st joseph river Fishing Report 2025

Tommy Rothery docked his Polaris Supreme after the annual George Davis Expedition, with only eight anglers aboard. Rothery tied up at his space on the inner wing at Fisherman's Landing, ending his long range season on a positive note with a visit to Baja's southern banks and the Cleofas Bank, where all the fish that were kept were caught. Four cows were among the fish offloaded January 13. "All the big fish were from Cleofas," said Tommy. We released about half the fish we caught there, and nearly everything, including 15 big tuna, we caught up above. "So many people put so much emphasis on their pile of fish at the dock," remarked Rothery. "It disgusts me." Rothery and his anglers consistently release many fish of all sizes. Charlie Middleton of San Pablo got two cows; one with a sardine and the biggest one on a chunk. His tuna weighed 201.4 and 245.6 pounds. He said he fished with 8/0 Gamakatsu hooks, 130-poudn Maxima line and 130-pound Spectra backing on a Penn 80 SW reel and a new Ugly Stick 130-pound class rod. "That rod works good," said Charlie, who got his smaller fish in only 15 minutes. Al Tokunaga of North Hollywood took a 232.4-pounder after a 30-minute tussle. He said the fish bit on a sardine pinned to a 9/0 Eagle Claw hook. He fished with 130-pound Momoi line and 130-pound Spectra, with a Cal Sheet-s prepped Penn 50 S reel and a Calstar 6455 XH rod. "I used an eight-ounce torpedo sinker attached with a rubber band," noted Al. "He bit right after daylight. They were down there about that time every day." Roger Brown of Riverside bagged a 210.9-pounder with a mackerel on a 6/0 ringed Super Mutu hook. He said he fished with 100-pound Jin Kai line and 130-pound Jerry Brown Line One Spectra on a Tiagra 50 W reel and a Calstar 6455 XH rod. Brown's fish was notable in that it fought for 35 minutes, and then pulled skipper Drew Henderson over the side when he single-gaffed it. They were both brought aboard without further incident. Rothery noted that he will be doing boat work from now until May 31, when he will begin his summer season of three to five-day trips.

With great anticipation of a light load aboard the Apollo, all 14 of us anglers showed up at the dock early, swapping stories about past trips. We started boarding about 9:30pm and were greeted by Capt JJ Gerritsen and the rest of his crew, we signed in and had a seat for our safety briefing. Capt JJ then asked if we wanted to head offshore for Albacore which had dramatically slowed down the last couple days or head south along the coast for a shot at Dorado and Yellowfin and Yellowtail patty hopping. Without much hesitation we decided to head south and patty hop. We got the feathers in at gray light and started the troll, within 15 minutes the yell of "Hook-up" sang out, unfortunately the mystery fish got away and we were under way again. Five minutes later we heard that yell again, the mystery fish won round two and will live another day. Third time's a charm didn't hold true for us, our third hook-up is still out there in the deep blue. At that point the first troll rotation was fired (which included me) and the second shift took over. Within 10 minutes they had our first fish on the deck, a skipjack, from that point on while looking for patties we boated about 19 skipjack. We found our first patty around 10am and moved in with hopes of a wide open bite, but to our dismay there was nobody home. That held true for the next 8 patties we found, then finally around noon with a mouth full of burger, we heard the call to get ready. Never fails every time your food is done, it's time to drop a line. As soon as our sardines hit the water the patty expolded, we ended up with 1 Dorado and 2 Yellowtail. We only found two two more patties holding fish and ended up with 1 more Dorado and 4 yellowtail. It was now time to head back to port and we again set out the troll lines and managed to pick up 7 Yellowfin Tuna on the way back in. I really enjoyed sharing the rail with a great bunch of folks and look forward to doing it again soon. If you would like any of the pictures posted please email me at [email protected] .

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!

Mike Pritchard called in with this report for the Tribute. "Captain Randy Kramer is running the boat today. He just called in with limits of Yellowtail, 7 Dorado and a handful of Bluefin for the morning. The weather is very nice and they are having good kelp fishing, with a good sign of Bluefin. So we'll keep you updated as the day goes on.

July 20
  Good evening folks.  Turn around day today.  In and out.  Unload, fuel, cherish baby, load, load and go.  That's how it goes down.  The bait receivers was fun.  Turns out all that rain we got may have effected the sardine we get there.  It's speculation but things weren't right.  We got some bait though.  Some good sardine and some good mackerel.  Yellowtail bait.  Tommy is back on board for this trip and he's decided to start off tailing tomorrow.  We're going to tail our butts off.  We'll see how it goes tomorrow but we most likely will get our tuna on the day after.

  Getting to know your crew: I've told you Mark is trying to bring his weight down.  Well Justin is in the same mode so I had an idea.  They're both throwing 50 bucks down.  He who loses the most weight by October 1, or the closest date we have a scale to October 1 takes the money.  Now that's a battle.  We have a couple of hungry crew members for sure.

  My rivals are on board this trip.  Many San Francisco Giant fans.  Uugh.  It just so happens that a 3 game series between them and my Pads start tonight.  I'm actually listening to the game now.  4-2 Pads in the 7th.  Now I know this is a fishing blog but it's a travel day.  You love it anyways.  I'll talk fishing tomorrow.
       and go Pads!

Hello everyone, Today there was a ton of fish both Yellowfin and Bluefin Tuna. However was tough to get them to stick. We did manage to land some of both species. The grade is great we just need that consistent bite. We will be trying a new area tomorrow. Will report again then, Team Supreme

Hello everyone, Today we started fishing on our annual Hess Charter. It was a slow start but we did end up picking at a couple Yellowtail. We are by no means satisfied with what we caught, so we will be giving it another try here tomorrow. The fish we did manage to land were that great grade fish, 20- 30lbs. We are just hoping to get a great hit on them tomorrow before we head out to a new area in search of offshore exotics. Will report tomorrow, Team Supreme

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.