Pompano Fish Report 2 - April 2007

Yesterday we saw sights that reminded us of the seventies..when the Cortez was alive with birds and fish boils. Your heart would pound with excitement and anticipation as you raced the boat towards the feeding frenzy.

Our day went like this....getting to the bait hole about a half-hour before dawn, we made baits in record time. (Which is in no small measure is due to my buddy's inate ability to think like a mullet. Says he can sense the bait balls.) Then we use the current favorite bait rig...a Sabiki 4-hook bait rig with about 3-4 ounces of weight on bottom and lately have been jigging them up 3-4 at a time. We will want about 10 each for the day’s fishing, figuring a 50% hookup rate.

These are bigeyes...terrific live baits. Hint: use a towel or fish glove to hold them while your other hand takes them off the needle sharp hooks and plop them into your livewell...keeps the slippery devils from jabbing you.

[Edited on 4-6-2007 by Pompano]

first spot...

We first fished baits at favorite yellowtail habitat north of Pta. Chivato. This.a hump of rocks in about 210 ft. called “The Ranch.”..don’t ask me why...I am going to rename it Lonesome Dove anyway, because we have only caught 1 fish there in the last 2 attempts...and this time we scored nada...zero. We fished hard with fly-lined and deep baits, and tried about everything else in the boat except our two dogs....and finally decided to head south 18 miles to "Wilbur's famous Hole"..a renowned and legendary hotspot absolutely guaranteed to produce huge fish...if you were lucky enough to know how to find it.

When fishing it is mandatory in these waters to toast Neptune before noon, so we opened a sacrificial Tecate for him and my buddy...and a cold Pacifico for me. He can have that swill...I can only equate Tecate with rusted metal can taste of the sixties...ruined it for me forever.

Underway to Wilbur's famous Hole, we spied some bird action near Sta. Inez islands and hove to for a bit of bait fishing. I got a good hit and a long run ... and then it let go. I reeled in and the bait was still lively..a sure sign of a light yellowtail bite and release. They are among the gamefish that do not have long sharp teeth. Then my buddy gets one on his fly-lined bait and away it goes. He gets a good hookup and sets the hook well, bringing a nice 20+ pounder to my gaff. We work the birds and spot a few surfacing tails here and there, but for some reason the bite was over for us at that spot.

Besides...Wilbur's famous Hole was still beckoning us further southward..



[Edited on 4-6-2007 by Pompano]

second stop...

Now we are toasting Neptune again while letting the gps guide us towards Wilbur's famous Holeand I mention that fact that all the birds are overtaking us and are rapidly winging south ahead of us. Then far, far ahead on the horizon about 3 miles east of Pt. Conception we can make out a dense cloud just on the water horizon...Birds! Birds by the thousands! A long wide tornado of birds whirling and diving, turning the surface white with their splashes. As we came within a mile or so we saw that the entire sea behind this first mass of birds was alive with yet more.... It was really like the old days of acres and acres of fish boils. We looked at each other and said, “Screw Wilbur's famous Hole!”
and hit the throttle full-bore, racing towards the bird cyclone ahead. Our boat dogs pointed the birds for us, also...but we were too busy getting some rigs ready for pitching iron. I yell...’Tally Ho! Watson..the games afoot!’ My buddy says, “Who’s Watson?..you better lay off the toasting for awhile.” We plunge into the birds....rods at the ready...dogs pointing.

in the fish boil

I have not been in such a mob of seabirds since those early days on the Cortez! Gulls, boobies, pelicans, shearwaters, frigates, yellowtail gulls, splittails...and more..they were all there....literally by the thousands and more streaming in from all directions.

A frenzy of screaming and diving beaks...all scooping up the little blue striped baitfish that were balled up in huge swarms by whatever predators were haranguing them. We glided in, shut down the engine..and started throwing our iron into the mess...we could now see the swirls of larger fish everywhere feeding on the baitballs.

Bits and pieces of baitfish were flung into the air, scooped up in flight by frigates who never set a foot into the water. You could look down and see full bodies, half-bodies and scales everywhere...all sinking into the depths. Meanwhile, we notice that we are not getting any hits....hmmm? What the heck is that about?

We chucked everything at them...plus putting out some more baits...nada. This was very strange, even though by now we had figured the main predators to be firecrackers and not worthy of our fishbox. We finally realized that this huge boil consisted of nary a yellowtail that we could hook, nor a cabrilla, grouper, rooster, etc.

A little frustrated, I dropped my iron down to the bottom..about 270 feet here...and viola!..a nice pinto took it. Well, by Golly, pinto is a lot better than nothing, so we switched tactics and bottomfished these tasty guys for a bit. We did real well with blue-white Salas, about 6 oz..and hooked everything within 5 feet of the bottom..usually picked them up on the descent rather than the ascent.

At first we had thought that we had just stumbled onto a pile of rocks that the pintos normally frequent, but as the birds and bait moved, so did the pintos far below. We conjectured that the torn pieces of bait drifting down to their deep habitats were making the pintos move with the frenzy above. (Remember, my buddy thinks like a mullet and he knows things like this.)

As we moved with the boil and birds we kept bottomfishing underneath and caught a variety of fins..including these:

and some like these...

cabrilla hump...

We trolled home along the mine area near Pt. Conception with Mirrolures and nailed a couple of nice cabrilla...our personal favorite for dinner.

work time...

A fishing note: We had 77 degree surface water most of the day and saw lots of floating kelp..no big paddies yet, BUT... we DID see a couple of flying fish. Hoo-boy, when will that first dorado be caught? Manana?

No fishing day is complete until the fish cleaning job is over and the boat is spotless and ready for the next day. A sharp filleting knife, a steel glove, a board, and some gallon baggies makes the fish cleaning job go quickly. A good buddy doing the boat cleanup meantime is priceless.

Thanks for the fishing report and the pictures.Looking forward to the next edition.

the "Glory Days" are NOW!!!