Stillwater south season closer and two piece rod biulding party

Tigerfish picked up me and my boat just a little after 2am Saturday, once we were loaded we started the required all night red-eye express to arrive at Stillwater-south by daylight, from Chico.  The two of us and maybe as many as a half dozen others launched under the cover of a misty wet fog cover.  No wind and mild swell.  We made our way over to the north boarder of Carmel Pinnacles SMR.  As we arrived the fog lifted and a very light south wind set up, which made for a real cool northward drift away from the SMR toward Midway Point.  Between the two of us we had three new rods to break-in.  I really got carried away in the madness and added a couple reels, switched to braid, and topped with mono by virtue of an Albright with a lock.  The company I keep had convinced me my coffee-grinders, ugly-sticks, and 20 lb mono could be improved on.  My fish finder was having difficulty marking fish in all the kelp.  And in one of the kelpy sections I learned how difficult it can be to break 30 lb braid tipped with 25 lb mono.  I quickly lost my beautiful Albrights with locks.  My reties on the water were very quick and easy three-wrap overhand knots to mono, and I was fishing again.  As we moved west the kelp became less dense and on the sonar I could holes in the kelp all the way to the 80 ft bottom.  I sent my 3 oz motor-oil spit tail down and in a few moments I had a nice bottomy feel.  I pounded the sand with a few jigs of the rod, a quick glance at the FF showed no marks, but apparently somebody was home, tight line now on the new rod and reel!  I had the drag dialed down tight from the previous war with the bottom, but who ever it was down there wasn’t impressed as it stripped out maybe 15 to 20 ft.  I winched that bad boy/girl up and at the surface I could see great hook set in the upper jaw in a way-legal blue-green ling.  I opened up my clothes-pin stringer and sent it through the mouth and gill as it went by the side of the kayak on one of its passes, and that fish was mine. 
   The wind changed, and was now blowing out of the North-west, pushing us towards the SMR.  If you weren’t careful you could accidentally end up in the SMR.  A couple of large dive boats took a shot at capsizing us, they must get a kick out it.  I also got to watch Tigerfish attempt to winch up the bottom of the pacific, he was making progress.  I was impressed with how much abuse the rod he was using could take.  Eventually he cut free.  On onto my second of the new rods now.  Again I lost my Albright and mono as I to had to cut away.  Later on a new of encounter with kelp/bottom I tried to emulate master angler Tigerfish’s methods.  It worked!  I simply wrenched up what I was hung up on, but in the process I converted my new one-piece into a somewhat less useful two-piece.  Hmmmmm.  Well I couple more pieces and it could be a pack rod. 
I caught an under-ling, some number of rockfish (I didn’t count, less than six probably) including  the grassy and olive species that I have never caught before, I sent them all home except for the ling and one blacky that I invited to diner.  Just a beautiful day out on the water, we came in about 3:30.  We are dining on a little each of several species this eve.  Dinner pics later. 

A few pics for you while you wait.

Ok, dinner is complete (last photo below) ling tasty as always, and olive very good.  I could not tell the difference though my family thought the olive tasted more like trout.

Awesome!!!!!

Love the pics too!!

What a great way to end the season!!!

Thank you for sharing!

Sincerely,

Jim

Nice Ling. Looks like a better day on Sat  Way more chop today...almost lost my cookies.
Thanks for the report...aka-kimo

great report way to close out the season. how do you like that cuda 350. I am looking to upgrade to a GPS model. I have been happy with the low end cuda i have

Was a good day otw for me also . Started off fishing a swimbait and got to nice browns which I sent back down .A little later pounding the bottom and bendo hook a nice ling . In the prosess to get my gaff fish thrashes and gets away .Little bit later while bring up from bottom blam get a nice olive . A couple mins later I get another ling which gets on the gaff easy .Had a realy good take down that bit my bait in half was heavy . Tested out new rod worked well . Tried to pull up rock from bottom but gave up a Chris said in his post . Was a great last day otw for a while . Want to give a big thanks to all who have helped me the last few months .Cant wait til next year . David

great report way to close out the season. how do you like that cuda 350. I am looking to upgrade to a GPS model. I have been happy with the low end cuda i have

I like it.  I choose it over the color version because it has a slightly larger screen based on advertised size.  To be fair, it is the first and only one I have ever used, but I think it works great.  I have the transducer mounted on the tip of the rudder.

Looks like a great time, wish I could have made it. 

great report way to close out the season. how do you like that cuda 350. I am looking to upgrade to a GPS model. I have been happy with the low end cuda i have

I like it.  I choose it over the color version because it has a slightly larger screen based on advertised size.  To be fair, it is the first and only one I have ever used, but I think it works great.  I have the transducer mounted on the tip of the rudder.
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Cool thanks. Color is nice but I'll use the extra battery drain for GPS vs. color. You'll have to post pics of the rudder 'ducer mount. Never seen it done that way

Nice report E and co.  You guys put a few miles on the vehicle.    And you did fine on the fishies too!

how do you like that cuda 350. I am looking to upgrade to a GPS model.

Not to thread jack, but I too have the 350 and like it.  I haven't used it a ton as it is on my back-up yak - an Outback.  The only draw back I see is that when you have it in split screen view, both views are thin.  When in split-view, it is especially hard to read ff view, and thus I find myself leaving it in ff mode most of the time so it is easier to see, rarely using the gps function.

Michael

Congrats on the ling fellas. Thanks for the report and pictures.

Jedmo

Beautiful end-of-season Ling!  Thank you for the report and pictures Chris.

Great report and pics - nice work.   

WTG Chico Crew

Good job on the season closer guys! What rod was it that you snapped Chris? jim

Good job on the season closer guys! What rod was it that you snapped Chris? jim

One of those Cabelas salt striker jigging sticks, the 6'6", 30-80 lb line, medium.  I could be wrong, but I am thinking they will make good on it.