Monterey/Santa Cruz
Mackerel and sanddabs are providing charter boat anglers with an angling option until the rockfish and lingcod season opens in the Monterey Bay region on May 1.

“The 12 anglers who fished today, March 17, aboard the Checkmate were very happy with their sanddab and mackerel catches,” said Todd Arcoleo of Chris’ Fishing Trips. “They caught the sanddabs off the Monterey Beach Hotel, while they bagged the Spanish and Pacific mackerel at the edge of the Monterey Marine Canyon. The fish hit Sabiki rigs, baited with squid strips.”

Chrissy Chonacki at Randy’s Fishing Trips confirmed that the mackerel and sanddab fishing has been very good when the boats are able to fish. “We tried to make a trip on Sunday, but the boat had to return because of rough seas,” she said.

Ken Stagnaro, skipper of the Velocity, has also been making sanddab and mackerel trips out of Santa Cruz Harbor. On his latest venture, the 26 fishermen on board the Velocity caught 180 sanddabs, 150 Spanish mackerel and 140 Pacific mackerel. Their next trip is set for Sunday, March 30.

A big groundswell and wind has kept surf fishing enthusiasts from fishing the Monterey Bay State Beaches lately. “You don’t want to be on the beach when it’s as rough as it has been because it’s not safe,” said Jim Franco of J&D Auto Gone Fishing. As the weather calms down, expect fishing for barred perch and striped bass to rebound.     

  Half Moon Bay
There is very little going on for San Mateo County coast anglers. Some charter operators are offering crabbing and whale watching trips, but public interest is low. In addition, strong winds have deterred boats from getting out of Pillar Point Harbor.

I’ve run a couple crabbing trips with small groups recently, “reported Captain Tom Mattusch on March 17. “We ended up with full limits for a total of 7 anglers on my two last crabbing trips,” he stated.

“We want to do some research fishing in deep water, but those trips won’t happen until April 1 at the earliest,” added Mattusch. 

The folks at the Queen of Hearts are ready to run whale watching trips, but so far there has not been much interest and the weather is making things all that much more difficult. 

The word is the same at the Huck Finn Sportfishing Center with no trips having run lately and no trips scheduled in the near future.

  San Rafael
Rico Petri of Fairfax and Keith Fraser, owner of Loch Lomond Live Bait and Tackle, tried to catch sturgeon on Monday, March 17, but they couldn’t keep the stripers from grabbing the bait.

“We lost one sturgeon and caught one starry flounder while using ghost shrimp east of the Pumphouse in 12 feet of water,” said Fraser. “However, the rest of the time our baits were getting hit by bass. Within 1 on just about every cast, we hooked a striper.”

In the 1-1/2 hours they fished, they landed 4 keeper stripers to 8 pounds and had their baits stolen numerous times. “We left after we had gone through 3 dozen ghost shrimp,” he said. “The sturgeon didn’t have a chance.”

Trollers are also nailing stripers. For example, Tom Glasser and Tom Nelson caught and released 10 stripers, about half keepers, and nailed a 26 halibut on a recent trip. They were trolling wormtail jigs at the Brickyard.

“Shore anglers are nailing both stripers and sturgeon while bait fishing off Buckeye Point, about 1 mile past China Camp,” Fraser added.

  Emeryville/Berkeley
To say that there isn’t much going on for East Bay charter boat anglers is an understatement. In fact, there is virtually nothing going on beyond the occasional sturgeon fishing trip.

“We have been doing some sturgeon fishing on the weekend, but we didn’t go out this weekend,” reported Craig Stone of the Emeryville Sportfishing Center on March 16. “There has been some pretty good halibut action taking place down in the South Bay. We are planning to start running halibut trips by the beginning of April.”

There have been no reports coming out of Berkeley, since the Berkeley Sportfishing Center is temporarily closed. Charter boat operators are expecting to offer a normal season of action, starting with halibut fishing in early April.

At this time, the best action in the East Bay is taking place off the bank. Shore anglers are catching plenty of shiner perch while fishing with shrimp baits and pile worms. 

Leopard sharks have just started to show up for bankies soaking squid, sardines and mackerel.

So far there have been no stripers reported by anglers fishing the East Bay shoreline, but they should start showing at some point next month. Early in the run baits such as ghost shrimp and pile worms will provide the best chance for success. Once the bass start showing in stronger numbers pluggers will start to get in on the action. 

  Crockett/Martinez
The fishing is far from wide open, but anglers soaking baits in San Pablo and Suisun Bays are whacking an impressive array of gamefish these days and the action promises to get even better over the coming weeks.

“Last week we ran trips on Wednesday, Friday and Saturday and we had quite a bit of luck,” related Captain Gordon Hough of the Morning Star. “On Wednesday, our 12 anglers got 2 keeper sturgeon, 17 stripers, some big perch and 1 keeper halibut. We got all these fish while fishing shrimp baits while anchored in San Pablo Bay. On Friday, our score was 6 stripers and a halibut for 10 anglers. On Saturday, we fished east of the Pump House and ended up with 1 keeper sturgeon and 5 stripers for 18 angles.”

Captain Jim Smith of Happy Hooker Sportfishing described the fishing as “slow, but starting to get better.” “The temperature is 55 degrees and we are starting to see more action. Today we got a shaker sturgeon and lost a monster oversize fish that an angler fought for over 45 minutes. We are using a wide variety of baits including ghost, mud and grass shrimp along with roe and pile worms, “ shared Smith.

Captain James Smith of California Dawn Sportfishing has been catching both sturgeon and striped bass in recent days. “We’ve got a 52 inch sturgeon and a keeper striper in the box right now and yesterday we had a 65 inch sturgeon,” disclosed Smith on March 16. “I’m probably only going to run three more sturgeon trips up here and then I’m moving back down to the main bay. Halibut are showing up in the South Bay and I want to be in a position to get out after them in early April.”

Jay Lopes of Right Hook Sportfishing has been fishing mainly in Suisun Bay from the Moth Ball Fleet to Big Cut. His primary baits have been eel and shrimp. In recent days one of his clients scored a 52 inch sturgeon, but Lopes confided that fishing conditions have not been very favorable due primarily to the strong winds that have been plaguing the bay and West Delta. 

  Bodega Bay
The outlook and attitude of most charter boat anglers and skippers along the Sonoma Coast is very bleak overall. Due to the probable closure of salmon season, the next major angling opportunity will be the opening day of rockfish season on June 1.

“We have nothing going on around here,” exclaimed Captain Rick Powers of the Bodega Bay Sportfishing Center. “The squid have departed and the crabbing isn’t very good, so we are pretty much reduced to running whale watching trips.”

Captain Les Fernandes at Fish On Bait and Tackle said virtually the same thing as Captain Powers. “There isn’t anything happening up here in terms of fishing. We are running the occasional whale watching trip and that’s about it,” related Fernandes.

“Next month if the tides are right we will be running some leopard shark trips in the bay and, of course, if halibut make a showing along the beach, we’ll head out and take a crack at them,” added Fernandes. 

  Fort Bragg
It is no secret that salmon numbers are critically low in California waters, but for a graphic example of just how low the numbers are, we need look no further than the action taking place outside Noyo Harbor. 

The season has been open for over a month and in that time there have only been two salmon caught by charter boats. One of the salmon was a shaker caught aboard the Telstar and the other was a fine 10 pound keeper caught aboard the Sea Hawk while they were on a whale watching trip. Now, this is typically a very slow time for salmon fishing offshore of Fort Bragg with the best action coming in May and June, but results this low are unheard of. 

“I haven’t been able to get on the water due to the weather, but even before the water got rough there weren’t any good reports of fish being caught or located,” reported Randy Thornton of Telstar Charters.