Stillwater Cove (Pebble) and Capitola Reef

Camped at New Brighton this fri and sat.

Sat morning - me, greg, and newbie brian launched out of Pebble at grey light.  Flat as a pancake, no wind, ankle-slapping waves.  The kelp is THICK!  I had to take out my mirage drive cuz just couldn't punch through the bull stringers.  Just way to dense.  Paddle power for the rest of the day.

Immediately head to the boiler rock and start getting bit.  Greg gets into something HUGE.  It's towing him around, wraps him up in thick salad.  He's on this thing for about 10 minutes, gaining then giving line.  It would take long ass runs, so we were thinking it was not a big ling.  WSB?  'But?  Never know cuz it broke off.

On that same hole Brian gets into something huge too.  He's only fishing 10# fireline - after a few minutes, BING!  Line snaps.  We started getting schoolie blacks and blues.  Then the sea dogs moved in.  It was over after that.  Lost at least 1/2 dozen fish to furbags literally at the boat!  Those things are so bold.  They snagged fish right under us as we were trying to net.  Scary, and irritating and the wind had picked up around 1100 so we packed it up.  No lings, cabs, or hallies - just straight cod.  Best was dark plastic.

Sun morning, chose to fish out front in capitola.  Surfcaster catching stripers on saturday morning so wanted to see local action.  Launched out of capitola wharf to ankleslappers.  Picked at the capitola reef for a few cod - very small and the kelp looked trashed.  TONS of bait literally everywhere, though.  Brian hooks up into something big  - peels drag and tows boat.  See a thresher come up under the boat.  Its only about 3-4 feet long but the long ass tail is unmistakable.  (Bill: It looked just like Jimmy Durante.)  Of course, comes off.

Conditions were as flat as I've ever seen so we went out about 2 miles to see if any flatties were home.  Again Brian hooks into something big, but breaks off.  On the paddle out, we see another thresher jump into the air, clearing the surface by about 5 feet.  It was an amazing aerial display - thought we were at Sea World.  Did it twice, so we know it was thresher.

Brian was the hotstick fishing 3.5" big hammers on 1/2 oz head.  Should have switched to the smaller plastics when I saw the size of the chovies.  but I stuck with the 5" hammers on 1.5 oz head for a scratch bite.

Highlight of the weekend was seeing that shark clear the flat calm surface of the water.  Glad all three of us saw it.  Otherwise I would have thought I was hallucinating.  Anyone else experience jumping threshers like that and are threshers at all common.  I always thought they were incidental.  But seeing two (or maybe the same one twice) will have to revise preconception.  I know members here have caught at least two out of HMB, but what about in the canyon?

I know members here have caught at least two out of HMB

ChuckE caught one in HMB last year and Mike / Sturgy caught one in Linda Mar a few months back. I was fortunate enough to watch Mike battle his 5 ft thresher on 12 # mono = it was unreal   Would like to hook up one sometime....I was really jealous just watching Mike play tug-of-war  

Nice report!  

A couple weekends ago a few of us saw some threshers off the Sonoma Coast.  None of us landed any, but we did see a power boat with an 8' thresher hanging off its side.

Brian

Damn, this sucker's pretty nice.

http://baysidemarinesc.com/