Understanding surf wind and swell reports

I went to Crabfest and the weather was great and the water was pretty easy. I am trying to connect in my head what the wind/swell reports means as far as conditions on the water go. What are the important numbers are and how much worse than today can they get before things get dicey? Was the water at Crabfest today equal to the bunny hill?

I would say that conditions at Crabfest were good for kayaking (light wind, medium swell, air temperature mild for winter) but not so good for crabbing (outgoing tide).  In comparison, I went back to Bodega Bay the next afternoon when the wind was about 10 kt from the north, medium swell, cooler air temperature, and incoming tide.  The result for me was that I caught more crabs because of the incoming tide but I had to expend much more effort because of the wind; despite the incoming tide the north wind kept pushing me offshore.  I would consider the kayaking conditions that day to have been only fair.  If the wind had increased to 15 kt I would have quit.

  The part that  lots of people don't understand is the interval, or period of the swell. When your out in deep water you sometime can't even notice it if it's long. Except the boats around you keep disapearing and reapearing. Another hint is when there is a high surf warning, NOAA always sites "a long interval swell". There is a reason 10', 10 seconds is just a rough  day out in the ocean, and 10', 20 seconds the waves are breaking at Mavericks. Also usually there are lulls between sets with long period swells. That's why they call them sneaker waves. They kill people here in NORCAL every winter.   

So I am thinking a 10 knot limit might be a good place to start.

That's a good limit for newcomers
I myself will go out (drive out of the garage) on a 10-15 forecast but might call it quits if once on water it's a mess.
One thing I also look for is the evening forecast.  If it's less than the morning then there is a chance that windy or swelly conditions early will die down. So bailing out of the water early may not be necessary.

We were just discussing about this on Norcalunderwaterhunters.com.  I was asking essentially the same question but from a diving point of view.  One thing I haven't seen mentioned in this thread is that wave interval is indicative of the power contained in each swell.  Check it out on the "Water Condition Reports" thread.
But in summary a longer time interval means that the wave has more time to build, 6ft swell at 6sec will produce 3-4 foot waves on the shore, wheras 6ft swell at 20sec can produce waves over 10ft high close to shore.  I'm just learning this stuff and am mostly repeating what I have read in the last day or two, but here are links for info on the bouys that actually provide the swell height and interval.  I found it to be very useful to interpret the data.
http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/station_page.php?station=46042
http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/station_page.php?station=46014
Good Luck!
Joe

More good info. Thanks. So what period do we want to see as a max to go with the 10mph winds? We had a forecasted wave period at Crabfest ranging between 14-18. It was a roller coaster ride and I didn't venture too far out for fear of having to go where I shouldn't in order to retrieve my traps. It didn't cause me any problems on the water and the surf was manageable.  Is it easier to manage a longer period if the winds are light?

I also use some surf or beach cams. I use Port San luis cam and can see how the wind outside id doing. How many times have you heard the weather is crap. and another person went anyway and said it wasn't what was forecast. So make use of the web cams and common sense.

traildad, Crabfest was no roller coaster ride.  You might need another couple years playing in the calm like.  I'm not trying to be rude, but that was so calm and peaceful.  Were I you and thought that was roller coasterish, look at the swell report for the day and think about the experience for many nights.  Spend some more time on lakes and go out in the freshwater when the wind is UP, like 20mph or better many times.  Eventually you will be comfortable.  I only had 45 min out there at crabfest due to daddy duty and I was setting hoops 30 feet offshore from the breaking swells and I thought it was a fine calm day.  When I went further out to say hi to folks it seemed like a lake.  Any of the big lakes here will have heavier conditions than that on the average winter day.

Keep at it and your comfort level will go up.

Jim

Yup Crabfest was a lake......

Yup Crabfest was a lake......

Once ocean fishing opens up again we'll make sure to get you out again.  Once you catch a few big rockfish and lingcod, 6 foot swells on long period don't seem so bad

traildad, Crabfest was no roller coaster ride.  You might need another couple years playing in the calm like.  I'm not trying to be rude, but that was so calm and peaceful.  Were I you and thought that was roller coasterish, look at the swell report for the day and think about the experience for many nights.  Spend some more time on lakes and go out in the freshwater when the wind is UP, like 20mph or better many times.  Eventually you will be comfortable.  I only had 45 min out there at crabfest due to daddy duty and I was setting hoops 30 feet offshore from the breaking swells and I thought it was a fine calm day.  When I went further out to say hi to folks it seemed like a lake.  Any of the big lakes here will have heavier conditions than that on the average winter day.

Keep at it and your comfort level will go up.

Jim

I'm not trying to be rude either, but maybe you missed this part of my post...

It didn't cause me any problems on the water and the surf was manageable.

I was very comfortable on the water. I describe it as a roller coaster because it was an up and down ride unlike what you get with choppy water. I didn't venture out farther because I didn't know if it might be worse, maybe much worse. I have noticed at the contest events there is not a lot of taking under wings going on. It is a competition after all. Being my first time on the ocean it seemed reasonable to not venture off of the "Bunny Hill".

fair enough Traildad.  We'll meet on the water again

in the Monterey bays -monterey side- it is almost useless to look at the swell or wind reports as the direction of the shorelines here tilt those numbers either way...I went out in some small craft advisory days that were more manageable for me as a new guy than on other days where they were calling for smaller swell and long duration...as mentioned it starts and stops ...shitty days get nice and nice days get shitty...and then back again... from my limited experience.....I did make notes of the swell and more important for my spots -wind direction and speed- reports from the days where I had a shitty time out there..and started to pay attention when I saw those same numbers....still went to take look and try....but used those numbers in my head as the canary in the coal mine if it looked like time to go in......one trouble I've noticed is that my fish-n-dives allow me to stay fishing...when the other kayaks and small boats call it... longer than it really is safe to stay out, maybe catch a rouge roller....big multi directional chop and white caps breaking in the kayak are my cut off point at present....had so many glassy days this season

fair enough Traildad.  We'll meet on the water again

I'd love to hear your opinion on the question. Anything I can learn here on the forum is learning the easy way. Anything I can avoid learning the hard way is good! The fewer yard sales the better.

Like I said tho, time, time, time.

I agree that it really comes down to time on the water and observing the actual conditions vs forecasted over many many trips to get an idea of whats comfortable for you.  Like others have mentioned, some days the forecast will look very doable, but once actually on the water, it may be a different story and vise versa.  Good luck.

Some stuff I've seen alluded to here, IMO needs a little more discussion and that's the launch spot vs swell direction and period.

I used to dive Horseshoe cove south side when ever I could.  It's a funnel shaped cove pointing NW.  A 3-4 ft NW swell could make it undiveable (at least for me) , but on the other hand when a fair size south swell was in town it was a great place to dive because many of the other areas where people usually go (because they're protected from the more normal NW swell) were dangerously rough.

Many of the NorCal launches are well protected from a NW swell but not so much from a S swell, IE Timber Cove, Shelter Cove.  Some are pretty well protected regardless of direction like SWN and Gerstle Cove. 

I guess I'm using allot of words to say Swell Direction and period can have significantly different effects on different launch spots.