbers where we got stopped by the yellowfin or bluefin. They were under the porpoise school, but we couldn't raise any with bait.  Thanks,  Marc "Good Enough"  32 45 118 15     Hope this picture works. http://albums.photopoint.com/j/AlbumIndex?u=1475575&a=13444520&f=0&vt=vp

FreeSwimmer       ALLCOAST    Jul-04-01, 06:12 PM (PST)  
No question...that is a yellowfin. The pec fin reaches all the way to the base of the 2nd. dorsal. A bluefin pectoral fin never is that long that it reaches the origin of the 2nd dorsal fin. Taking them on the troll under porpoise is typical of yellowfin......rare (if ever under porpoise) for bluefin. Nice fish and good signal for an outstanding season.    Dave

Bravo 6       ALLCOAST      Jul-04-01, 10:21 PM (PST)
RE: no question.............. I think now, after carefully surveying the picture that you could be correct. I didn't base my opinion on the photo, I based it on the fact that Bluefin are here now, And most importantly I've never ever caught Albacore and Yellowfin on the same real estate. There have been YFT sighted and a couple hooked, But that's way inside and down from the 43. Hmmm. I'm still not sure...The only things in favor of the YFT argument is the pec fin and the water temp. Furthermore (this is to the skipper that caught the fish in question) you caught 2 nice tuna and didn't have a clue what they were. Therefore you are hardly qualified to make the deciding vote on what you got.  We are looking at your pics. When I boat a fish on Bravo 6, Theres no question what I got. Gary (Bravo 6)

FISHING AT THE 43    BOMBERO     ALLCOAST       Jul-04-01, 06:40 AM (PST)
TOOK MY SHAMROCK OUT TO THE 43 FOR THE FIRST TIME ON TUES. BUDDY BOATED WITH MY AMIGO MARC WHO HAS A 25' SKIPJACK(DIALED). LAUNCHED OUT OF OCEANSIDE ABOUT 5AM WITH A SCOOP OF MIXED CHOVIES AND DINES. WE PUT THE DAISY CHAINS OUT ABOUT 10 MILES SOUTH/EAST OF OUR DESTINATION, WHILE MARC TRAVELED BELOW US TO WORK THE SAME WAY UP. DIDNT TAKE LONG BEFORE WE GOT SINGLE, NO BAIT FISH. GOT ONE MORE IN THE AREA THEN IT DIED OFF. HEARD SOME TRAFFIC ABOUT FISH 6 MILES FROM THE 43 SO SCOOTED THAT WAY. MEET UP WITH THE 'QUEENFISH' AND TOGETHER WORKED THE AREA FOR MORE TROLLED FISH AND ONE BAITFISH. THANKS FOR HELPING 'QUEENFISH'.  MEET UP WITH MARC AND WE SHOWED EACH OTHER OUR KILLS. GREAT DAY OF FISHING WITH MY BUDDY PAUL AND HIS NEPHEW JR. EVEN BETTER WEATHER, BEST OF ALL WE CAUGHT FISH AND MADE IT HOME SAFE. FINAL FISH COUNT 6 NICE ALBACORE 20 - 25+# (BIG ONE BROKE MY SCALE).   THANKS MARC,  JOE

7/3 on the 43    ohfishal       ALLCOAST     Jul-04-01, 12:06 PM (PST)
Left Pt. Loma around 5am heading for the 43. Stopped on a few paddies before getting there. All were dry except one that had a few yellows that didn't want to bite. They would only take the dead anchovies we were chumming. I finally went down to 12lb line and hooked one on a chovie, but he busted me off in a hurry. Trolled away from the fleet until we couldn't resist joining them after hearing all the radio chatter. We ended up with 8 albies and a few blue sharks. We were west of the 43 by about 6 miles for most of our fish. My buddy caught his first tuna, but we really didn't have the drill down as far as bait fishing. Only got one or two on bait.  Five fish between 5-8 lbs. one around 12, and two around 20. I think we could have gotten alot more if we fished bait better. My buddy wasn't even throwing bait on alot of the jig stops.  We trolled B&P yo-zuri, B&G feathers, B&P cedar plug, Blue and white feathers, Abortion feathers, color didn't seem to make a difference. The bite shut down around noon. We stayed out till around 5 and headed in, but didn't get any fish later than 1ish. We stopped on some patties in the area, but all had been trampled or were dry. On a triple jig stop we got two albies and a blue shark, I thought that was kind of odd. Anyone else ever get blues on the troll?  Matt   P.S. Bait sucked, over half rolled. Seas were calm all day.

7/3 43 Albies     Yachtsman      ALLCOAST      Jul-03-01, 05:47 PM (PST)
Left Newport this morning at 3:15 and arrive 8 miles west of the 43 at 5:45 am. Went through water temps ranging from 67.5 to 69.5 on the way out. When we figured the water was not getting any cooler than 67.5, we started trolling blk/ple, blu/ple spinning jet heads. By 8:30 we scratched up 5 albacore for the two of us ranging 10 - 15 lbs. We trolled all over the area west of the 43 and it didn't seem to matter where you were because the fish were everywhere. At 9:00 we had our first double, then WFO Albies 15 - 20 Lbs. crashing bait and staying with the boat for about 45 minutes. That stop produced 7 fish and with 12 total for the two of us we called it a day.  There was some great Yellowtail action over the radio at this paddy, then some guy jumps in to spear fish and shuts the bite down. It amazes me why people have to ruin it for others. If that individual "found" that paddy first, I retract my previous statement.   Anyway, great day on Lake Pacific, travelled home at 29 knots very comfortably. Great chovies from Newport Bait, hardly any rolled and the Albies loved them!     Cheers,   Yachtsman

Monday's Reports:  Calm Seas a slight southwesterly, 43 Fathom flat and calm seas, continued good fishing for the Albacore near the 43 Fathom Bank, seems as though the squid off Catalina has finished their run for the season, still maybe a little around for those willing to jig it off the back side of the island under lights, the upcoming full moon will curtail much of that activity. Maybe even the tuna bite will back off a bit as this moon fills.

Skipper with the triple and double, what's your numbers "32:36.9 / 118:12.08 , We just got anothe triple, we're taking a beer break, lots of fish around here. 11:50am .......  32:29 /118:07 We've also got fish here ....... N/W of the bank, 32:34/ 118:02

Seeing nothing less than 30lbs fish, flat calm seas, great fishing we got spooled several times, Off Ensenada, 50 on the top, 55 on the bottom! 1:10pm Casting to boiling fish, we had a triple right away, lots of fun, 67.3 to 66.9 right on the edge of the red tide.

Sunday report     birddog          ALLCOAST   Jul-01-01, 09:24 PM (PST)
Fished on the Seabitch on a straight line between the Butterfly East (267) and the 43 approximately 12 miles above the 267 and 16 below the 43. WFO we couldn't get more than ten minutes without a jig strike and lots of bait fish. Some rats, but as the day progressed the fish got bigger to 20-25 pounds. We got hit on everything and had daisy chains getting slammed on the stops, the fish traps on the whiskey line were real hot in the am and anything worked as the day went on. Got out a little late due to a 125 lb mako (my brother never caught one, so we did kill it) and then we hit a dream paddy and lost at least 7 but landed 9 yellowtail. We filleted on the boat, but brought the 3 largest tails home to weigh and they were 25, 27, and 28 pounds on a bathroom scale. Great day and lots of cooperation from Todd on Isla Mia. Total count 43 albacore, nine yellows and a mako for the boat. Can't stay awake any longer, been going since 1:45 am. Hope everyone did as good, but I am too tired to read any posts    Mike  

6/30-7/1 Tuna      TOP DOG   ALLCOAST     Jul-02-01, 09:31 AM (PST)
Hit the area between the 390 and 1010 for numerous albies to 20 lbs (many on the smaller side) They hit all types of lures with several good bait stops. Largest fish of day was a bluefin at abouut 25lbs. Spent the night anchored at Punta Pescador. Sunday morning put the lines at about 15 miles off the beach. The first jig strike was within minutes. Contuned working toward the Finger Bank. This is where we got into the quality 30lb albies. Several bait stops that would last for over an hour each. Most of the bait fish were caught on 15lb line but they would also hit the heavier stuff. We stopped on jumping tuna, paddies, and birds all have tuna under them. We had one paddie with yellowtail on top and tuna below. Go get them.

Albies, Albies and more Albies!    ChicksWhoFish    ALLCOAST   Jul-02-01, 08:51 AM (PST)
I went fishing Sat. out of Point Loma, we were near the butterfly bank and it was wide open Albies!! We also got some Tails from under the patties! It is going to be a great season!   Best Fishing & Tight Lines!   Dara   www.ChicksWhoFish.com

BEST DAY of fishing this year       Affordable Marine      Date: Mon, 2 Jul 2001 20:37:12 EDT
Hey Guys, Went out Sunday for the BEST DAY of fishing this year, was a little worried about the weather but threw caution to the wind and left at one am Sunday morning. Went out at 245 degree heading about 40 plus miles and the seas were lake like, with ablies jumping out of the water, boxing in the area and kept going west it was an awesome day, we had to work at keeping the tuna off our jigs!! tis days like these that keep me going back. hot feather of the day was the plug, black and purple, and the black and purple daisy chain. temp break was anything below 67 and it was a rockin!! just head west and youll find em, but remember dont leave fish to find fish

Wide open Albies at 52 miles out       Affordable Marine        Mon, 02 Jul 2001 16:42:52 -0500
Hi Dennis, Here's the report for Saturday's fishing. Left Shelter Island on Saturday morning at 12:30am and headed out on a 180 degree heading. Reached 48 miles at 5:30am and put the jigs out for what seem's to be the longest time and not one strike on the jigs, then at 50 miles out had a tripple on the black and purple, no bait fish on this stop. So we trolled again and thirty minutes later had a doubble on the troll and 2 bait fish on 20lb line. And when we hit 52 miles that's when it broke loose with a doubble, and 1 bait fish, then trolled again and got tripples with no bait fish, then put the jigs in again and within 5 minutes had a quad chummed hard, boils all behind the stern with no bait fish, trolled and before we can give out the numbers to a fisherman we had another quad that turn in to 4 bait fish on the stop. Then we trolled past a small strand of kelp and hooked up a small 10lb yellow that boiled on a green and yellow cedar plug which turned into wfo yellowtails that charged the boat then the yellows left and it turned into wfo abacore that hit anything we threw at them, black and white taddy 45's, cripple herrings, blue and chrome tady 9. Most of the fish were small 5lb to 22lb being the biggest. We released all the small ones and kept albies ranging from 10lbs and up. Totall count for three guys, 15 abies and 12 yellows from 10lb to 18lbs. tight lines, Vince on the new boat, " Blue Thunder."

Sunday Albacore Fishing  Affordable Marine  Mon, 2 Jul 2001 12:48:11 -0700
Had a good day fishing at the 43 in my 19ft proline. Left S.D. bay with a decent mix of livies. Headed out towards the 302 to check it out, and sure enough the water was very cold and the ocean looked like the Mojave Dessert, no life. Ok, lets troll to the 230 it was the same-same except the water got allot warmer. I assessed my fuel level and decided well lets head to the 43, that was the right decision because 12 miles short of the 43 it looked good so we dropped in the lewers and in 5 minutes whamo double albies approx. 10lbs. kept trolling the area and then the big boys showed up, double hookup again except these fish made the drags scream. I landed my fish solo while my buddy was pinned to the rail fighting his. I said, hey! get that fish to the boat ya wimp and then oops the jig pulled (rookie), my fish went 39.8lbs (40 plus in my fish stories). Headed for home trolling from the 43 to the Point Loma and had a Dodo strike at 31 miles from the point in 69.2 degree water. Ended the day - 4 albies 2 lost, and lost one Dodo. The radio information: the fishing was WFO outside the 43 around the 118.08./ 118.10 area. I heard some boats talking on the VHF that were headed for home at 11:00 with their boats loaded from the butterfly. Thats to far for me! I've gotta draw the line at the 43 spot. Words of Wisdom: He who rushes fisherman looses fish! Beware of the swimming Hogs! Happy Fishing & Tight lines From Tuna Dave on "Deep Color"

Albacore at the 43 Jason on the Avenger   Affordable Marine      Mon, 2 Jul 2001 00:52:13 EDT
We took off about 4:00 am to the 43... about 7 miles before the 43 we hit a big temp break and started trolling around and got our first double strike off the season. We limited right there using jetheads. We got back in around 11:30. on another note I am putting the Avenger up for sale... Its a 20' bayliner in awesome condition... it has a rebuilt 1995 120 outboard motor... its great for fishing the coronados or the 302. If you are interested e-mail at hurley9255@aol.com or call me at 858-735-6167... im asking $7,995 but i will be flexible. This boat has killed a lot of fish. Jason on the Avenger

Albies on the 43   HardFishin    ALLCOAST   Jul-02-01, 08:02 PM (PST)
Launched from Daves in Long Beach early Saturday morning and got two scoops of anchovies that were so slimey, so hot, so cured that you couldn't keep em in your hand to chum em. Hit the throttle at 0540am and off I go to a point 10 miles below Pyramid Head. Great weather, a good lump running but no slamming and I'm fishing by 0815am. Head South and West toward the 43 and find some PBrs and 2 sporties working the area. Troll around for a couple hours and get a double jig strike and a bait fish and end up with 2 and a half albies because a 4 foot mako munched the other half. Later, I went out to check the jigs for kelp and while winding in the first one I see the other one get bumped.....then go bendo. I put rod one down and run in and shut down the motor and with the jig less then 20 feet from the boat and before I slide to a stop, another albie races in and eats the jig! And I get another bait fish too boot! Later I get another stop and more bait fish which were released. Quit fishing at 3pm and headed for Pyrmid cove and Bar B Qued albie. Total for day one, 8 fish. Up at 4am Sunday and back out to the area by 5:30 Have a good morning with 2 stops for 3 jig and 2 bait fish. Then it goes dead for most everybody. Boats start picking fish agin around 12. At around 1pm i find......THE MAGIC PADDY!! I didn't have much confidence so I didn't stop to fish It. Instead I trolled passed and through a line of chum as I went by and BOOOMM, CRASH their here! Stop the boat and here they come! Now, It's 1pm, the sun is out, the water is purple-blue and clear and it's just SO great to look down and see fat brown bodies crashing the chum right at your feet! Pulled 2 fish and tried to run back up to the paddy but saw fish on the finder so I through chum and up they came again. Dumped iron and caught a third. Thats it...I'm done. Put the numbers out on the radio and go out and clean the one fish I gaffed and about the time I'm finished, here they come at full speed. It looked like the Long Beach to Catalina Ski race but from every direction. I swear I even had guys bailing out of airplanes! And not one of them caught a fish. I gess I pulled the fish just too far off the paddy and they left. Oh well, I tried. Total for day 2 was another 8 fish. Anchored for the night just up from fish hook on the front side of the island and had another tuna-Que. Got up this morning and had a cup of coffee and put out some chum and got a nice little bass and barrie bite going and came home at 7:30. The numbers I was fishing at are 32 40.440 and 118 09.177 but the best bite went off 5 miles closer to the 43. Someone else will proably post those numbers. The weather and water temp. can't last much longer. Get em while they're hot. HardFish'n.

Albies south of 425      SCOTT    ALLCOAST    Jul-02-01, 07:32 AM (PST)
Left shelter Island @ 21:30 Fri. nite for 425/south and in some.Started troling @6:00 first hook-up @ 9:00 was a 12# Dorado. Then it was albies about every 20 min.Troled on a 180 heading until we got bit then boxed the area.Numbers were 32 08 117 17 in that area.Got 13 albies,2 yellowtail,1 dorado and a big bone head.The water was not as ruff as we were expecting and that made it nice.Great trip fishing with my brother Richie and my friend Tom who was the hot stick.OH I almost forgot! the water temp was 64.5 deg.The hot jig was zukiny,next was mex. flag. Scott on the trophy.

Putting another trip together out of Ensenada on Amato,s 36 footer for the 11 and 12 of July need 4 more fisherpersons for a total of 5. cost is $225.00 per person includes meals, boat, crew, bait. Alcohol extra. Leave dock at 11:00 pm return next night around 11:00 you can spend the night on the boat the return night.  Also looking for fisherperson to fish mako madness tournament on the 21,22,23 July out of Dana point on one of my 26ft fish equipped Panga.   Thanks Dennis