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Hey there guys,
I will be heading out in a couple of hours for Friday at Catalina. Report around 8 pmish tomorrow night.
Good luck on your Channel Island trip. You got the 'Channel Island Chovie' FT's, AA's, or BH's all stocked up?
JapanRon
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Hey JR, Don't forget your can of spray paint.
That is a sure fire way to catch lots of Yellows.[laugh]
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Hey there TubeN2 and guys,
16 anglers went on the Tradition to Catalina courtsey of Jimmy and his crew. After tanking up with both live squid and fresh-dead, we got close and personal with some of the kelp beds and stringer areas on the inside, near-west end of Catalina.
Water is cleaning up real nice as Jimmy predicted and it had laid down really nice upon arrival at the island. Overcast early in the morning but just beautiful after the sun came out and the water and fishing heated up.
As it has been with the sportcoats in the last week, the fresh-dead seemed to get a more solid bite. My bass flippin' stick, 15 pound test on a small shimano reel handled fish on my Texas, sliding egg, and later 3/8 ounce leadhead.
I think that when you're fishing squid, it's important to have a leadhead that has an extra wide gap but those leadheads have to be sought out AND will cost you extra. My buddy stayed with the standard gap BUT long shank model leadhead. I suspect he used the long shank because they were kind of short biting a bit.
Fish were biting up and down the water column with the pesky opaleye all the way to the bottom and BITING ON MY LEADHEAD WHOLE SQUID RIG!! The bass pretty much hugged near the kelp edges down to around 15 feet.
Lots of near-miss short calicos and a very good number of 2 - 5 pounders. Some of the heaviest fish were released ...... yes ... some guys were releasing the potential breeders. Give 'em a round of applause guys!! This just reflects, Jimmys outlook to a large degree, and the regulars that fish his boat.
So it was near limits of calicos for those who wanted them and 2-3 opaleye per person average, with 4 sargo or are they pargo. Nice fish.
Great News for Plastic Nuts (like me)
Last but not least......my Wednesday rail buddy started throwing the green back and pearlesent body Kalin 4" swimbait on a leadhead and got his first plastic Catalina calico of the season. I tried for some bumps but ended up with zilthch on the plastic. Pretty hard to get 'em to chomp the plastic with all that candy around,
Great Day fishing and hangin' the my buddies,
JapanRon
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We went out on Sunday to the CAT. We started out on the East end near Farnsworth but inshore.
We were getting some toad Sandies over there. A good sized 18lb Butt was the first strike of the day.
I came close to landing a 45lb YT. It was no problem on my 15lb test and 14lb drag system on my Avet reel with my light bass stick. A little kelp wasn't much of a problem either.
We were pulling out of a spot when I hooked up and the boat played the fish for me as if it was a marlin. Half guns and hammered drag. Finally a fouled hook swooped the hook from the mouth after 22 minutes of fight.
There will always be another day.[cool]
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