mi dnr Fishing Report 2025

Sunday, August 12th, 2012

Hi friends. Big, beautiful 25-45 lb. yellowfin with a few handfuls of those beastly bluefin is what was on our plate today. We had a couple of good drifts in fantastic weather that made our day just dandy. Everybody is really amazed by this quality grade of yellowfin and I'm personally amazed that crewmember Mark doesn't have his own television show. Networks are missing out on what a goldmine following Mark around with a camera would be, 24/7. Some people might think that they're paying a healthy sum of money to come out fishing on a long range boat but I look at it like, people are paying a lot of money to come spend a few days with Mark Clark.

Anyhow, here is a short recap of our day: good morning (0545 hours), good breakfast (French toast, sausage, and eggs), good trolling rotations, good fishing, good weather, good sunshine, good lunch (chili), good fishing, good afternoon snacks, good galley assistant/chef-in-training (Shawn), good friends, good times, good dinner (roasted turkey with all the goods), good showers, good squid making, good night. It's alllllllllllll good. We allllllll bundle.We'll chat with you tomorrow.

P.S. Thank you to Jim Bostian for hooking us up with the San Diego merchandise. You're the man and if you're ever looking to hop on a 3/4 day boat, hop on the San Diego our risk losing us as friends forever. Thanks Jim.

Aug. 11
    We had a great morning today.  I'd have to check with the big guy but I believe we had around 60 of the 15-25 pound yellowfin and 9 of those big 60-80 pound bluefins on our first drift.  I'd call that a good morning.  It wasn't full speed either.  It was just a nice scratch over a period of a few hours.  Nice drifting along there in beautiful weather once again.  I sure hope this weather lasts a while along with the fishing.
    
    After our first drift we did some others of course.  None producing as well as the first one but throughout the day we scratched at some more yellowfin and a few more of those big bluefins.  It was just what we needed after a day of mostly driving around seing a lot and  not catching much.  Needless to say we'll be hanging around here tonight and trying it again tomorrow.

    On a sad note, one of the greats in the sportfishing industry passed away today.  Most of you reading this wouldn't know who I'm talking about because he was a behind the scenes guy.  I'm talking about the great sardine fisherman Joe Machado, and if you've been fishing in the last 35+ years, you were using bait most likely caught or found by him.  As you all know, no bait no fish, so we'll be throwing some sardines over the side for him tomoorow.  RIP Joe.
                                                        

April 15, 2025 mi dnr Fishing Report

2381

The Annual SFR charter aboard the Apollo with Captain J.J Gerritsen and crew was a big success !! The Apollo is running out of Sea Landing on beautiful Santa Barbara Harbor, the closest harbor to the outer Channel Islands. Great weather meant an ideal cruise over to San Miguel Island for some of the finest shallow water rockfishing you'll find anywhere. 300 feet down you say, maybe 200, how about 100 feet ? No way. The offshore terrain around San Miguel is so rugged and marked with underwater pinnacles, we spent most of the day fishing in 25 to 90 feet of water. Lighter rigs, jigs, leadheads and swimbaits were the order of the day, and the San Miguel rockfish were in a hungry mood. We started catching fish before daybreak and spent the rest on the trip hauling up huge reds, chuckles and lings, all sporting some of the most vibrant colors I've seen on any fish in a long time. Awesome day!! We limited out on huge rockfish, slammed about 50-60 grumpy whitefish, 5-6 huge goats and 16 or so pre-historic looking lings before calling it a trip. Epic day !!!! The jackpot was a nail biter as Shawn Suhr's huge lingcod and Art Moralez's giant goat battled to a near dead heat. Captain J.J needed to come down and settle the score, with the final vote went going to Shawn's 12-13 pound ling. Great job Shawn. Captain J.J and his crew did an awesome job as always and the Apollo is looking as spotless as ever. The Apollo will be in Santa Barbara till around mid May before moving down to Fisherman's Landing in San Diego. Call Sea Landing at 1-805-963-3564 or log onto www.apollocharters.com for their schedule. Great trip everyone !!!. email me at [email protected] for any photos. Thats the word on the water. Don

April 14, 2025 mi dnr Fishing Report

2549

Back after a five-day trip, the 7th Annual Paul Chappell Charter aboard the Polaris Supreme arrived at Fisherman's Landing July 10. The 24 anglers were guided by skipper Drew Henderson.
"We got some nice yellowtail at San Martin," remarked Drew, "but there's a lot of that big squid around there. You can't get any more yellows once they get on you." Chartermaster Chappell won first place for his 34.6-pound albacore. He said he bagged it with a sardine on a 2/0 Mustad 94150 hook on 30-pound Yo-Zuri line. He fished with a Penn Squidder reel and a Sabre seven-foot rod of the same era. Phil Beltrami of Napa won second place for a 33.4-pounder, and Craig Pappas of Santa Cruz won third place for a 32.4-pound longfin.

April 13, 2025 mi dnr Fishing Report

2521

We fished our first day of the 5 day offshore kelp hunting. We saw plenty of kelps most having mucho yellowtail and mucho dorado on them. Unfortunately they were not in the moods to eat. We scratched out 60 mixed fish for our efforts today. We're heading for Benitos Island to fish for the night and at least a few hours in the morning. If it doesn't look good we will shoot down to the next island, Cedros.

April 12, 2025 mi dnr Fishing Report

1743

Sep. 3

Well today was just dandy. I got out of the office today for several hours and it was neat. We got to where we wanted to be at 10:00 this morning and for 5 hours we had very good yellowtail fishing on just a beautiful grade. 18-25 pounds is what they were and they were snapping. It's just what we needed. A stopped boat with bent rods and excited passengers and crew. After that we were successful at getting bait and I was told by a few of the passengers that even that was a blast. Anyways it's safe to say that we are stoked. A load of fish and plenty of bait to use on tuna the rest of the trip. I want to take back my hole stupid time machine comment I made yesterday. I think our timing will be perfect. There's some big bluefin being had up above. Fish up to 150 pounds have been caught and that wasn't happening the beginning part of this trip. We're doing alright. The weather today was yet again just fantastic. We may experience some bump tomorrow though and it should come down for our last couple days.

April 11, 2025 mi dnr Fishing Report

1528

~~Sep. 17
 We had bad odds today.  We fished for wahoo and our fish hooked to fish landed ratio was poor.  It always is with wahoo but I feel today was extra bad.  I think if you're landing half of what you hook with wahoo you're doing OK.  Today at best we were 1/3.  At best.  I called out to 2 of our anglers fishing today and asked what there ratio was for the day and I got a 1/2 and a 1/4.  Then my buddy Dave came up to the wheel house and said he was 0/4.  So that gives you an idea.  If we would've caught half of what we hooked today we would've had a really good day.

 Alright.  I'm done whining.  I'm still glad we came here.  Everybody got there chance at a wahoo and there's still a chance for some more tomorrow.  We're headed inside now and we'll be fishing for wahoo while we're looking for tuna first thing tomorrow morning.  The weather now is fantastic.  A little weird this morning with mixed swell and a wind coming from the southwest but it's beautiful now.

 We couldn't come to an agreement on a price for someone to wear Mark's shirt today.  Justin wanted 200 and Mike said he'd do it for 150 but I couldn't find enough people to chip in.  It was a good one too.  He was wearing a white shirt today, so by 9:00 this morning he could've entered a wet t-shirt contest.  He may have won too if you're into guys like Mark.
        

Weekly Fishing Reports

Fishing reports for mi dnr are updated each week, usually by Thursday morning. The reports are compiled by an outside contractor who receives the information from bait shops, marinas and fishing guides.