chris bait and tackle Fishing Report 2025

Long time friend, crewmen, passenger, and father Dave Dunham passed away earlier this year. His daughter Julia picked off a beautiful Yellowfin Tuna to start off the morning Hope you are proudly looking down smiling today Dave.

~~Oct.16-20
 So for the last few days, I was either too busy to write a report or just too tired.  I knew these blogs wouldn't be making it out here until tomorrow anyway so I figured I would just do a 4 day report to explain the remainder of our trip down below so here it goes.

 When I left off, the sharks backed off and allowed us to have a great afternoon and we were hoping the sharks would do the same thing they did last year after the first couple of days which is leave.  That didn't happen.  It was a sharky trip for sure.  Brown Reef Sharks were in the picture for the remainder of the time we were down there.  Sometimes they were relentless and we'd have to pull anchor and go trolling for wahoo and other times they would back off just enough to allow us to scratch at the tunas and then other times they would back off completely.  They weren't tuna eaters though.  They let us wind in what we hooked, but they loved our kite baits.

 Anyways, we still had an excellent trip down there sharks or no sharks.  There were a lot of windows of opportunity and there were some slow windows as well.  There was almost always a window where we would get at least two cows before sunrise, and after that it never stayed consistent.  If we didn't need to sleep it would've been convenient.  I know we missed plenty of tuna bites in the dark hours through out the night but that's when we would sleep.  Like I said though we had an excellent trip and here are the numbers to prove it.

 130 yellowfin tuna and 60 wahoo for 8 guys for 6 days.  54 tuna kept.  11 over 200 lb's, 5 that may go when we weigh them on the dock scale, 6 between 170-180 and the rest were 100-150 pounds with much fish being in the 120-130 pound class.  We also released 76 of those too!  One release estimated to be around 200 pounds and several in the 150 pound range and like I said, many in the 120-130 pound range.  Our largest was 240 and next in line was a 234 pounder kept.

 Here are the team jackpot totals: 1st place goes to Charlie and Craig with 2 fish totaling 453 pounds.  2nd went to George and Scott with 2 totaling 414.  George also had 5 tuna over 200 pounds by the way.  One per day besides the last day.  3rd place went to the Jer-bear and JC with 399 pounds, and Brian and Bernie finished just behind them with 396 pounds.  None of this is official.  We still need to weigh them oin land.

 And that's basically how fishing was down there.  Here are some things that stand out to me while we were down there.  First of all I'd like to talk about KC.  I'm not saying he was scared, he just didn't seem too pumped on fighting one of these fish we call cows.  He wasn't the first or fifth for that matter to jump on a spot on the kite for example when one was available.  On the third day it couldn't be avoided.  He got up on that kite and when he did this particular time he hooked a big one and he handled it as well as anyone.  I mean he kicked that fishes @$$.  He came to battle and he won.  It taped out as a 193 pounder.  After that it wasn't hard to get KC up on the kite when a spot was presented.  It went from where the heck is KC, to him not leaving the rail at all.

 I let Mark know the Raiders lost.  I did it in a mean way too.  His birthday was the 16th I believe, and Chef Mike baked him a cake and we all sang happy birthday and when it was over, I gave him my birthday present which is spilling the beans on lying about the Raiders beating the Chargers.  Ha ha Mark.

 The weather was a lot less steamy the last few days down there.  It was still hot, but once the clouds went away it didn't feel like a sauna there anymore.  Although myself and a few others got the worse case of burnt lips we ever had.  I did it in a dumb way too.  I knew I should go get my chap stick from my room on the first day down there but my lips did;t feel like they were getting chapped so I thought, because of the humidity my lips weren't drying out and I didn't need protection.  Dumb, stupid and idiotic.  My lips may not have dried out but they still got as burnt as ever.

  So that's it.  We now travel for a few days.  The crew has plenty to do.  Clean, clean clean and sleep.  The passengers will be sleeping and celebrating a wonderful trip.  We'll be trying to break up the ride on our last day of travel by looking for a dorado kelp but that's still not for a couple more days.
      

 

The last couple of days we have experienced some fun Coronado Island fishing for yellowtail, bluefin tuna, calico bass and barracuda on private charters. As a result we have switched our open party trips to Island trips. These trips will unfortunately require a passport and will begin on Monday. The best setups have been a 20 or 25 lb flyline setup and a 30-40 lb setup to fish a yo-yo lure or dropper loop. Plenty of targets for all you jig chuckers as well. The cost of this trip is $225 which includes your Mexican Fishing License, your FMM visitors visa, your biosphere reserve bracelet, plenty of live bait and 5 seasoned crewmen. Rental rods, fish cleaning and food will be extra. We have a full galley onboard with plenty of ice cold beer, soda and water. We also offer delicious burgers and all your basic breakfast items. The first 34 passengers to make resos at 619-224-3383 are in.

Hello Everyone Today we got to wet our lines for the first time in a few days. It was tough fishing but we did manage to scratch up some very good grade Wahoo and a few good Yellowtail. The size may be right but the numbers are not cutting the mustard. We are headed to a new area tonight in search of better numbers tomorrow. Wish us luck, Team Supreme

Jodie Morgan called in with this report from the Apollo. "We are starting off with limits of Seabass this morning & 1 beautiful Halibut. You should know that there is beautiful weather as well.

"If you are interested in fishing the Apollo we will be in Santa Barbara until late June before we go back to San Diego. Give me a call at 858-220-1593 & we'll get you on the boat."

Hi everyone,

I would like to tell you about a couple of charters I have that are looking to fill a few spots.

(1) May 28-29 2 day trip out of Santa Barbara, looking for 5 people to make 20 for the trip. Hunt for sea bass, halibut, bass and rockfish. contact Alan @ (562) 281-6563

(2) 2.5 day trip out of San Diego limited to 15 people contact Steve @ 714 272 4395.

Good luck and good fishing.

JJ

Well, we had a great day today. Everybody had a blast fishing lots 60 -100 lb. tuna. Pat Jaeger landed a 195 and a 213 pounder. Chuegy pulled in a 225 pounder. There were a couple more around 165 or so. We did stop at lunch for a delicious pork shank with spiced white beans and saffron pilaf. It was really good. And our weather is also good. So another wonderful day out here. Look at our schedule and find a trip that will work in your schedule and come out and have some fun.

~~July 28
  I just woke up and thought I'd better write this before I forget about it.  Last night after our late hit we made a 5 mile move tighter to the Island in this little bay, if you would.  Man o man was it good sleeping.  The boat just gently rocked us to sleep.  Gently.  The AC was pumping and we were all beat from our day and kind of sick of the wind, so we came over here, out of the wind and fell asleep with our thumbs in our mouths.  Now it's getting about time to fish.  I'll let everyone sleep another hour and then it's wake up time.  See you tonight.

  Midday report:  We left The Island around noon.  It wasn't as good today as it was yesterday.  It was still good, we were just hoping for a little more in a shorter time.  It might be because of all the bait that's around here.  I can't imagine they haven't been just stuffing there face all night and morning.  i've been fishing that Island for 15 years and I haven't seen anything like it.  Even the Godfather himself called it an "unbelievable" amount of bait there.  And then at noon when we were looking for one more stop, all the life vanished  Just like that.  Poof.  I didn't give it any time after that looking.  We left right away.  So it took us a couple hours longer then I was expecting and we were just a stop shy of what I wanted but we're still looking good on yellowtail.  We saved a little room for tomorrow. 

  So we took off in search of tuna/dorado this afternoon, and we were unsuccessful.  The ride up so far has been fine.  The weather forecast looks good for tomorrow.  It should be good to start and only get better throughout the day.  We deserve it.  The reports above in tomorrows tuna zone for us were good today.  There were some productive kelps up there today.  We want some.
          

  Happy Anniversary, Renee, thanks for letting me go fishing, I love you!!!! D