Well we added a tremendous amount of color to the catch today rounding out the trip in the variety department with a couple of quick drifts on delicious bottom fish to the delight of all, but to the special delight of John Chiang, Derek Chan, and Jeff Liu, who will be enjoying the perfect "steamer" fish with their families tomorrow. The delight was also particularly enjoyed today in the form of an outstanding fresh fish taco spread prepared by Chef Jeffery Grant that could not be topped for freshness or flavor. We do not typically include this option as part of our fishing routine, but every once in awhile the final move just happens to line up for us to take advantage of the opportunity to fish for something completely outside our standard realm. As such we genuinely enjoy this chance to catch something different that comes our way only so often.

The ultimate finishing touch was near perfect traveling weather with gentle sea conditions dominant and forecast to continue in the upper zone for at least the next couple of days. For those anglers on the upcoming voyage do not fret over the small, tropical storm Marty brewing to the northwest of Cabo San Lucas. The comparatively small tropical cyclone will not reach the zone you will be fishing during the next voyage and if anything will likely produce warm, calm, balmy weather for your voyage up above.

We had a great first day offshore. Great action on Dorado and smaller grade yellowfin . The dorado were nice grade and some of the tuna were good but a big percentage were little. Quite a bit of release size tuna. The weather is epic and we are headed in for yellowtail action. We will report again tomorrow.

Andy Cates

American Angler docked at Pt. Loma Sportfishing September 17 after a five-day trip with skipper Sam Patella. Sam made his first trip in months, after a bit of back surgery.

"I'm just happy to be back and catching fish again," he said to dock reporter Bill Roecker at the scales.
 
Patella's 25 anglers had a nice catch of yellowtail, tuna, dorado and some incidental species. They fished at Guadalupe Island and on the beach for tuna and yellowtail, and Sam said they had a wide-open bite on dorado in open water.

Anthony Bantiles of Torrance won first place for a 70.5-pound yellowfin he said he got with a sardine on a 2/0 Gamakatsu hook and 40-pound Yo-Zuri leader tied to 65-pound Izorline Spectra. He used an Avet LX reel and a Calstar 765 XL rod.

Larry Markworth of Ventura won second place for a 67.5-pounder, and Chris Cruger of San Diego took third place for a 65.5-pound Guadalupe Island yellowfin tuna.

Good fishing today for us. We arrived at our starting point at 1130, and as soon as we found the right spot we were busy for the remainder of the day. The tuna were 18 to 35 lbs. with a few bigger & a few smaller. There were some yellowtail, and dorado as well. It was good action after the long ride down here. We are going to try this again tomorrow, as the weather and fishing is great. Jeff and the Indy crew

The Independence has openings on some great upcoming trips.

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We had an action packed day here at the ridge.. Good times and good fishing is what its all about. There were many Yellowfin and Yellowtail caught today along with some nice sized ridge Wahoo and some big Groupers to round it out. The weather is on the bumpy side, but the good fishing makes you forget about it! We will be traveling up the line to fish in another area tomorrow. "The Intrepid Team"

The Intrepid has openings on up coming trips.

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Art Taylor brought his Searcher home to Fisherman's Landing September 16 after a five-day Let's Talk Hookup charter to Cedros Island.
 
In his last report at sea on September 15, Art wrote, "Today we finished our trip with a little action on decent size yellowtail--12 to 22 pounds. Most of the fish were caught on flyline sardinews with a few fish caught on yo-yo jigs, blue and white.

We only had a couple of hours to fish and we managed to land 44 fish. The weather today was great--clear skies and calm seas. We are headed home with a great catch of fish and we will be at the dock around 8:30am."

Doug Nance of San Diego won first place for a 35.8-pound yellowtail. He was tied by Wade Wells of Camarillo, who had an identical fish. Hans Giesholt of Tempe, AZ won third place for a 33.8-pound yellowtail.

Excel arrived at Fisherman's landing September 16 following the Turis-Cirks charter of seven days with skipper Justin Fleck, who took the group on a tour of The Ridge.

"All our big tuna came on balloons," he told dock reporter Bill Roecker. Therefore they were not eligible for the jackpot.

"It looks good on The Ridge," continued Fleck. We had good fishing for wahoo, yellowtail and yellowfin tuna."

Braid rep Jan Howard was also aboard, as was Ralph "The Long Ranger" Mikkelsen. Wahoo swept the jackpot spots.
 
Chaz Schoemaker of Glendale won first place for a 47.6-pound skinny. He said it bit a sardine on a 4/0 Eagle Claw hook and 27-pound wire leader, which he tied to 40-pound fluorocarbon. He used an Avet LX reel and a Calstar 700 H rod.
 
Todd Gruberger of Encino won second place for a 37.9-pound wahoo, and his son Jacob got third place for a 33.8-pound wahoo. Jacob is 13, and goes to Coutin School in Canoga Park.

"Big Daddy" Don Burnside of San Diego tied a Marauder jig to monofilament, and came up with a 62-pound wahoo. He said a very good fisherman told him about getting five times as many strikes with Marauders on mono as with wire.

Andy Cates docked Red Rooster III at H&M Landing September 16 after the four-day Charkbait charter with Charkbait owner Mark Smith as chartermaster. He said he took his 30 anglers to San Pablo, where yellowtail were thicker than flies.
 
George Kosmos of San Diego won first place for a 32.6-pound yellowtail. Kosmos said he baited a sardine on a 2/0 Mustad hook to take his forktail. He used 30-pound Big Game line and 65-pound Power Pro Spectra on a Newell 332 reel and a Seeker 665 rod.
 
Joe Flewelling of Phoenix, AZ won second place for a 32.4-pounder, and Gabriel Lopez of LA won third place for a 31.4-pound yellowtail.

Mike Lackey docked his Vagabond at Pt. Loma Sportfishing September 16 after four days of offshore fishing with 26 anglers. The 19th annual Bob Lage charter ended up at San Martin Island. Vagabond anglers also reported a great dorado bite.

A sardine on a 2/0 Mustad hook won first place in the jackpot for Bob Curtis of San Diego. He said the 59.8-pound yellowfin fought him for 30 minutes after it bit on his 30-pound P-Line. He used a Penn GL reel and a Seeker 6460 rod.

Chartermaster Bob Lage won second place for a 58.2-pound tuna, and Doug Buck of Santa Ana won third place for a 52.6-pound yellowfin tuna. All of the large yellowfin caught on thee trip came from open water, said the anglers.

If this year turns out to be another banner year for dorado nobody should be surprised. A warm water event and what may be the natural cycle for the "flats" has already produced two dorado over 50 pounds for the long range fleet.

Frank LoPreste docked his Royal Polaris at Fisherman's Landing September 16 after an excellent seven-day Yo's Tackle charter with 28 passengers. Fishing was almost as good as it gets, he said, with yellowfin tuna on the 13 Spot biting like crazy.

"We had a tremendous night bite on dorado," he said, "and I don't men a few of them. There were thousands."

The first fishing was at Alijos Rocks, before the boat moved in to The Ridge. Tom Hartigan bagged four nice yellowfin there, and two of them were big enough to figure in the jackpot.

Phil Capriccio of Huntington Beach won first place for a 78-pound yellowfin tuna. He said he took it on a sardine and a 4/0 ringed Super Mutu hook. He used 50-pound Seaguar fluorocarbon leader, 50-pound P-Line and 80-pound Spectra on a Tyrnos 16 reel and a Calstar 700 H rod, and brought his winner to gaff in 15 minutes.

Tom Hartigan of Thousand Oaks won second and third places for his tuna of 74 and 73.6 pounds.

Well this didn't exactly go as planned. Unexpected? Not really. The way this place has been over the past ten days there is absolutely no predicting what may happen from one day to the next. Such unpredictability is actually what lured us into remaining and giving it another try. And it was a good move. As my favorite mentor Steve Loomis used to say "it wasn't a bad move, it just didn't work out as planned". Just for the sake of conversation though I'll throw out the question to all the shore side strategists who follow the fishing along through the various vessels’ daily web reports, what would you have done? I know among the seasoned long range anglers such conversations regularly occur down below during their voyages so here is your chance. Fifty six Guadalupe yellowfin tuna for our first day, beautiful conditions at the island, day three of a six day, plenty of premium sardines, and the island to ourselves. After the first successful day, and with these conditions to work with, would you have departed in pursuit of island yellowtail? I am going to speculate that most of you would arrive at the same decision.

GETTING THE JACKPOT FISH

We arrived here at the Big Island around 0900 and it took a while before we had any good feelings about this place. After lunch we got settled in to a spot where there were finally some fish around and we were able to have a slow pick on them. For all the gang's hard work, we ended the day with 11 of these nicer Tuna.

The photos of the day are Chris and Anthony with some of the Jackpot fish for the day. Tomorrow we are going to spend a few hours looking offshore and then it will be time to go home.

Tuesday September 15

 We had choppy weather today, but excellent fishing on Dorado.  We caught and kept, and caught and released for over three hours straight on just one of the kelp patties.  We are hoping for
better weather tomorrow.  Everything is going good.

Thanks for checking in.
Tommy and crew

Captain Ron Baker and his wife Deena Nelson Baker returned with skipper Joe Crisci aboard the Qualifier 105 September 15, after a four-day trip to Cedros and Redondo. Fishing was very good. Most anglers looked to have near-limits of 'tails, with some assorted other species.
 
Tom Nakamura of Santa Monica won first place in the jackpot for a 41.7-pound yellowtail. He said he bagged it with a sardine on a 2/0 ringed Mutu hook. He fished with 30-poundAnde line on a TLD 30 reel and a Calstar custom 6460 rod.
 
"He put up a good 25-minute fight," said Tom. "He took me three-quarters of the way around the boat."

Jeff Pew of Culver City won second place for a 40-pounder, and Bruce Stewart of Culver City got a 35-pound yellowtail for third place.

Hello Anglers,

In the past two days we have had some pretty good action all along the" Ridge". There has been a good mix of wahoo, tuna, yellowtail, and dorado around. The reason I personally like to fish this area is because you never know what will bite next. One minute we have fast placed wahoo fishing where they are slashing every bait in the water, the next minute there are school sized tuna chewing on the corner. We had an awesome night time yellowtail bite where you couldn't get a bait to the bottom without getting a bite. There were also times where the dorado would just show up out of nowhere and everyone would have one on. Not to mention, the weather has been outstanding. We have just a little more time left for our trip so we decided to work our way up the line. JUSTIN

Ride The Big Boat

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