seabright beach shorefishing...

I surfed friday in santa cruz, checked zmudowski later where I saw the biggest barred surf perch I have ever seen
(and probably ever will see). some guy caught it on a 3" grub. It was a toad.

saturday it was wide open on the big surfperch at seabright.  I learned a lot from a guy that uses a pyramid sinker
circle hook and bait. But I used a 1.5" kalin grub and did pretty well once he found 'em.

surf perch taste okay, but I wish they were a littler firmer. I'd never kept one before. I kept 5 slabs that day
and released a ton of little guys. The slabs were females full of babies, which was a little sad, but I guess they'll
make good trout trolling bait maybe.

caught my first striper, about 7"   

sunday, circle hook dude lands a 25" (or so) striper. he said 4-5lbs, looked a little bigger than that to me.
I landed one slab perch and some dinks. most of my excitement came from watching the striper get landed.

striper had mole crabs in its belly.

he casts out the bait, then watches the rodtip while it's in a holder. it was a pretty big circle hook, but he
caught a lot of small perch on it anyway. They pretty much hook themselves, he just reels 'em in.

sunday night I tried a giant yozuri popper from the jetty.  sunday morning I tried the popper from the shore
as well as a hairraiser and a kastmaster with a bucktail. looked dead, but I tossed them anyway. no hits.

On sunday I did see a big bait ball from the cliff with birds sitting on it and diving on it. would have been just
out of casting range tho.

knowing it was going to be windy and there would be lots of family activities, I did not bring the yak this weekend.
It was kind of a relief to just shorefish and not be tormented by the yak.

hope everybody else had a great memorial day weekend.

J

Your variety of fishing experience is impressed. Glad you had good time on the long weekend. Thanks for the report.

thanks eric, I think we are both learning pretty fast, long way to go to catch up to guys on this board tho.

J

I think tomorrow I'll throw my telescoping pole into my bicycle saddlebag with some kalins grubs and see what I can do.  Seabright was pretty bad during the dredging a few months ago and I'd abandoned it... but sounds like I need to make another try!

fish close to the jetty. hours around high tide were best. good luck!