Author: Erik Landesfeind

It only took one early season Saturday offshore run to convince Matt and me that we probably weren’t going to be doing anymore offshore fishing this year. Now that the fish have moved well out of range of our little boat I can proudly say that we never did take that second trip. If you’re wondering why I’d be proud of sitting out the best offshore season in at least 15 years; the answer is simple. I hate fishing around other boats. While I’d assume that most boaters would prefer to have a spot of biting fish to themselves, for…

Tuna Bite Outer Banks Just when it looked like things were finally winding down on the offshore scene, the Cortes and Tanner banks cranked it right back up with a late fall bite. The banks, which produced a lot of the bluefin for the long range fleet this summer, had been hit and miss the last couple months and hadn’t been getting much coverage due to better opportunities closer to home. But with the coastal fish drying up, 1 1/2-day boats have been making the run and loading up. On a recent trip the Tribute landed 115 yellowfin tuna, 38…

In its simplest form, fishing the breakwall is about as basic as inshore techniques get. Position your boat within casting distance of the wall, pitch a bait up to where the rocks stick out of the water, hop the bait down the rocks and pull like hell when you get a bite so the fish doesn’t get back in a hole and break your line. But simple can be boring and relatively unproductive unless the conditions are just right. As a result, most anglers will bring a quiver of rods and reels to cover the not so simple scenarios that…

It’s been getting dark earlier and earlier lately and with end of daylight savings time, our after-work fishing options are becoming limited. The good news is that one of those options, the Long Beach breakwall, is just coming into its prime-bite time. While it might not be as exciting as pulling on yellowtail, targeting bass at the wall can be a lot of fun and it’s a great way to keep your angling skills sharp during the off-season. While the breakwall I’ll be discussing is the one that surrounds the Long Beach and Los Angeles Harbors, all of the breakwalls…

The good news this week is that the unprecedented yellowtail fishing we’ve had along the coast continued, with boats from the Channel Islands down to the Mexican getting in on the bite. The bad news is that there’s a storm system bearing down on us that might put a damper on the fishing. The storm is forecast to arrive on Friday night, with minimal amounts of rain falling along the southern coast, but the rain has plenty of wind behind it and it’s forecast to blow 20-plus all day Saturday. It’s anyone’s guess as to the long-term effects of this…

The yellowtail fishing we’ve had along our coast this year has been off the charts and the bite isn’t showing any signs of slowing down. If we’re lucky enough to have another mild winter, there is no reason that these fish shouldn’t continue biting. So let’s take a look at a few tips that private boaters can use to get in on the action. The first tip really isn’t a tip at all; it’s actually a question that private boaters should ask themselves before they even decide on where to go fishing. That question is, “How do I want to…

It’s taken until the third week of October, but summer is finally ending on the Southern California coast. With the crazy season we’ve had so far I’m not going to make any predictions of things coming to an end, but I will say that fishing is in a transitional period. There have been some sporadic northwest winds blowing offshore over the last couple weeks and with another wind episode forecast for Sunday, it’s obvious that we are entering the fall weather pattern. This blow probably won’t be enough to end the season, but every time the wind blows out of…

On Monday night I got a call from my friend Captain Jimmy Decker asking if I’d like to fish with him for a few hours the following morning. This wasn’t all that unusual, as was it not unusual that I had to decline due to other obligations. What was unusual about it was when he told me that he planned to leave Newport Harbor at 5:30 AM, head out and try to catch a wahoo in the morning and then look for a marlin on the way home. “I have something to do in the afternoon, so I’ll be home…

Yellowtail Bite Continues One of the few normal things about this very abnormal season is that since early spring, the best yellowtail bites have been happening around the full moon and October’s full moon was no different. As we approached the full on October 8th, the bites that had been cranked up a couple notches and bites developed in several new areas. As with every full moon, there is a bit of uncertainty as to what the fish will do in the coming days, so I’d advise keeping a close tab on Fishdope and the sport boat counts before deciding…

Reading Offshore Conditions Over the last several months, I’ve received multiple emails from readers asking me to explain some of the tools and practices private boaters use when fishing offshore. Many of these questions revolve around reading SST and Chlorophyll charts and translating that information into catching fish. So let’s take a look at what the charts are telling us. This is an SST chart from 9:12 PM on September 17th. As you can tell by the legend at the top of the screen, the water showing up as blue is the coldest and temps increase as it makes it…

The word “unprecedented” has been used to death this year. It’s been used to describe boats scoring wahoo out of Dana Point, blue marlin biting in U.S. waters and long range boats fishing Catalina Island; and as much as I hate to do it, I’ve got to drag it out once again to describe this week’s coastal yellowtail bite. What’s so unprecedented about the yellowtail bite? Well, for starters most of the fish are in the 20 to 30-pound range, which is definitely not normal for a warm-water year. Even less normal is the fact that the fish are being…

I’m not going to spend a lot of time discussing the tuna bite this week as not much has changed since I wrote last weeks column. That being said, there is one thing that bears repeating. In my column from September 12th, Captain Jimmy Decker talked about how the yellowfin off the Orange County coast were moving west each day. Well, that westward progress seems to have been partially blocked by the band of cold water that’s been sitting off the west end of San Clemente for going on two weeks. As a result, the front side is still kicking…

The big news this week is that a blue marlin joined the offshore fishing party that’s been happening in U.S. waters. While there have been reports of large marlin being seen the last few weeks, someone finally hooked one over the weekend. The fish, which was estimated to be in the 400-pound class, was hooked during the Oceanside Anglers Marlin Tournament aboard the Reel Nice & Easy. Captain Clayton Dobbs was fishing aboard the Reel Nice & Easy, one mile west of the 152 when he spotted skipjacks puddling and decided to put out a KK Pono, Skipjack-colored, jig on…

If you thought last week’s wahoo report from Dana Point was strange, get ready for something crazy. Yesterday, Channel Islands Sportfishing had more yellowfin tuna in their counts than did Fisherman’s Landing or Point Loma Sportfishing. If that’s not enough for you; this week at least one long range boat, along with several San Diego overnight boats, were competing for tuna with the 3/4 day boats out of San Pedro and all within sight of Catalina Island. In hopes of getting to the bottom of what’s going on, I spoke with Captain Jimmy Decker, who has been running charters almost…

With our second hurricane in less than a month currently spinning off the coast of Baja California, things are looking good on the offshore fishing scene. While hurricanes and the big south swells associated with them don’t actually push warm water (or fish) into our waters, they are helpful nonetheless. While explaining the details of their benefits is best left to an expert like Chris Dunn, the Fishing Weatherman, here’s my Weather for Dummies version. Whenever a warm storm system comes up out of the south it will block, or at least lessen the affects of northwest winds on our…

It’s getting harder and harder not to sound like a broken record when reporting on this season’s fishing. So, suffice it to say that the tuna fishing out of San Diego is about as good as it gets. Take for example Tuesday’s afternoon half-day trip on the Dolphin out of Fisherman’s Landing . On that trip, 11 anglers brought in 110 yellowfin tuna. Like I said, it’s about as good as it gets. If you’re lucky enough to find a 3/4-day boat with spots available, they are getting them too. The San Diego out of Seaforth Landing had just under…

Private Boat Yellowtail Techniques The yellowtail bite at Catalina is the best it’s been since the 1998 El Nino and with fish scattered from the east to west ends, along both the front and back side of the island, it doesn’t look like the action will slow down any time soon. Despite the volume of fish, there have been many reports from private boaters who have either struck out at the island or only ended up with a couple fish for their efforts. While some of these unsuccessful trips can be attributed to the yellows not biting on that day,…

This week’s big news is that there is no big news as the fish are biting just as well as they were last week. While this doesn’t make for very exciting headlines, it does bode well for anglers who have trips planned for the weekend. Let’s take a look at what’s biting. The Channel Islands continue to serve up their standard summer fare of rockfish and calicos with enough exotics in the mix to keep things interesting. To take full advantage of what the islands have to offer, your best bet remains an overnight or full day trip. If you’re…

Bluefin Tuna Fishery The big news earlier this week was that the Mexican government agreed to let sportfishing boats once again target bluefin tuna in Mexican waters. This verbal assent was supposed to be followed shortly by a written statement, but that hasn’t happened yet. SAC (Sportfishing Association of California) was instrumental in getting the ban lifted, but according to So Cal Salty they are now hedging their bets. Yesterday, the SAC sent out a letter to all owners of member vessels advising that they had yet to receive official written notice of the lifting of the bluefin ban in…

Here it is, the first full week of August and much like the last full week of July and the string of weeks leading up to that week, the tuna bite continues. But what about everything else? Where are the sand bass, the barracuda, the calicos? Well, that’s tough to say and with the offshore fishing as good as it’s been, it’s easy enough to kind of forget about the fish that aren’t biting. I was reminded of these other species when I received an email from a reader this week asking, “why there are such big numbers of sculpin…

The offshore fishing is still the big news this week, but before I get into detail about what’s happening, I’d like to take a look at some other fishing options. First off, the seabass, yellowtail and halibut are still biting at the Channel Islands. Most of the seabass and halibut are being caught by overnight boats out of Ventura Sportfishing. 3/4-day trips fishing the islands have been doing well on calico bass and there have been some yellowtail in the mix. Sport boats fishing the coast from Marina Del Rey to Dana Point have been mostly targeting rockfish and sculpin…

Fishing weedless baits in the kelp for calico bass is probably the most exciting aspect of inshore fishing in Southern California. There’s really nothing like firing your bait down a long lane in the kelp and burning it past multiple ambush points during the retrieve. Even though you’re expecting it, you’re still surprised when that big bass materializes out of the kelp and detonates on your lure. You give it a pause to turn on the bait before swinging hard and the fight is on. The rod loaded to its maximum while the bass lunges side to side in an…

With the membership of our message board being so high, it’s easy to miss when a particular member suddenly stops posting. Some of these members move away, others get too busy with work and a few even give up fishing altogether. Whatever the case, they’ve decided to move on and we wish them the best. But once in a while, one of these members that we didn’t know left, will have stopped posting for another reason altogether. Kevin Woyjeck was one of these members and he gave his life while fighting the Yarnell fire in Arizona last year. I received…

With fish spread from Long Beach to well below the Mexican border, the offshore season is in full swing and the fishing is the best it’s been in a very long time. There was some wind this week, but the forecast for the weekend is stellar and the fish should be biting. I have to warn you though. The good weather coupled with biting fish is going to make for crowded sport boats and lots and lots of private boat traffic. So, before I get to what’s biting in Southern California, I’d like to take a moment to offer a…