As I’ve been feeling better and better, I had the itch to take the skiff offshore. Weather looked nice, so I decided to make a run. The fish had been thinning out where I wanted to go, but I was still able to get on one good paddy for fun yellowtail fishing.
Summary
I left San Diego bay around 4:45 and picked up some great bait. It was a mix of sardines and anchovies. The crowds were down a bit which was nice. I went at medium speed until grey light and then made about 17 knots toward a spot between the 371 and 425. Reports had the good paddies southwest of the 425. I saw some mammals on the way down and a few dry paddies.
When I got in the area I was looking for I started to troll and zig-zag around. I made a westerly move and noticed the temps were going down. I gambled that I wanted warmer and headed almost due east. I was south of the 425 by about 5 miles.
I found one paddy that had a little bait on it and saw some birds flying around. The side scan didn’t show anything, so I moved on. About 5 minutes later, I saw a lot of birds doing their fish dance, so I headed at them. 100yds away I saw the nice kelp. Trollers in and bait in the water about 50yds away.
Right away, I had dorado swimming up the to transom. I tried to chunk them, but they wouldn’t play. They kept jumping while I was there just to tease me. While I was chunking, I got hammered on a sardine that resulted in a nice 8# yellow. I put out a chovie next. Nothing. Tried another sardine for instant results.
Trolling and looking for the birds proved to the the ticket. The fishing was plenty for me and a good test of my back. No pain, but I got tired quickly. After getting 4 nice yellows, I headed home.
Catch
Landed 4 of 7 yellows on bait. I was using my Phenix 867ML with a Curado 300 and 808MH with a Daiwa 40H BG. I threw both chovies and sardines, and got all the bites on the sardines.
Conditions
Water
Conditions were nice. Probably one of the top 2-3 days I’ve been out on the water for. Wind was about 5-7 right away, but died down to a lazy west at 5-7 after going totally still. Waves were 1-3 at around 7 seconds. Something was coming out of the south and there was a little wind chop on it from up north, but not bad.
Temps were in the 68-69 range all day.
Tide
Weather
Overcast and 65-70 all day. Pretty classic summer fishing where the sun didn’t come out.