horsetooth reservoir Fishing Report 2024

Thursday, October 4th, 2012

Hi friends. I don't know what's going on with me, it's like the fish just elude us in the morning time and around lunchtime, people start to get very down about our fishing day, myself included. We had a horrible morning. A boat just a few miles from us got on a kelp and had good fishing on bluefin, yellowfin, and dorado. Okay, maybe that means that we're in the right area. Nope. We went in all kinds of different directions only to find a boat already on a kelp catching fish or a boat already working the area. Very frustrating. Around lunch time, the mood on deck was starting to sour and the mood in the wheelhouse was the exact opposite of laughing babies, sunflowers, and Labrador puppies. It was straight death. I was pretty sure that I was about to lose my turkey caesar salad all over the dash and that would've been the highlight of my day up to that point. Yep, it was that bad. But as our boss's old boss, Steve Loomis, used to say, "west is best."

So I made the decision -- we're going to head west all day until we don't see a boat on the radar or we fall off the earth. As I was checking my water temperature charts, looking at the next area where I was sure that I was going to go and find another boat or non-biting fish, it happened. Not the sound of a single fish popping on the sonar or the mast-man yelling at me to rotate trollers, but the sound of a school -- a gigantic school -- on the sonar. I flipped from the computer screen to the sonar screen, throttled back the mains, and spun the wheel hard to starboard. In the excitement of the moment, I managed to tangle up the chord for the gyros in the wheel as I was spinning too (sweet), so I'm yelling in the P.A. system, chasing down the school, and trying to untangle the chord all at the same time and just like that, the school is off the edge of the screen, swimming away with my heart.

As I sit looking at a blank sweep of the sonar for a few seconds and the thoughts of ripping the wheelhouse chair from its base and throwing it out the window, I finally realize that Jed is screaming down at me from the mast. He was screaming profanities, but not directed towards me, at least not directly. His screams read something along this line, and I'll clean it up for everyone at home, "they're f-ing shinning!!" Bingo, as I came back around, the sonar lit up once again right in front of the boat and after a few seconds -- which seemed like a century -- the fathometer ran red. Oh my gosh, they're under us, thick! I can't remember if I cursed when I called for the bait to rain down on the school after we stopped the boat but I apologize to our anglers if I did. In all honesty, I don't think they could hear me on the P.A. as everyone was screaming their heads off as well and after shutting down the mains and running out to the back deck, the most beautiful sight I could've seen was right before my very eyes; fishing boiling everywhere and all the rods bent over. Sonny Jim!

We drifted with that school of five hours and after the initial rush where they were biting sixty pound line for a couple of hours, we kept two to five going for the remainder of the stop. We finished the drift with 120 bluefin tuna (limits) in the 15-30 lb. class and 40 yellowfin tuna in the 12-18 lb. class. Like I said before, Sonny Jim!

So there you have it. A day in the life of a sport-boat captain. It's life of stressing like you're a lady of the night in church and then in the blink of an eye, you're the fireman carrying out the baby from the house fire to place it into the loving arms of it's mother. Here you go, ma'am.

-The Supreme Team

Well we had good fishing on albacore until about 10am and then headed off to Guadalupe. We traveled in beautiful weather and had a great Mexican fiesta lunch of carne asada, rice, beans, and all the toppings you can imagine. For dinner Pedro served fresh albacore with a curry cilantro sauce, and fresh veggies on the grill. Really tasty.
The guys have been resting up and getting their gear ready for tomorrow. We will be fishing Guadalupe for big yellowfin tuna by daybreak. Wish us luck!

"It was really good fishing wahoo at the bank," said Rothery at the sales. "We stayed there two days and then went in to the southern banks where the big fish were." All the big fish (there were 13 tuna over 200 pounds weighed on the certified scales at Fisherman's) came from the southern banks. There were just as many from 100 to 200 pounds as there were cows, and those were found in both spots. "The Baja tuna were real steady biters," said Rothery. "There were lots of ‚Дтem around, we could see ‚Дтem at the surface and on the meter most of the time." Research biologist Chugey Sepulveda got the big one, related his pal and fellow biologist Scott ("Scootch") Aalbers of San Diego. Chugey wasn't able to be at the weigh-in. The fish weighed 306.2 pounds. Chugey had two more cows, at 220 and 201 pounds. "Scootch" said Chugey got the big one and the others on one of the boat's heavy rigs and the kite. He used two sardines on 6/0 Mustad 7691 hooks, tied to 130-pound P-Line and 130-pound Izorline Spectra, on a Tiagra 50 W reel and a Calstar 655 XXH rod. "He got it on the next to the last day," said Scootch, "about four p.m. He fought it for an hour and 15 minutes, and it wrapped him around the anchor line about 15 times. The crew helped out a lot with the fork." Tom Bass of Newport Beach won second place for a 274.8-pound tuna. He also had a 232 and a 206-pound yellowfin. Tom said he got his fish on a sardine and an 8/0 Eagle Claw hook, pm 100-pound Blackwater fluorocarbon leader of 15 feet, tied to 130-pound Izor Spectra on a Tiagra 50 reel and a Calstar 6460 XXH rod. Hack Bernstein of Valencia bagged a 269.6-pounder. He fished a sardine on an 8/0 Eagle Claw hook tied to 130-pound P-Line and 130-pound Izor Spectra on a boat rig: Tiagra 50 reel and a Calstar 655 XXH rod. Pat Jaeger of Bishop posed with his daughter Maggie, three, and the 268-pound tuna he got with a double sardine rig on the kite. He said he used 100-pound P-Line and 130-pound Izor Spectra on a Penn 50 W reel and a Baja Boomer rod. Ryan Gillette of Orange was another who used a double trouble sardine rig on the boat's rod and reel to take a 246-pounder. Robert Kalatschan found a brace of cows, at 226 and 213 pounds. There were two more cows that appeared at the scales without tags, said Susan Rothery. One weighed 214 pounds and the other went 202.

July 18 We couldn't get in our groove today. Stops for 1,1,1,1,1. Saw plenty of fish. Nothing I would call a school but descent balls of fish that just wouldn't react for us. And that's all I have to say about that. Arrive depart tomorrow on another 5 day. July 17 We made awful time coming up the line from Cedros last night then all day we got tied up with all the tons of bluefin schools we passed along the way. 60 miles of the fish. We also scratched yellows on the kelps we went by. The albacore evening area moved up 20 miles and we didn't get to the grounds until 3:15.

 

 

 

We did manage to find a couple hungry biting schools of albacore before dark and put some more meat on the boat currently chilling at a comfortable 30 degrees. Weather is fine and we're going to enjoy some delicious lamb chop for dinner and hit the rack. We'll be here tomorrow to finish up the trip. We are far away from home but we'll stay as long as the fish are biting. Sorry Tommy, we might be getting home late on Monday. July 16 For the past 2 weeks if you were a long range boat at Cedros you just rolled up to a certain spot on the island, shut down and made a day of it. Not today, that certain spot was not happening today. We had to fish. It took a while to locate them but around 11:30 we did. 6 schools up at a time. Unfortunately they were not biting fish. We'd stop on a big school for 6, stop on one for 3,1,0,6,12, like that. At 5:30 we stopped on the mother load school and had them almost jumping in the boat they were so thick but yet again, it didn't bite like advertised. We did get quite a few there and hit a couple more schools before dark where we caught some fish. Perfect weather today and should remain that way for at least a couple more days. We're going to take advantage of the glassy sea and head back offshore for the remainder of the trip. Good night. Drew and the famous crew of the Polaris Supreme. July 15 We started off at the night before hot evening bite area with the fleet. We drove 20 miles to far before light. A code boat who had a later jump passed through that area at daylight and found some biting albacore. So the fleet slides up 20 miles. When we got up there we had time for a couple of stops before the door slammed shut. From then until we left, SLOW. We started to slide down. 20 miles later we're back where we started and we see the fish. 1 good stop, 3 short stops and 1 great stop later, we're headed down to the Island for some great yellowtail fishing and sun block wearing weather. Oh yeah, the weather today was just fine. Drew and the crew. July 14 Good afternoon viewers. We arrived at the dock early this morning and weighed up jackpot. 1st was Tim Ryan with a 36.6 albacore. Second was Kirk Kirkpatrick with his 34.6 pounder and bringing up third was Dennis Mc Neely with one at 33.6. We are now rolling down in beautiful much overdue sunny weather. We have a full load of fantastic sardine and passengers eager to use them. I'm just sitting in the wheelhouse starring at my water charts and listening to my code boats trying to figure out where to be tomorrow. We're going to start somewhere offshore tuna fishing. The reports don't sound to great so we might have to do some fishing tomorrow and try and relocate these albacore. The weather forecast looks great so we have that going for us. It's almost seminar time and shortly there after dinner time.

The San Diego has had a good start to the day!  We are experiencing good Yellowtail fishing and some other miscellaneous action too!  Check out the nice Halibut we caught today!

Mexican limits on Yellowtail, 4 Yellowfin up to 50 lbs, 6 Dorados. Fishing is great. Get on Board call 619-224-3383

Polaris Supreme trip report 11-25-18. We departed today on a six-day Guadalupe trip. We got out with a nice load of bait that we already had on board left over from last trip. We literally checked in our passengers and loaded and left. A nice early start! The previous seven days we were out for a private seven-day trip to go fish Wahoo! It was an absolute hundred percent success we came in a day early. Here are a few pictures of some of the folks in their catch. We will be out at Guadalupe Island by 10 o'clock tomorrow morning and looking to tie and to some hundred pounders. Wish us luck! The Polaris Supreme Crew.

"The bluefin are still biting," said Mike Pritchard. "It's 8:30 in the morning and we have outstanding Bluefin fishing. It looks like everybody in this area is doing very well on the Bluefin. It's a good time to hop on a boat."