Berkeley Pier Sunday 6/9

  So JD yak, and myself headed out about 7ish on Sunday.  We cleared the sea wall, and headed north towards the REichmond island.  We were told to fish between the big stick buoy, and the island.  Jd Yak caught a few small sharks on live bait...
  The Walrus started out with live bait...no luck..and then went to a luer...no dice!

the wind was a com in' so we headed in at about 11.  There were a coupole other new guys from NCKA.  One guy got a 25" Halibut, the others like us were left with a workout

Nice try guys. Keep at it though... you just never know when the big one will bite.

Freddie

Greetings,

My group launched around 7:30am and worked the pier ruins.  The water was pretty calm and the wind was nonexistent until later in the morning.  A great day for a paddling and fishing.

The bite was definitely not wide open.  Berkeley flats is probably scraped clean by all the pressure from the previous weeks.  It still as the allure of having live bait that is conveniently located near the launch.

B-A-R-F had a hit early on but failed to capitalize on it.  We told him he sucked.  I on the other hand ended the day with a fish carcass(I will explain later).  Shicken had the most action out of the group with a little pet shark and a 25inch halibut.

The halibut was caught on Shicken's custom rod, avet reel, and wicked drift rig.  He could probably fill in the details of the setup. 

Way to go Shicken!  His first EDIBLE fish off a kayak.   

My catch was done without a rod and reel.  We had to give instructions on how to fillet a halibut to some delta fishermen.  It was their first time catching a halibut.  They had a very dull fillet knife.  I came back to the cleaning station and witnessed the hamburger meat leftover.  They kindly gave me the remains as a token of their appreciation.  There was roughly 2.5lbs of meat left on that fish.  The bones where dumped into pot for soup.
Thank you DELTA guys! 


Another plus, was having the opportunity to run into some fellow NCKA'ers, JDYak and The Walrus. 

Below is Shicken with the obligatory NCKA knife pose.

good going on the halibut fellas.

that pic of Shicken looks alot like Marv...

Hey Pat,

yes that is me (Marv).  How ya been?   

I finally joined the legion of kayak fisherman. 

There are still a decent number of fish in the berkeley flats, they are just spread out.  Survivors of this seasons halibut massacre. 

The last two times fishing the berkeley flats have left me with nothing but scratched baits.  To better my chances of hooking the fish I had to give the fish more time to eat the bait, and prevent them from getting spooked by the feel of the weight.  The rig I used is basically a sliding rig using a slydo, instead of clipping the weight directly to the slydo, clip on a 1 foot line to your weight.

The drag was set just tight enough to keep line from pulling out during the drift.  When the fish struck, I backed it off further and allowed the fish to run with the bait.  The downside of this is that you will have a high chance of stomach hooking a fish that is not a halibut.  (unless you use a circle hook, but it is a bit more difficult to stick a circle hook through a live anchovy's nose)  Easy to do w/ a lever drag reel btw. 

Another thing that made this catch more satisfying was that I used a rod I put together myself.  I'm now addicted to rod building, when I'm not fishing.. i'm building rods LOL.


-marv

Hey Pat,

yes that is me (Marv).  How ya been?   

I finally joined the legion of kayak fisherman. 

Nice to have ya aboard mang. Good to see out killing some fish on tha yak.

Whats been happenin' Wally/John?  I was riding bikes with the wife up in the hills and probably could have seen you guys out there. Gotta get on the water, if you're trying to find the money fish! .....sharks are fun if they're big ones (and if you're lucky,you won't have to touch them.)
 
Congrat's Shicken! You guys are gettin out there and finding them at least. It looks like the other type of halibut from the angle of the shot. Fat and no spots.
.....and as for that "obligatory" pose?   It's MINE  and it's used ONLY when gettin that first one OR when conquering a BEAST! 
tryNOTtoDILUTEit!      

Thanks for the details and pics!   I gotta get in there and DO THAT.