SC Wharf Sunday 9/12

Decided to do some relaxing fishing off the wharf yesterday with my dog and see if the anchovies were bigger than previous weeks so I could stock up on them for bait.  Got there around 9:30a and the Iron Man race was in full swing. The huge schools of anchovies seemed to be reduced to a few smaller schools, or maybe they moved farther away from the pier.  As I pulled up a family was slaying a bunch of mackerel, pulling in 2-3 at a time.  Setup a sabiki and dropped it over the side, and dang near lost my rod when a school of macks came by and had 4 of them hooked.  Casting out as far as I could I was able to catch some smaller bait sized smelt which I wanted to try out my Hawaiian slide bait rigging with. This method uses a detachable sliding sinker so you can cast out and then send down bait on a leader.  Only got one scratched bait, but they looked like halibut teeth marks to me.  Heard of a few halibut caught on the Cowells side.  The bait fishing died off at the slack tide, but once it got moving again the smelt were being picked up by dozens, but didn't see any more macks after noon.  Still got a few of them which I brined for bait to use this weekend.

Thanks for the report
Glad to hear of the Mackerel
I love them BBQ'd

Forgot the pic of the macs 

That's awesome. Thanks for sharing.

Wow al howd u even manage getting onto the wharf w the race going on!

Nice max tho. I always dig them. Were they wormy at all?

How fun. Looks like them kids were enthralled in a quest.

Glad I'm not a smelt. Nice mackerals

interesting set up. I have done that before with a float in Pacifica. How did the bait hold up with that zip tie holder?

interesting set up. I have done that before with a float in Pacifica. How did the bait hold up with that zip tie holder?

Frankly not sure, as when I pulled it up after waiting around an hour, it was gone.  But I expected the ziptie to still be there at least, but maybe didn't cinch it down tight enough.  The next one i put out hooked through the nose, and it was very lively and I could see action on my rod tip often, and was still there when I checked an hour later, but had some teeth marks in it.  Can also use poke it under the spine on their back instead of the eyes or nose.  These were the small size, but I also got a larger size that would work well for something bigger like rockfish.