Tunaslam Corner-02-26-10
by Cory Visser
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Darin showing off his Monstar Bug
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“TUNASLAM CORNER”
Thursday Recap Report-Weekend Possibilities:
For local fishing in Santa Monica, Long Beach, Catalina and San Clemente Islands. 02-25-10That darn weatherman keeps on throwing us Fast Balls, Curve Balls and Change Ups, and annoyingly almost always on the weekends. Guess what guys and Gals more Rain and Wind this weekend! Bah Humbug! I’m itching to get out. Third weekend in a row my trip to Ensenada was cancelled. Just huge swells over 10 feet and 20 to 30 knot winds standing in the way from going south of the border this weekend. Not much better conditions forecasted locally either.
Meanwhile between storms and wind, The Giant Squid took the week off! Keep on targeting these ravenous predators, and hopefully you find a recipe that suits your tastes. For best results you should cut off the head, remove the entrails, and ice ASAP! Always remember to remove the outer membrane on either side of the steaks, cut into thin portions, about ¼ inches thick. The rest of the recipe is up for grabs, and often disappoint. Soaked in milk overnight, generously dipped in a good fish batter, and deep fried seems to yield the most favorable results. If the Squid is over cooked, becomes tough as a rubber tire, under cooked, turns to mush. I have tasted some that are sensational and others where I couldn’t even swallow one bite. A fellow I work with caught some the other night and pan fried the large Calamari steaks thinly sliced, cut it into small cubes, and made cerviche out of it. He said the whole family went bonkers over the recipe? Good luck with your experimenting with recipes for Calamari!
The winter bass bite has been sensational so far this year, that is, when you can get out? Water temps at a very warm 59 to 60 degrees in many areas, despite all these storms, which are normally in the low to mid 50’s this time of year, supports the predicted El Nino conditions this summer. Palos Verdes, the Horseshoe Kelp, Izor’s Reef, and the Newport Pipe have all yield great results. I fish exclusively with plastics for both Sand and Calico Bass, and release almost all I catch. Drifting over structure and bait balls near structure, yield the best results.
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Darin's bug Mania
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Many ask is it an AM bite or PM? Wish I could tell you, as so far this year it varies all the time. There have been killer bites in the grey, just after sun up, and both late and early afternoon. Does the bite correlate with the tides, not necessarily? Although good tides often produce better fishing, as opposed to lousy tides, a few trips went WFO on flat water days? Go figure?
Speaking of El Nino, if it happens, it generally means an early and a short Albacore season. The Chicken of the Sea Tuna does not like water temps over 68. Consequently if that threshold is reached by early July or sooner as it did last year, Albacore head for water that is cooler and that means 100+ miles offshore, or up north, depending on how wide spread the warm water expands. I fished the 238 bank in late June last year, some 72 miles south of Point Loma, where the water temps on the high spot were already in the 70’s. Yikes, that warm early. Mother wind had her hand in El Nino last year, and kept rolling the water over to keep the temps down somewhat. However, the main schools of Albacore still required a fast boat with a great range of at least 250 miles to reach the main herds. Most sport boats had to schedule minimum 1 ½ day trips to reach the fish.
Now El Nino could produce excellent White Seabass, Yellowtail, Dorado, Yellowfin Tuna, Sand and Calico Bass Bites. Not sure about Halibut. Regardless of how warm the water is in July, the tendency is for Dorado and YFT to arrive later, perhaps by early August. In normal years YFT won’t arrive until sometimes September. Now Yellowtail could go off next month and well into summer, both at the Islands and offshore.
Thoughts, suggestions, new subjects, tackle and rigging questions, and best of all, send me your pictures of any recent catches of a whopper or personal best fish caught to: tunaslam@roadrunner.com
Or PM me?
I’ll do my best to accommodate you. Thanks Cory.
Islands!
Catalina
No reports or boats out!
San Clemente Island
No Sporties out again, that I know of.
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Max with some nice Bugs
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