Mendocino Rockfish Opening Day 4/1/2026

I started monitoring the weather for the opening day. Swell and wind look good, but it might rain. 
If it is not heavy rain, I plan to go after some rockfish on the opening day.  It has been more than 10 years since opening on April 1, instead of May 1.

Paul

Hope the weather works out for you for the opener on the Mendo Coast Paul!

Seems strange after all the restriction that we are seeing an earlier/longer season and a loosening of regulations regarding size and limits of Cabazon and Greenling for example. I guess it's a good thing, I remember early season rockfish and lingcod as not being so productive but guess we will see.

 

I remember early season rockfish and lingcod as not being so productive but guess we will see.

I don't know about Mendo, but I've been sailing my AI and testing gear in Santa Cruz a couple of times in the past week, including just yesterday. I measured the water temp as being 60 degrees both times, which is something that I don't usually see until much later in the season. So, I'm guessing (hoping?) that RF might be better than expected early in the season...

The stretch of really warm and sunny weather does seem to have helped set things up for a decent start. Wondering if the rainy weather on the way through 4/1 will churn up the water and cool things down. Saturday 4/4 is looking nice.