oconto Fishing Report 2025

~~Aug 25
 Once again, today we had a good day.  We started our day off fishing bait.  Wide darn open on the small greenies.  I was singing the Who song "rain on me" because it was raining bait.  It didn't take long to get what we needed for the day and we headed off to the bluefin grounds which is right there.  We had one OK stop but right before lunch was our good one.  I remember because I ordered my lunch when we didn't have anything going and when I walked outside we had 4 going.  I can power down a meal pretty fast though and that's what I did.  We were able to drift with that school for hours before it stopped biting.  We had a couple per round of those 30-40 pounders.  I call those the perfect grade.  They are manageable, meaning they're fairly easy to bring to the boat while at the same time when you do you always end with a smile because they're big.  The perfect grade.  After they stopped biting say around 5:00, we looked for another school unsuccessfully for an hour so we ran back to the bait grounds and had a little start on our re-bait.  We'll finish in the morning.  Having this perfect bait right next to the fishing grounds is the most special thing about this area.  It's more special than the beautiful bluefin we're catching.  Sometimes where you caught your bait is more important than where you caught your fish.  No bait, no luck.
         
 

A couple of jumbos for mark and Jeff on our izorline two day !

Captain Mike Pritchard called in this morning at 6:45 AM. Today we 8 Bluefin Tuna on the boat and 1 Yellowfin Tuna (22 pounds). Most of the fish are in the 20 to 25 pound range. We do have 2 fish hanging. We have flat calm weather and a light load of 14 anglers.

We have lots of room on our trip for tomorrow. The weather looks like it is going to be nice again tomorrow. If you would like to join us please call (619) 224-3383 to get in on the action.

It started out great and got better and better. The whole boat went bendo kelp after kelp and the kelps weren't to far between. I'd say we could have done better on the hoo. We lost alot more than we landed. The anglers were pulling the tricks out of their sleeves seeing what cool ways they could get bites. Hookless jigs, taquitos etc. We couldn't ask for better weather. It is unbeatable. We're headed up north to finish the trip with some yellowtail fishing.

Aug. 20
    Another fantastic day out here for us.  We had a great nights sleep.  The boat just gently rocked us to sleep just like a baby.  We tried for a gray bite but only caught one.  It didn't take long looking for a school before we found one.  We short stopped 15 yellowfin and then it didn't take long to find another deal and that one was good for a 2 hour drift.  When that dried up it didn't take long to find another one and that one was good for a 2 1/2 hour drift.  After that it was lunch time and we're pretty much done with the yellowfin.  We spent the last half of the day looking for bluefin unsuccessfully.  We're going to head for some new grounds.  And by that I mean some water I can't remember ever fishing in.  We have reports of some bluefin schools so we're going to check it out.  We'll be there first thing.  I'll let you know.

    The weather today got interesting.  It stayed pretty much windless through out the day so it remained similar to a lake, but around 9:00 in the AM it started dumping rain on us.  And I mean dumping.  Everyone on board scrambled for there rain gear.  I got to try out my new Aftco raincoat and it worked great.  During the down pour the lightning that was around got pretty darn close so I had everyone go indoors to wait it out.  It didn't take long to pass and we continued fishing and catching.  After that it stayed dry the rest of the day.  The boat got a nice fresh water rinse.
                                    

 

GOOD SHOT ON A 2 DAY!!! APOLLO went with 22 anglers and they brought home 88 Dorado, 41 Yellowfin, & 36 Yellowtail. Checkout their next open party trip at Fisherman's Landing @ (619)221-8500

Sep. 3

                Hello everyone and welcome.  We are back in action.  I'm sorry we had to take some time off but the baby missed her daddy.  The Syd monster held up the whole operation.  After a week with me though she said "OK dad, you can go now".  You see, she understands dad has a mortgage to pay.  OK, enough of that.  We departed this evening for a quickie.  1.5 days.  We have bait.  We got quite a bit more than I thought we would out of our one box.  It's pretty much straight mackerel though.  There's some sardine but not a lot.  We'll see how they like them.  They are the bluefin.  We chose to hunt the blues.  They're such a nice grade of fish.  Better than the 5 pound yellowfin that's around.  Here we go again.

                                                                                                               

 

~~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.