Location: San Clemente Island – Pacific Ocean
Landing: Dana Wharf Sportfishing
Boat: Sea Horse piloted by Captain Trevor
Water Temps: 60 degrees
Depths: 25-50 fathoms (150-300 feet of water)
Target: Yellowtail, Calico Bass, Red Snapper, various species of Rock Cod…but mainly Yellowtail.
Do I bring the sticks, or not? The entire week prior to our family’s spring break trip to Newport Beach, CA was an exercise in flip-flopping on that very question. To bring the sticks would require extra schlepping of rods, reels and HEAVY saltwater fishing tackle through the airports. The entire week was also spent studying the fish count reports on the 976-Tuna.com website…the Southern California equivalent to In-DepthAngling.com. Finally, on the day before we were to leave, the landing in Dana Point reported landing 71 Yellowtail…The sticks go!!!
Now for the sell job of the year…How do I convince Janel to let me go out on an overnight boat leaving her with the two boys for an entire day on our family vacation? Going out on the longer range boats does not come cheap. It runs $120 just to get on this particular trip; a very expensive proposition for making this a family outing. Add to this the cost of any additional tackle, a one-day license, galley tab, jackpot and you are talking about $200 per person. Janel, however, was incredibly understanding of the need to scratch the itch. Woo-Hoo!!!
We left Dana Point Harbor at 8:00 pm for the six hour trip out to San Clemente Island, 60 miles off the coast. The Sea Horse had bunk capacity for 24 anglers and plus the crew of four. The game plan called for anchoring up at the Island and waiting until first light. At that time, we would target the deeper water rock cod in order to fill the sacks. At 8 AM we would begin searching for birds diving into the water; this would signal to us that fish below were pushing baitfish to the surface while the birds would attack from the sky. I settled into my bunk at 10 PM after getting my gear rigged and ready…It’s been a couple years since the last time I tied dropper-loop knots. The guy sleeping in the bunk next to mine turned out to be the LOUDEST snorer I have every heard. I mean, this dude qualified to be the poster child for the Sleep Apnia Foundation!!! 
At 3:30 AM the drone of the boat engine died down and the clatter of the anchor chain signaled that we had arrived at our staging point for the days’ fishing expedition. Since my body was on Central Time anyhow and the guy in the next bunk was still in sawmill mode, I decided to go up on deck and do some night fishing. There were five or six of us in the stern of the 75’ Sea Horse. Most of the guys were pitching soft plastic Fish Traps. They were picking up undersized calico and sand bass out of the kelp paddies. Since I has inadvertently left all my Fish Traps at home (they were in my boat waiting to be tried for sumo-sized walleyes) I went for the sardines on the drop-loop rigs prepared earlier in the evening. I went an hour and a half with nada while the others kept catching non-legal calicos. After missing a couple of hits, I finally connected on a Calico Bass (see pic below), the first legal fish to reach the boat.
At daybreak, Captain Trevor fired up the engines of the Sea Horse and we began a series of drift passes over deep water rock beds to fill up our fish sacks with rock cod. This tactic calls for a sensitive tip yet stout casting rod with a medium sized level wind reel. I was using a Bass-Pro Shops 7’ casting stick with a Shimano Corsair 400 reel spooled with 12 lb Berkeley Big Game monofilament line. We tied an 8 oz sinker (yes, you read that right…a half pound sinker) to the end of the line and then tied two drop-loops at one foot intervals above the sinker. On each drop-loop, we tied 2/0 Mustad circle-hooks. Each hook was tipped with either live sardines or else a strip of squid that had been cut up by one of the deck hands. Once baited, you simply drop the rig straight down to the bottom pretty much like you would do when vertical jigging on the river. The only difference is that bottom was 45-50 fathoms or 275 feet-300 feet deep. It typically only takes a few seconds until you feel the familiar “tap-tap-tap” telling you a fish was playing with the bait. I personally like to let them have it for awhile before setting the hook. This morning, we caught a lot of smaller sized legal fish. Another pic of a pair of Calico Bass appears below.
At 8:00 AM, Captain Trevor began searching for the Yellowtail which we were all excited to be targeting. We began looking in the locations he had connected on when he piloted the boat on Saturday and again on Sunday when they boated good quantities of Yellows…no bird sign could be found though. He switched up after an hour and took us into the shallow kelp paddies…maybe they were beginning to move shallow early even though they would not normally do this until the water temps get up into the mid-60 degree range. Again we did not find anything. Some of the fishermen were grumbling that all we were doing was driving around instead of fishing. If any of you have taken trips with the IDA guides, you know how this feels…do we continue to chase the elusive mama-pig walleye or do we vertical jig for the “sure thing” sauger bite up by the dam? It was now 10:00 AM and we were supposed to pull out to return to Dana Point by 2:00 PM. The clock was ticking.
Captain Trevor started back toward the other end of the island. What was interesting, in my opinion, was that there was a half dozen deck-hands from other boats along the West Coast who jumped onto this boat. Their boats were supposed to go out today but cancelled out due to lack of reservations. We were the only boat out here. These deck-hands were not grumbling at all. They seemed to know something that the rest of us did not. These guys, while in their late teens/early twenties, knew from their experience as deck-hands that we needed to give the captain more time. I was half dozing off; feeling the effects of Dramamine, taken to make sure seasickness did not get the upper hand.
Twenty minutes back toward the other end of the island, Captain Trevor announced “We have bird sign, get the sticks ready!!!” The excitement was building. Guys began grabbing their tuna sticks. My tuna stick is a 7’ Seeker casting rod coupled with a Penn 320 GTi level-wind reel. I had 15 lb test Berkeley Big-Game monofilament line wound on. On the end, I had a “scrambled-egg” color 4/0 saltwater jig tied on. This “jig” weighs something between 8 oz and a pound. It is more like a “spoon” than a “jig”. In any case, I knew there was a problem when the other anglers had 30lb-40lb line on their tuna sticks and I was fishing with 15lb line. Crud.
“OK guys, we have fish down 25 fathoms in 35 fathoms of water right under the boat!!!” announced Captain Trevor. Immediately the guys began casting out their jigs. Now what happens is that you cast or drop your jig and let it go entirely to the bottom. When it reaches bottom, you RIP that thing back to the surface with every ounce of energy you can muster!!! “HOOK-UP” is yelled from the mid-section of the boat followed by loud cheers of excitement. Soon, more yells of “HOOK-UP” begin coming from all over the boat. Now, when a Yellowtail hits your jig, your rod immediately is bent double and you need to do everything you can to keep that fish from diving to the bottom into the rocks and pinnacles that are down there. You MUST get that fish moving UP!!! After ripping that jig up 3 times, you begin to lose some steam reeling the jig up to the surface…DON’T GIVE IN!!! KEEP BURNING IT UP!!! If you don’t, there won’t be any fish in your sack.
Our first drift pass yielded 7-10 fish. It is important for a lot of guys to get fish hooked up because the rest of the school will follow the hooked fish up making it easier for the other anglers on the boat to get a hook-up. This is a really key point…the guys on the boat REALLY have an incentive to help others on the boat be successful. This was critical for me. One guy in particular got hooked up next to me and, after 15 minutes, successfully landed his fish. He came back up by me and began coaching me how to increase the speed, how to cast the jig out more effectively.
Our second pass yielded another 7 fish or so…no hook-up for me. That same guy next to me again got hooked up and landed a monster size beauty which ended up being the runner-up fish for the jackpot. This guy was TOAST after fighting this fish; he was too tired to fish any longer. Pound-for-pound…the Yellowtail fights harder than any other tuna.
Our third pass…Arm on FIRE from the effort needed to burn that jig back to the surface. My new friend coaching to “Keep burning that jig, keep burning that jig!!!”. Suddenly my jig stopped and the rod immediately went double. HOOK-UP!!! I buried the butt-end of the rod into my gut in order to be able to pump the fish up. Big problem though…15 lb test line. The captain came over to help. “Crank that reel down, pull up!!!”, he yelled. “Keep cranking down…don’t just hold it up or that fish will take you into the rocks!!!” Between cranks, the reel screems “Zeeeeeeee!!!” This went on for fifteen minutes; all the while moving from one side of the boat to the other side and then down the entire length of the 75’ boat. Captain Trevor asked if I was ready for him to cut my line.
Another five minutes went by before my Yellowtail came to the surface and was gaffed by Captain Trevor. The entire crew…deck-hands, captain, galley-cook…everyone was on deck helping their customers fight and land their fish…it was amazing watching these guys helping customers land their fish…reminding me of how much customer service we all get from Dean Marshall at Everts and from all of the IDA Guides.
After that third pass, we just could not get back on the school…they seemed to key on sunshine, which was only out for three hours on this day and disappeared after our third drift. Captain Trevor decided we had enough time to chase rock cod in the 35-50 fathom depth range. The Red Snapper pic below generated cheers of “Rojo!!!” from the anglers on the Sea Horse as it came to the surface. There were many more cheers of “Rojo” before we pulled out and began the six hour trip back to Dana Point Harbor.
A few points I would like to add.
1. If you don’t have the equipment, you can rent it.
2. REALLY study the fish count reports on 976-tuna.com. If you only focus on the landing, you may miss the detail that only a specific boat is connecting on the exotic fish.
3. Everyone on the boat wants you to succeed. When the boat hooks up enough fish, they get the school to come up; the whole boat gets more hook-ups.
4. Find out exactly what baits you will need. Don’t count on the landing to have the right lures. You can get everything needed at a Walmart.
5. Take along extra spools of fresh line in different weights. 12lb, 15lb, 25lb and 40 lb. will get it done.
Here are some additional pics.
Thanks for the detailed report. I’ve had a chance to do some short party boat trips but never overnight. Glad your crew was so helpfull. My West Coast experiance was they didn’t want you to bother them so they were a–holes. Anchovies bouncing off your head as they chumed etc.
They are the In-Depthangling.com for SoCal fishing. All of the major landings/boats in Southern California post their daily catch counts on 976-tuna.com. This website also has audio reports that are posted by the boat captains while they are on the water. You can listen to those audio reports as you are surfing the site.
