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Messages - SandyToes

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General Talk / Re: Waders for surf fishing

« on: September 12, 2022, 05:39:26 PM »

I basically just go in shorts and barefoot. For perch you don't need to cast all that far, so mostly I'm not standing in the cold water. Might be different for striper at a beach with such a long / wide surf zone like OB? Around Santa Cruz even if I want to wade to cast I wade back out to reel mostly, so my legs aren't in the water much.

If the weather is cold I just load up my torso and head with layers and it works for me, but I'm pretty cold tolerant. And most days it's not that cold until it's so windy I don't wanna fish anyway.

No shade on waders (or a wetsuit, I wear them all the time for kayaking and surfing), wear them if they make it more fun and comfortable. But when I have tried waders for surf fishing they feel bulky and like more trouble than they are worth for me. And the safety factor of flooding them is real. Give shorts a try if you have been going the wetsuit route, you may find it's the way to go for you too.

General Fishing Tips / Re: Union Resevoir Advice

« on: July 07, 2022, 08:05:42 AM »

Thanks all. I marked that deep water by the dam on my last trip (which makes sense, artificial lakes are almost always deepest by the dam), I'll try that again.

General Fishing Tips / Re: Union Resevoir Advice

« on: July 06, 2022, 10:20:41 PM »

Thanks for the advice and I'll probably give Spicer a shot while I'm up there, buy why not fish Union? It's been recently stocked (or so say the guys at Ebbets Pass Sporting Goods in Arnold), and there were a ton of fish jumping last year, not that I could get any to bite... Just curious why Spicer is better.

Gearing Up and Rigging Up / Re: Wheelez Repair

« on: July 01, 2022, 06:55:39 PM »

Wow, that's awesome of you! I love NCKA.

Very much appreciated, PM on the way.

General Fishing Tips / Union Resevoir Advice

« on: July 01, 2022, 04:58:05 PM »

Does anyone have any experience fishing / tips for Union Reservoir (off Highway 4, Stanislaus National Forest)? When I was there last year I spent days watching trout jump right in front of my yak but could not get a single bite. I tried all kinds of lures, power bait, trolling, casting, soaking bait under a bobber, multiple depths, etc. I am admittedly not the best or most experienced freshwater fisherman, so I could be missing something, but I definitely struck out.

I'm headed back in a week and would love to do better this time, so any advice you want to throw my way would be much appreciated. Thanks in advance!

Gearing Up and Rigging Up / Wheelez Repair

« on: July 01, 2022, 04:53:12 PM »

My wheeleez wheel (grey small beach wheel) has a hole in it, looks like a thorn or similar. like 1mm diameter but clearly visible once you know where it is.

Does anyone have tips on repair? Thanks in advance all you smart people! Happy Friday.

General Fishing Tips / Re: Significant Wave Height (Seas)

« on: January 02, 2022, 06:58:00 PM »

I emailed with NOAA on this topic a while back, I'll post the exchange and links below. TLDR is that they don't summarize the data on sub dominant swells for you, but the raw data is available.

Surfline and other commercial sites do the work of doing a deeper analysis and publishing the full spectrum of swells, but you have to pay for that.

Quote

. To Whom It May Concern -

I'm writing to ask if there is a way to get raw data on sub dominant swells form the buoy web pages. For example, I live on the Monterey Bay, and when there is a long period but low height SW swell in the water (i.e. 2 feet at 17 seconds), along with a short period but taller swell from the NW (i.e. 6 feet at 9 seconds), the buoy data that I can ind on the buoy web pages does not show the sub dominant SW swell at all. Is there a place I can look to get info on these sub dominant wells? This has been bugging me for years, so I would greatly appreciate any help you can give. Thanks very much.

PS, a few years back I had the opportunity to work as a technician for MBARI on the Kaiimmoana tending the TAO array, so I have a bit of insight into the incredible effort that goes into maintaining the fantastic system of buoys you guys operate. Thanks, and keep up the good work.

Sincerely,

Jon

Jon,

Good to hear from you, and glad you are using our data.

Unfortunately we do not calculate sub dominate swells on our web page, but we do have the spectral data located here:

http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/data/realtime2/46042.data_spec

This is the energy measured by the buoy into frequency bands. From that you could write a script to calculate and/or plot the frequency and compute height. Information on this can be found at:

http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/wavecalc.shtml

What you would need to do is determine the wind swell separation frequency, and then use the energies in the swell portion you are interested in. For example, in the image below the dominate swell is at 7 seconds (.14hz) with a sub dominate swell at 16 seconds (.063hz). The separation frequency is .1hz. So I would sum up the energies from .05-.1hz as sub-dominate and .1-.2hz for dominate and calculate wave height from the formula on the web page. Plus, I know my frequencies so I can look up the direction here:

http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/data/realtime2/46042.swdir

and find the sub dominate direction is 196 degrees and dominate swell is 304 degrees.

I hope this helps you,

Walt McCall
Physical Scientist

Gearing Up and Rigging Up / Re: Best way to rig for live bait lingcod

« on: October 14, 2021, 08:30:53 PM »

I used to mostly use a 3 way rig for my sliding snell bait leaders for lings (and other things), but I have been gravitating towards sliding sinker / fish finder rig setups more. I think they are more sensitive and maybe snag less? Seems less likely to get line twist too than a 3 way.

Interesting to read about the different ways that people rig to make swapping out terminal tackle easy. For both my kayak setups and my surf fishing setups, I tie a snap swivel onto the end of my braid main line. Then I can clip on whatever I need. For sliding sinker rigs, I tie a swivel or loop (to clip to the snap at the end of my braid), then a 12" to 18" piece of mono with the slider on it, then another swivel, then the leader to the hook or hooks. I find that having a 12" to 18" length of line between two swivels for the slider to move on is just fine, it doesn't need to be able to run up my main line infinitely. And it allows me to snap the sliding sinker rig on and off like anything else.

Works great in the surf too, so I can swap to plugs with no tying or hassle.

Hookups and Fishing Reports (Viewable by Public) / Re: Light Tackle Mackerel!

« on: October 04, 2021, 06:13:12 PM »

Probably, they were all over in Capitola Saturday. Totally reminded me of spunky strong wild trout on that little rod... Great fishing for the kiddos (and for me!). We were all having a blast.

Hookups and Fishing Reports (Viewable by Public) / Re: Light Tackle Mackerel!

« on: October 03, 2021, 06:51:42 PM »

Ooh, I like that idea. I've always had a soft spot for kastmasters, just a simple elegant lure that goes really far when you toss it. I'll try that on my yak some time soon. I've got half a mind to head out with my daughter's rod next weekend and focus on macks instead of the usual groundfish...

Hookups and Fishing Reports (Viewable by Public) / Light Tackle Mackerel!

« on: October 02, 2021, 01:34:58 PM »

I took the wife and kids out on one of the rental skiffs in Capitola today. While I was busy catching a series of too small to keep rockfish, my wife and kids started catching Mackerel on my daughter's lite ugly stik combo.

I took a turn too, and man was it fun! Little guys were bending the rod 180, stripping drag and jumping. Just little bits of squid on a 1/² oz Carolina rig I tied up for the kiddos at the lake this summer. 6 ln test or whatever the combo came spooled with.

Anyway, I've caught Mackerel before but never on a trout setup, and it was such a blast I had to share. If you never have either, bring one with you next time you go out while the mackerel are in, you'll be glad you'd did!

Hookups and Fishing Reports (Viewable by Public) / Re: Weekend is coming. Thinking Santa Cruz

« on: September 24, 2021, 09:50:43 AM »

Quote

I don’t think the surf is always mellow—need to check surfing sites. And if the tide is too high, the beach can practically disappear.

Thanks, definitely don't want to misrepresent conditions. What I mean is on the kinds of days I would go kayaking, it is a mellow launch. Obviously if the swell is up it's a different story. On big days there is an all time surfing wave in the cove, 1.5x overhead and reeling, with vicious shore pound and long shores pulling you into the rocks. Always check conditions as NowhereMan says. Both before hand on the web and in person with a good long observation of the surf.

The beach *usually* doesn't entirely disappear in summer even at high tides as the sand is *usually* built up, but it does disappear regularly at high tide in the winter when storms strip the sand, and this can happen in summer too so good to be aware.

Anyway, sounds like you decided against Mitchells, just wanted to follow up my statements re: conditions for launch landing safety so future readers are not lead astray.

Hookups and Fishing Reports (Viewable by Public) / Re: Weekend is coming. Thinking Santa Cruz

« on: September 23, 2021, 04:15:41 PM »

Mitchells is a doable but not easy staircase. There are twists and turns where you need to be able to lift it up over your head if solo, or at least over railing height with a team carry. I can do it solo with a 13' ~75 lb yak, but it's a strength and maneuvering challenge. I'm pretty strong and my back is so far (crossing fingers) pretty good.

Launch is pretty mellow, but watch out for south swell sets, they can wrap in there.

Gearing Up and Rigging Up / Re: What brand of braid?

« on: September 13, 2021, 12:13:07 PM »

I have some reels with J braid and some with some cheapo Chinese braid, I forget the brand. I got a big spool of it for a bargain.

They seem equally strong, I think the test ratings are probably accurate for both. The cheapo does fade more, and is way rougher. Have definitely gotten a few casting cuts from the cheapo while surf fishing and trying to cast hard, and the j braid doesn't really do that. For dropping a line off the side of a yak I can't tell the difference.

Gearing Up and Rigging Up / Re: Conventional reel recommendation?

« on: September 09, 2021, 01:07:56 PM »

I've been pretty happy with the piscifun chaos xs. Got it as a cheap backup reel, and it moved up to one of my main reels when my abu reel had the tension knob fall off in the water (whoops)... It's holding strong after a year of moderate use, and it's only like $55 list, plus piscifun usually has some discount codes going. And they are not backordered to my knowledge.

I read somewhere that piscifuns are manufactured in the same Chinese factory that makes abus anyway...

I would second the low pro 300 size baitcaster rec with a high gear ration and a power handle though, I love that setup especially for jigging. The big thumb bar makes it easy to drop, reel up, drop, reel up repeatedly, and the fast retrieve makes it nice for fishing deep.

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Messages - SandyToes

General Talk / Re: Waders for surf fishing

General Fishing Tips / Re: Union Resevoir Advice

General Fishing Tips / Re: Union Resevoir Advice

Gearing Up and Rigging Up / Re: Wheelez Repair

General Fishing Tips / Union Resevoir Advice

Gearing Up and Rigging Up / Wheelez Repair

General Fishing Tips / Re: Significant Wave Height (Seas)

Gearing Up and Rigging Up / Re: Best way to rig for live bait lingcod

Hookups and Fishing Reports (Viewable by Public) / Re: Light Tackle Mackerel!

Hookups and Fishing Reports (Viewable by Public) / Re: Light Tackle Mackerel!

Hookups and Fishing Reports (Viewable by Public) / Light Tackle Mackerel!

Hookups and Fishing Reports (Viewable by Public) / Re: Weekend is coming. Thinking Santa Cruz

Hookups and Fishing Reports (Viewable by Public) / Re: Weekend is coming. Thinking Santa Cruz

Gearing Up and Rigging Up / Re: What brand of braid?

Gearing Up and Rigging Up / Re: Conventional reel recommendation?