Yesi went. Thanks for the advice. No bonito, just sporadic macks. I tried plastic, gulp, no takers. Some guy was catching big opaleye...in the 1.5 to 4 lb range. I watched his technique and gotta say i was impresses and schooled. I tried peas and got small blacksmith, senorita, and calicos...all released. When i used market shrimp, i mostly got senorita..call me the senorita king. Couldnt believe how many fish are there, but they are expert bait stealers. /4Got there late because i missed the first boat so maybe the bonita bite is in the morning if there is any. Right before departure, some guy ariving for the last boat dropped his line down first cast using a dropshot gulp..nailed like a 3 lb grassy. My rig with squid at times cut mack thrown out a bit went untouched. Oh well, i got schooled. Cool ride over and back...not used to getting to catalina so fast...most of the party boats travel over at a snails pace...like 4 knots and so the ride takes forever. Passed by the whole 3/4 day fleet fishing the horseshoe area probally nailing the sandies and barracuda? I think if i go back, id just take 1rod, a little backpack and some fresh frozen bait and go really light and try the shore areas. When i fish mdr, thats how i do it, but of course i have the luxury of my truck nearby with a cooler with ice and drinks.
Interesting place to fish...people waiting for thenext departure back sidle up to you to talk which can be cool if the fishing is kind of slow. Had a group of first graders bumrush me while waiting for the boat when they see me pull a blacksmith out...all asking me questions. I see they all are wearing the same color t-shirts and this young teacher is trying to get them all back to the the waiting area calling them by name. So i help her out cause all they want to do is watch people fish and i say to her , " field trip?". Shes like, "yes, a very long one...thank god its almost over". I kind of chuckle to myself because that was me a couple of months ago with some 3rd graders on a boat field trip so i knew exactly how she felt. She finally gets them all back to the waiting area , safe out of the casting zone, then one of them strays off again and i can hear her saying, "Ok im going to count to 3..1, 2,.., ". It was like she was trying to herd cats.so they finally leave. Then there was this whole family of adults, that descended upon the area all around me, they all looked kind of sketchy so i was keeping an eye on my things, but they were nice. Dont know where they got them but they had some kind of trot line and wanted to try fishing but had no bait or sinkers, so i gave them some. Then they were all trying to bum cigarettes off each other, but each would refer the cigarette bummer to another family member claiming the one they were smoking was their last one. While this was happening their line went unattended and of course...over it went, because it only had like 25 feet of line on it..then the lady with the tot line was shouting ," Who was supposed to be holding the fishing pole (they called this trot line a fishing pole) ". One guy says, "Dont look at me, i was looking for a cigarette." They were kind of funny. I ended up with lots of blacksmith, some small calicos, countless senorita. Lost a nice opaleye. Glad i read one of your posts and brought some peas...ghost shrimp might of been better for the opaleye. Next time i go, i want to either go light for just the day, or take a bunch of stuff and invest a little time beforehand procuring the proper baits, do some planning, and do maybe an overnighter like you did. I think the thing to do is wait for the bonito to start showing up in the counts on the boats that hit catalina, like the pursuit on wednesday. When they do, you probally have a much better chance of catching some bones.
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Let em go and let em grow |
Posted: Wed Jun 20, 2012 8:05 pm
