“Bill Roland fished with brother Sheriff Larry today and caught these two nice halibut weighing 12 and 13 pounds. These were caught on the west side of Santa Cruz using live sardines. Bill wants to dedicate these fish to his grandchildren Taylor, Dylan, Calib, and Adam, who all live in the state of Washington.”

Remarkably civil, Larry. Thank you!

Another private boat fishing the same area caught two legal halibut, a 30 inch lingcod, and a four foot leopard shark. They were really thankful that Mike told him where the bait was at in Capitola today. We didn’t get a picture cuz they launched out of the harbor, but they were nice enough to call us on the radio to let us know of their success.

Another rental boat caught five rock cod out by spongebob. They also lost a flatty right at the boat because they forgot lock their interlocking snap swivel. DARN!

It looked like a really promising day on the water when Ed left, but he didn’t come across anything he was looking for. He saw lots of shearwaters and pelicans working in 80 feet of water but there were no marks on his meter when he came up over it. He zigged and zagged around looking for signs of seabass for a while then tried Capitola reef. He ended up getting skunked for the day, but enjoyed the dolphins, sea lions, shearwaters, and everything else going on – the surface has been pretty lively with all the bait around.

We were premature announcing the flight of the sardines – they’re packed in around the wharf like — sardines! People were catching them all up and down the wharf today, and both inside and outside the marina.

Elsewhere on the wharf, sardines were a bit slow this morning. They started coming in at the end of the wharf around 8:30am, and continued getting better after that. The catch moved toward the gate as the day progressed. Then around noon it started tapering off again. We started seeing pacific mackerel about the same time and it followed exactly the same pattern.

So actually what we said earlier about bait being thick as theives around here wasn’t exactly correct – it’s more correct to say it was non stop on the boats. A little trickier on the wharf.

One other little interesting highlight – one white seabass was caught and released in the shallows on the wharf today. He was using a live sardine on a sliding rig. It was short (21 inches) so the guy who caught it released it. Darn darn.

Weather wise – really nice day. It was actually warm today – we haven’t see much of that this summer, and it sure felt nice. It goes in threes around here, so maybe we’ll have a warm start to the week.

On the private boats today Dan was fishing up by Natural bridges and came in with a 27 inch lingcod, two small flatties, and a great story about the 60 pound black seabass(!!!!!!) he caught and released up there. He was using live sardines on a halibut rig. Wow – very cool. They’re carniverous you know – the black seabass.

We have not seen nor heard of any of the sort of flattie or seabass action that Bayside is reporting these days. Whatever that is must be private boats out of the harbor, but we sure wish we were seeing some of that ourselves.

Other than that – we are still neck deep in bait here – no problems getting sardines, and mackerel appears to have moved in since yesterday. You can get bait just about anywhere around here including off the wharf.

So today is kind of a flip on yesterday – we have no excuses and there was plenty of time to take pictures, but there was literally nothing to take a picture of as far as the rest of the rentals are concerned. Non-bait fishing was just not very good here today with the exception of these guys and James’s kayak excursion. There’s really not much to pin this on either – there’s a little bit of a swell that has turned off what we had of a halibut bite going, but it’s really not enough to shut down rock fish – so it’s a puzzle.

Anyway – bummer. Most people were good humored about it, but boy it’d be nice to get some decent catches in on the rentals – it’s been a while.

We may need to start selling that thing at the bait shop or something. Either that or tell all the rentals to just follow the kayaks.

Great(!) job you guys – congratulations!