merritt Fishing Report 2024

After 6 months of fishing in the deep end it was nice to shut the main engines off and enjoy the world famous Coronado Islands. I have always felt that it takes 3 days or 3 really good boats to give the islands a proper check. Today was day one of putting the puzzle together. 1 yellowtail, plenty of bonito and rockfish. A 40 lb rod, a few yoyo jigs and an assortment of torpedo sinkers.

Ryan Bostian called in with this update on fishing on the San Diego, "Boy we pulled one out of the hat today, we had zero Yellowtail on the boat at about 1:30 PM. We found some fish late in the day, we caught 15 Yellowtail, 57 Barrcuda and 25 Rockfish for 34 passengers. The water temperature dropped a little this morning with the wind that we had yesterday and the water gradually crept up and got right back up to 63.5 degrees, 64 degrees. The Yellowtail are still down here, excellent, excellent fishing late in the day. We ended up with 15 of them we lost at least another 15. The same story as earlier, they are nice size, in shallow water. If you are coming down bring 25 or 30 lb. test with 2/0 hooks and be ready to fly line some bait. You can also surface lure on the top for the folks that like to do that.

"We run every single day aboard the San Diego. If you'd like to make reservations and join us please call Seaforth landing at 619-224-3383."

Today we were able to try our hand at Yellowtail. Fishing was far from easy.The Yellows ranged in size with some waves of fish being 8-12 lbs and other groups coming through in the 20 to 30 lb range. We did manage to set most of the smaller ones free and tag the bigger ones. Exciting day, but had to work for the larger fish. Will report tomorrow, Team Supreme

Captain Ryan Bostian checked in late last night. We had very good fishing again today at the Coronado Islands. Today we had 21 anglers catch 85 Yellowtail and 51 Bonito. These Yellowtail are the coastal models and are much bigger than the Yellowtail being caught offshore right now. There are some fish that are in the 10 pound class. Then there are lots of fish coming in between 12 and 20 pounds. So they are nice quality fish. We are catching the fish on fly-lined sardines, yoyo jigs and surface iron. It really depends upon where we are fishing. Please be prepared with a 25 pound bait stick with live bait hooks (1 or 1o). Also bring a 40 pound outfit with Salas 6x Jrs. And a long rod if you what to fish the surface iron.

Hello everyone, Today we started fishing on our annual Hess Charter. It was a slow start but we did end up picking at a couple Yellowtail. We are by no means satisfied with what we caught, so we will be giving it another try here tomorrow. The fish we did manage to land were that great grade fish, 20- 30lbs. We are just hoping to get a great hit on them tomorrow before we head out to a new area in search of offshore exotics. Will report tomorrow, Team Supreme

Jodie called in from the Apollo out of Sea Landing with this trip announcement. "We have an Open Party trip this Friday, the 31st. It will depart Thursday night the 30th at 9:00 PM. This is a Berkeley sponsored 1 Day Trip. The cost is $145/Angler.

If you are interested in this trip or need additional information call Sea Landing at 805-963-3564."

Bluefin in our crosshairs for our upcoming 6 day. School size fish like this and a chance at trophies!

Polaris Supreme arrived June 10 after a five-day trip. Owner-skipper Tom Rothery docked the boat at Fisherman's Landing and weighed the best of the catch. "We fished open water and found a new albacore area," he said at the scales. "We fished our first night out, and got a few. The albacore bit good, and we also got some nice yellowtail off kelps. On our first half-day of fishing we had an excellent bite on albies of 30 to 40 pounds." Chartermaster Paul Hess of Napa won first place for his 42.4-pound albacore, which set a new high mark for the species this season. He said he bagged it with a sardine on a 3/0 Eagle Claw hook tied to 30-pound Yo-Zuri line on a Trinidad 16 reel and a Calstar 800 M rod. Brian Schwartz of Napa won second place for a 40.8-pounder, and Casey Weaver of Woodland took third for a 40.6-pound albacore. "He came in after 15 minutes," said Hess. "It was a standard albacore deal."