Showing posts with label Local. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Local. Show all posts
Friday, May 10, 2013
Monday, April 1, 2013
Local guide Justin Hanold scores record-setting tournament win at Lake Havasu
Written by Kellen Ellis Wednesday, March 27, 2013 News - Freshwater Fishing News 
Poway's Justin Hanold, a local bass fishing guide scored a big WON Bass Pro/Am tournament win at Lake Havasu on March 16th and 17th. Hanold weighed a two day limit totaling 46.97 pounds, anchored by a huge 5-fish limit on day 1 weighing 26.83 pounds.
Hanold arrived in Lake Havasu City on Tuesday the 12th to begin a few days of pre-fish. With temperatures rising in the desert, new waves of bass were moving up to the shallows to spawn each day. Justin made an unorthodox decision, saying "I made up my mind early that I would not make a single cast during all four days of practice."
After four days of covering shoreline with his eyes fixed in the shallows, Hanold had over 280 "marks" (GPS waypoints) set, all holding the location of solid bedding bass (mostly smallmouth). "With what I was seeing, I had a feeling every competitor would have 15 pounds in the boat in the first hour of the tournament," he said. With as many fish as there were up spawning in the lake, Justin knew he would have to focus his efforts on finding largemouth bass, which are bigger and more plentiful in the Colorado River which feeds Havasu to the north. So Justin set his focus on the river on the last day of practice, and found enough quality fish to know thats where he'd attack during the competition.
On day 1 Justin had caught his big fish of the day, a 7.06 pounder, a 6 pounder, and 3 fish around 4 pounds by 8 AM. Despite having a few more 5 pound quality fish marked in the river that would cull out those 4 pounders, Justin made a wise decision to leave them alone and save them for the second day. So Justin spent the rest of day 1 back in the main lake, hopping around his marks and was able to cull all 3 of the 4 pounders, leading to his first day total of 26.83 pounds.
On the second day of competition Justin ran right back up river to get those 5 pounders he saved the day before. Unfortunately, he arrived to find those fish gone, either caught the day before by other competitors, or just absent for whatever reason. That's not the way you want to start the second day of a tournament you're leading, but Justin kept grinding.
Fortunately for Justin, there were plenty of bass still in the river, and he had lots of marks left to check. He ran around the river catching the rest of the quality marks he had without having to save anything, and by 9 AM had around 17 pounds. At that point, he decided to again hit the main lake and try to continue culling fish. "Finding fish [in the main lake] was hard, but I was able to cull several times by running-and-gunning," he said.
Justin's running-and-gunning efforts yielded a limit on the second day weighing 20.14 pounds, giving him enough to win by a little more than 2.5 pounds over second place angler Clay Lippincott of Goodyear, AZ. All of Justin's fish were caught on white Berkley Jigs with Chigger Craw trailers.
Justin set new WON Bass records for single-day and two-day totals, both being held previously by Hall of Famer Mike Folkestad.
The win was worth $10,360 dollars in total, made up of cash prizes for 1st place, day 1 big stringer, and third biggest fish of the tournament.
The fishing at Havasu was truly spectacular for this tournament, as evidenced by the fact that the last place pro angler, Ed Shaver in 47th place caught a two day limit of 10 bass weighing 27.95 pounds, nearly a 3 pound bass average.
For more information on Justin Hanold, or to book a guide trip, visit his website at socalfishingadventures.com or give him a call at 858.254.9215.
Sunday, July 1, 2012
SCV <b>Fishing</b> Report June 19th: Local Lakes And Saltwater Report
It's Tuesday and that means it's time for the Halibut Hal Fishing Report for KHTS AM-1220:
Freshwater Report:
1) Castaic Lake....Still a very good largemouth bass bite happening this past week; try the Lagoon, Necktie Canyon or Hawk's Nest for bass up to about five pounds. If it's stripers you're after, then try the Buoy Line, Sharrons Rest or C-Point in the 40-60 foot depth. There's also a good bluegill/crappie bite off the pier; use mealworms or small jigs.
2) Pyramid Lake....Windy conditions continued this past week. When the winds do back off, catfish are biting both for shore anglers and boaters in the Coves, mostly on cut baits. Black bass are still around and are biting in 5 - 15 foot depth of water. Slow trout fishing prevails.
3) Lake Piru....Also experienced lots of wind this past week. Good bass fishing with many fish up to 4 pounds; try fishing with nightcrawlers in the Marina area. Along the shorelines by Reasoner Cove is where you'll find both crappie and redear.
4) Lake Cachuma....Fish early AM or late afternoon with live shad, for the best action on largemouth and smallmouth bass. Try the Coves for both catfish and bluegill. If you want trout action, try fishin near the Dam with nightcrawlers.
Saltwater Report:
Landings from Long Beach to Marina Del Rey:
The "Gail Force" from L A Harbor Sportfishing nailed limits of calico bass and lost a couple yellowtail while fishing Catalina on Monday. Meanwhile, the "Fortune" from 22nd Street Landing in San Pedro, on Father's Day, scored six yellowtail and lost a dozen more in the rocks/kelp and the anglers caught lots of calicos at Catalina Island.
Oxnard/Ventura Landings:
HOT BITE ALERT: The "Mirage" is on the first day of a 2 day trip and, as of this morning, they already have boated 24 white seabass and 22 halibut!!! The "Aloha Spirit", on Monday, returned to the dock with 22 white seabass, 6 halibut and 9 barracuda for 12 happy anglers. There's plenty of candy bait (squid) in the bait tanks for the Oxnard fleet. The water is getting warmer, the conditions continue to improve and the fishing is awesome!.....GO FISH!
....'til next Tuesday, this is Halibut Hal signing off for your Hometown Station, KHTS 1220AM.
Sunday, June 24, 2012
VAN ZANT: Local barracuda `season' on horizon
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
Friday, June 15, 2012
Local lake called one of best for family <b>fishing</b> fun
MEADVILLE — Pymatuning Lake: 17,000-plus acres of family-friendly, fish-filled northwestern Pennsylvania freshwater, attractively nestled (by some well-read accounts) right between Port Isabel in Texas and Reelfoot Lake in Tennessee.
Does that make sense? Not really?
Well, check out the May issue of Game & Fish magazine, and it will: That nationwide, all-things-outdoors publication has put Pymatuning Lake at Number 7 (right between Port Isabel and Reelfoot Lake) in its “10 Top Destinations for Family Fishing Vacations” in 2012.
“Shallow, stained, cover-laden and filled to the gills with crappie, walleyes, bass and bluegills, Pymatuning Lake beckons families because the fish stack up in obvious spots during early summer and eat quite readily,” article author, Georgia-based outdoors writer/photographer Jeff Samsel, writes in the recently-published “10 Top.”
Samsel, who couldn’t immediately be reached for additional comment, gave Pymatuning the notable designation of being among the nation’s best family fishing spots following a recent guided tour of the lake and Pymatuning State Park, according to Juanita Hampton, executive director of the Crawford County Convention and Visitors Bureau.
That honor’s been bestowed following reports earlier this year that Pymatuning — which attracts around 3.3 million visitors a year — brings the largest economic impact of any state park in Pennsylvania, according to a study conducted by Penn State University in coordination with the state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources.
With the summer season getting into full swing, those designations are “fabulous (news) for our area,” said Hampton. “This is huge. ...The most important thing about this destination,” she added, “is that it’s family-oriented.”
And any way the lines are cast out that way, “it’s some darn good fishing,” she said.
Ask some of those most familiar with Pymatuning, and they’ll say it’s getting better all the time. Park Manager Pete Houghton, for example, said the recent Memorial Day weekend was, from his view and 36 years’ experience, “the best one ever” for fishing and overall park visitation. From then on, “everyone’s (been) getting fish — it’s phenomenal,” he said.
Joel Brown, longtime member and president of the Pymatuning Lake Association, credits that growing anglers’ success (and growing fish populations) to the ongoing work by that association’s volunteers in conjunction with Houghton and other park and state outdoors officials. From population-boosting and habitat-establishing projects to general maintenance and a host of other continuing efforts, “you put it all together, and, I’m telling you, the fishing is fantastic,” Brown said.
The Game & Fish designation is “spot-on,” said Brown.
And “as long as there’s fish in this lake,” he added, “everything else is going to take care of itself — all the hotels, businesses, restaurants ... it’s really showing” how the draw of the fish in turn positively affects the local economic climate-at-large.
Economic impact
Pymatuning’s visitors spent a total of more than $83.6 million on their trips to the park in 2010, according the PSU/DCNR study released earlier this year. That spending, according to the study, directly resulted in more than $78.3 million in commercial sales; the creation of 1,178 jobs; $27.3 million-plus in labor income; and more than $43.5 million in “value added” — that includes profits, rents, indirect business taxes and more — to the region’s economy.
The economic impact of Pennsylvania’s most-visited park, Presque Isle State Park in Erie — which had roughly 4 million visitors in 2010 — ranked just under Pymatuning in terms of economic impact, according to the study’s findings.
The park — and by extension, the entire region — “has so much going for it,” said Hampton.
Did you know?
Pymatuning Lake has been named among the “10 Top Destinations for Family Fishing Vacations” in 2012 in the May issue of Game & Fish magazine, a nationwide all-things-outdoors publication.
Here’s the “Top 10” list:
1. Black Hills (South Dakota)
2. Everglades City and 10,000 Islands (Florida)
3. Kenai Peninsula (Alaska)
4. Mammoth Lakes (California)
5. Niagara River (New York)
6. Port Isabel (Texas)
7. Pymatuning Lake (Pennsylvania)
8. Reelfoot Lake (Tennessee)
9. San Diego (California)
10. White River (Arkansas)
To read the entire article, visit gameandfishmag.com/2012/05/23/10-top-destinations-for-family-fishing-vacations.
Learn more
-n For more information about Pymatuning State Park and its public facilities and events, call the park office at (724) 932-3142, email pymatuning@state.pa.us or visit dcnr.state.pa.us.
- To read “The Economic Significance and Impact of Pennsylvania State Parks” — a recently-issued study conducted by Penn State University in coordination with the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources —visit dcnr.state.pa.us/stateparks/thingstoknow/economicimpact/index online.
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