6/22/06 Santa Cruz bouy no hali luck

Any day that starts with me backing, however gently, into my neighbor's car isn't likely to bring any luck, and it didn't , in my hunt for halibut around the SC Mile bouy.  My new sabiki pole was an improvement, but I still got hooks in my pants. 

Caught some smallish Barred Perch in the kelp off Black Pt, then a jacksmelt, and then something I've yet to ID- about the same length as a smelt 8-10", large eye, silver sides, green top with dark mottling weaving up and over the back, large forked tail behind narrow area near tail, really a nice looking fish, and very durable bait - sardine?.  One stayed alive in my bait tube all morning, and the other one stayed alive on the hook.   Didn't attract any fish, niether did squid.  Lots of bait spots and probably more small fish marked. 
   We got out about 7:30, in at 11:30.  No wind, clear skies, a little bumpy mixed swell, I think it was left-over wind swell mixed with a low, long south swell.  After we got in about noon, the fog rolled in and a little wind came up, TV weather had it coming up from the south.
Water was clear and it looked fishy, but got none and saw none with 3 p. boats out there with my son and I.
   

sounds like you caught a makeral(?). Great shark bait. I'm sure a ling or hali would tear it up.
Sardines have spots.
Did you take a pic of it by any chance...?

tom it was a mackeral ...aka green back...candy another great candy bait!! i got a few of those today as well!!!
chef

look a bit like this?

yumm....saba sashimi

yummy...................I like mackeral!

Mackerel says the horrible speller.

Awesome bait.

Too bad yellowtail don't venture this far north, but WSB will slurp those babies up also.

MolBasser

   I dropped and broke my camera taking SC snow pictures, but the photos you posted are making it easy for me not to get another. Those are what I caught.   I still have the fish - I could mail it to you.
   My Goodson "Fishes of the Pacific Coast", p20, lists it as a "Frigate Mackerel: (bonito) Auxis thazard To 1 foot, 8 inches. Like the Pacific bonito, this mackerel will school inshore in summer and fall, but its appearance is irregular.  Although not highly valued as food, it is used as a bait fish.  A very similiar fish, the bullet mackerel (A. rochei), closely resembles the frigate but has 15 or more diagonal bars on its back, whereas the frigate has 15 or more oblique, wavy lines. both fish usually have eight dorsal finlets and seven anal finlets. Range (both species): from Redondo Beach (southern California) to Peru. Edibility: poor."
    So, is M. Bay just SoCal warm this year, or is the book wrong about the range of these fish?
   

My guess is that you caught spanish mackerel.

Awesome bait.

Use it.

Freeline troll them on the outer edges of kelp forests.

MolBasser

no i know the differnce between spanish and green backs......on the same day i got 3 green backs

please show me an image of a spanish mackerel.

It's real hard to find one because on the east coast a spanish mackerel is this:

http://www.floridaconservation.org/marine/FishID/mackspan.html



which is also known as a sierra in mexico.

and all images on google images are usually of this good eating game species.

I have caught mackerel in santa cruz too last summer. I think they were as above in my other post
also, but until I see a photo of a pacific spanish mackerel, I won't know for sure.

In the winter, when they were catching mackerel out of monterey, what kind were those?

J