Jaws II - SoCal Fly Fishing

September 2008

Big Blue Shark checking out the chum bucket (a 5-gallon bucket)

 

Catherine and I were in San Clemente for a week of family visiting and beach time so I also got in lots of fishing.  Three days of guided trips - out of Dana Harbor with Bryan Webb, out of San Diego for sharks with Dave Trimble, and out of San Diego to hit the kelp beds with Peter Piconi.   On top of that I got out on San Clemente and San Onofre beaches the other three mornings in town.  All in all a good time and I ended up with 9 species for the week.

Sharks

On Tuesday I went out with Capt. Dave Trimble of On the Fly  guide service.  We headed out of Dana Landing on Mission Bay around 6:30 a.m. and set a bearing for a ridge about 13 miles SW of San Diego.  On the way we encountered California Gray Whales, Ocean Sunfish, lots of birds, and surprisingly lots of seals and sea lions in shark country.    

About an hour after setting up our chum line we had a big shark approach the boat, a 100+ lbs. Blue Shark.  The fish about ate a gull on the way in to the boat and kept ramming up on the chum bucket.  When Dave started teasing him he came clear out of the water so we re-rigged the 14-weight with a big popper to try and get him on top.   Another even bigger Blue came into the area but never got close enough to the boat, probably a good thing since the 16-weight was back at the dock.  Once we re-rigged the big shark got close and took the popper on about the 2nd cast, a slow motion "rise" of a big snout followed by a big toothy mouth.   I got a good setup on him immediately and it was off to the races for about the next 30 minutes.   After a couple of long runs the shark sounded and then it was a long battle getting back 4" of backing at a time until finally running line and shooting head appeared.  We got the fish to boat, definitely the biggest Blue I've landed.

After a brief rest we set up again and pretty quickly had a small blue to the boat.  This one was a 10-weight fish but I took him on a 12-weight just to get a break, felt pretty easy after his big brother.  We got two Makos to the boat and I hooked up both.  The first took a very long run then just came unglued.  I landed the second, a nice Mako of probably 50-60 lbs., quite reasonable compared to the Blue or the big Mako I got in '06.

Yum, pounded Skipjack

Birds on the wing, Sharks in the water...
100+ lbs. Blue whacking the chum Shark on!
Big Blue to boat
Baby Blue Mako (blurry I know, hard to focus with that on the end of the line)

 

Kelp Beds & the Kelp Grand Slam

I spent two days fishing the kelp beds inshore.  The first was with Bryan Webb of  Pacific Coast Fly Fishing, who I met last year when in San Clemente.  We took off out of Dana Point Harbor on Sunday morning and fished the kelp off San Mateo Point and San Onofre as well as the rocks off of San Clemente.  We had an excellent day on Calico Bass, landing probably 20 of them, as well as several Pacific Mackerel, Pacific Barracuda, and a Kelp Greenling.  A by-catch for the day was a Cormorant and a Tern, I now have 4 bird species to my list!  The early morning was by far the best, we had fish almost every cast for a while.

On Thursday I went out of Mission Bay with Peter Piconi of Fly Fish San Diego and the new SoCal Fly Fishing Outfitters.  I've fished with Peter off and on for about 5 years now and am never disappointed.   We headed out to the kelp beds off La Jolla first and managed to get some Calico Bass, lots of Spanish Mackerel and some Pacific Mackerel.  When bigger fish didn't show we motored down the beds off of Coronado Island and there had tons of life.  My first fish was a Bonito, the first one I'd ever caught, and quite a fight on a 7-weight rod.  I got several very nice Barracuda there also along with the usual assortment of Pacific Mackerel.  My first Kelp Grand Slam - Calico Bass, Barracuda, and Bonito all in the same morning. 

Pacific Barracuda off San Mateo Pacific Bonito, my first!

Beaches

I spent three mornings on the beaches from 6-8:00 or 8:30.  I fished San Clemente two mornings and got a half dozen Surfperch on a #8 Surf Merkin.  I never saw any Corbina on the beach but a spin fisherman did see one though he had no luck hooking him either.  On the last day I hiked down to the Trestle's surf spot and walked to San Mateo Point to fish around there.  The huge swell of the last several days and the high tide in the morning caused the beach to be almost dangerous.  There was a huge shore break occurring and I had to walk quite a ways to hit a flatter portion of the beach to be able to seriously fish.  I got skunked that morning but was glad just not to have been bowled over by a 4' break on the beach though I did manage to break my 6-weight.  

Gear

I carried lots of gear to SoCal this trip and didn't even have enough to cover all the situations I fished so I had to use the guide's gear.  Here's the run-down on rods used:

For beach fishing a standard assortment of perch/corbina flies works.  I found the Surf Merkin this year is Fly Fishing in Saltwaters and relied on it pretty much.  In the past orange flies have worked great, Piconi's fly (can't remember the name) being one of my faves.  See Gary Bulla's site for a good assortment.  

For kelp nothing beats an Olive Clouser or small Olive colored streamers.  I did go to a bigger Sea Habit a few times and got fish on it too.

For sharks we fished big pink/red Fly H2O streamers and attached a big popper head to one to get the top-water take.  Tyger Wire works for small guys, hard wire for the big boys.