The Santa Monica Bay sportfishing boats have been catching mostly sand bass, calico bass and rockfish. Now and then barracuda will appear in the counts to spice up the action.
It won't be long though until the barracuda make their showing in the bay and the sportboats from Redondo Beach and Marina del Rey will be close to the fishing grounds.
Readers, do you realize the boats from Santa Monica Bay are out of the docks in five minutes and fishing in 20 minutes. That saves tremendous fishing time.
The Enterprise out of Long Beach Marina is catching both calico bass and sand bass, lots of them.
The Enterprise is in a perfect mooring area for fishing near the Southeast Bank and for rockfish on the Huntington Flats.
Huntington Flats is the No. 1 area for fishing sand bass and barracuda. Last week, the San Pedro Special twilight boat out of 22nd Street Landing caught 261 barracuda, 71 sand bass and two mako sharks.
The presence of mako sharks indicate two things to anglers. First, the water is warming. Second, a mako shark steak off the barbecue is hard to beat.
The Southern Cal twilight boat out of Pierpoint Landing has been catching good-sized "skinnies" in its evening run, contrary to the usual, that the barracuda stop biting at dark.
The sand bass also are biting in the evening for all the boats across the Southern California coast.
Yes, the 'cuda are here in force, and to top it off, the heavy-hitter
fishing veterans say the barracuda and sand bass catch will be at its best in a couple of weeks.In addition, the yellowtail might be showing as kelp paddies are beginning to float up from Mexico.
Island fishing: "Guru" Don Ashley of Pierpoint Landing said Catalina is so crowded with boats on the weekend the white seabass simply disappear.
Most of the white seabass are caught during the week, from the Isthmus to and around the West End now that the personal bag limit has jumped to three per angler.
Allyn Watson on the Dreamer took limits of white seabass during the week and a limit of 18 fish Sunday.
To date, the total counts for white seabass are: 91 for the Options from Pierpoint, and 60 for the Pursuit from 22nd Street Landing in San Pedro.
Ashley announced that Pierpoint Landing and Long Beach Marina have started the Kids Fish Free program. Any kid under 16 can fish free with a paid adult during the week on any half-
day, three-quarter-day, or twilight boat.
Freshwater: Catfish season officially opened Friday at Irvine Lake, but it was plain that the cats jumped the gun more than a month ago.
The opener brought the opportunity to fish in the evening, and the fish bit well both June 8-9. The best bites were at Santiago Flats, Boat Dock Cove and West Shore.
Santa Ana River Lakes produced quality stringers daily last week. The twice-
weekly plants of blue cats and silver cats have produced many 6- to 10-pound quality fish.
Bait for catfish is fresh mackerel, shrimp with "Bite-On Cajon" scent or others applied.
SARL conducts a catfish tournament each weekend with a $5 entry. Heaviest fish takes the pot.
Catfish facts: Did you know that specific bait is very important in catfish angling? Anglers mess around with homemade stuff and most of these concoctions stink to high heaven.
But the best baits are fish types or the old standby, chicken liver. I have also found that certain fishing techniques are important. Probably the most important is fly-lining the bait, eliminating all sinkers and fish at night or as close to darkness as possible.
The California state record catfish is a blue cat caught out of San Vicente Reservoir in San Diego. It weighed 103 pounds. Irvine Lake has cats that weigh as much as 60 pounds, and if you release a cat in that category you will receive some special lake prizes.
In the U.S., catfish can take on any number of slang names like mud cat and bullhead, which are really blue cats. Catfish are bottom feeders and can detect food through the skin. Their heads are flat for digging through the bottom strata. They have up to four barbells for detecting food.
They also have chemoreceptors across their body, which means they can taste anything they touch and smell chemicals in the water. In some species, they can actually breathe through the skin.
So as you can surmise, bait and smell are very important considerations when catfish angling. I know for a fact that the experts roll their hands in the next bait they are casting to hide their "human" smell.
Contrary to what is thought about catfish, the guru anglers like to use fresh mackerel, not just any old mackerel.
Hunters: July 1 marks the opening of the general rabbit season in California for brush cottontail pygmy rabbits and varying hare (snowshoe). Limit is five per day. Jackrabbits open all year.
gvanzant@verizon.net
