baum lake Fishing Report 2024

Aug 12
    Today was awesome.  We woke up drifting catching fish and that's about what we did until dark.  I'm not kidding you.  We moved the boat just a handful of times but never for more then 10 minutes.  It was drifting with always at least one on the hook.  In the morning until after lunch it was mostly bluefin in the 30-45 pound range with the occasional 60-80 pounder.  I have to tell you that that's a much more manageable grade.  It's a much better fish to start off on than those 60-80 pounders.  Don't get me wrong, you know I love catching those beauts but they make a much better cherry than ice cream if you know what I mean.  We had that kind of day where if we catch them tomorrow it will be the cherry on top.  The rest of the day we got into yellowfin tuna mode and it was game on for those fish.  Tommy decided to save our sardine on board it being they were feeding on the anchovy that went over the side so that's what we used.  Chovy baby.  I can't ever remember fishing anchovy for tuna on this boat.  I have to go back to my mission bay days to remember that but I didn't forget how to do it.  I wrote this in the beginning of the season and I'll write about it again.  If you're coming on a future trip, please remember to bring the lost art of anchovy fishing skills.  A big part of that is an anchovy rod and reel.  Something light that's meant for 20-25 pound test with a nice free spool to help you toss those anchovies away from the boat.  I hate to say it but if that means you need to bring your coffee grinder so be it.  
    The weather is still good!  Man I hope this can hold up for at least my buds on the upcoming Heil 5 day trip leaving the day after tomorrow.  We're staying put right here for our last day fishing tomorrow.  We're hoping we can get more of the 60-80 pounders tomorrow but we will be stoked with the 30-45's as well.
                                    

 

Sept. 25

Today we got nasty aboard the Polaris Supreme. And I mean nasty. When I use the term nasty I mean it in a good way. Unless I'm talking about the weather. If I say the weather is nasty I mean it was nasty. And by the way the weather was nasty today. It was windy windy windy and the swell was up and it was steep and we were rolling baby. It didn't bother us though because we were getting nasty on those bluefin tunas. Shortly after firing up after daylight Jed called down from above "tern birds pickin starboard bow". So I turned toward starboard bow and there was tern birds a pickin and when we rolled up on them, wouldn't you know it there was a big school of bluefin under them. I love those beautiful little white tern birds. They're the best of the fish finders. Find tern birds and you usually find game fish. For two hours it was game on. I mean they were snappin! 35-50 pound tunas? Yup. After the initial two hour whack things became civil and we scratched at them for another five hours. We could of kept picking at them but we had enough and the weather was getting worse so we headed east for the rest of the day and found nice weather in there. Night and day compared to what we had out west. We didn't catch much in there, a few small yellows and dorado but we didn't care. We had a heaven of a day already. We're on our way in. We have one night in and then we're back at it again. See you then.

Hello fishing friends,

We now have the Apollo in beautiful Santa Barbara for the rest of the spring. We are running two Berkley sponsored limited load overnight trips to the Channel Islands. The first trip will depart on Thursday night April 19th at 9 pm to fish on Friday April 20th. The second trip will depart at 9 pm on Thursday night May 17th to fish Friday May 18th. These trips will target Quality Rockfish, ling cod with the chance for some early season halibut or sea bass. Please come join us on the Apollo in Santa Barbara for some fun spring time fishing. Berkley will sponsor this trip and will be giving away swag on board. These ntrips are limited to 20 people and the cost is $185 per person. Please call Sea Landing at (805) 963-3564.

Thank you,

J.J.

Mike Pritchard called in with this update for the Tribute. "The great fishing we had this morning, did continue on. We've had very good fishing. We've caught limits of Yellowtail, limits of Yellowfin tuna and we had a nice Dorado lunch. The weather has been nice, but there is a light breeze. The Yellowfin really loved the surface lures.

"We'll be back out tomorrow night on another 1.5 Day trip. See you on the water."

Tom Rothery docked his Polaris Supreme September 28 following the 10th annual Jeffery Hall charter. He tied up at Fisherman's Landing and weighed the top fish from the five-day trip with 22 anglers. Dick Langlois of Rancho Cucamonga won first place for a 69-pound tuna from Guadalupe Island. He said the fish bit on a sardine and a 4/0 Mustad hook. He used 50-pound Ande line, a TLD 20 reel and a Calstar 765 L rod. "I got him in 15 minutes," said Dick setting up for the punch line. "It was 90 percent skill." Dick's son Tom Langlois of Rancho Cucamonga was second, for a 57-pound tuna, and Kalob Hall of Victorville won third place, for a 45-pound yellowfin tuna.

Today was a travel day. The weather is good and the anglers are excited to start fishing. Lunch we dined on chicken fettuccine and dinner was veal chop with bacon wrapped asparagus and lobster potatoes. We should be fishing by mid-day tomorrow.

 Just finishing up our three day trip here with some great local yellow fin Tuna!

We leave on our Beck eight day trip tomorrow!

This season has been full of extreme conditions. Our weather has been either flat grease calm with air temps pushing triple digits or victory at sea borderline dangerous. Our fishing has been either crazy wide open or scary slow. Today’s trip had a little of everything. Strong South wind in the morning followed by calm seas in the afternoon. Empty kelp patties in the morning followed by crazy wide open bonito smash. We never found a wide open dorado kelp but managed to scratch 27 along with 8 yellowfin tuna and a handful of yellowtail and skipjack.