HMB 8-4

Dang - thought it was 20. Took two to top 20.

Nice!!!

Nice work!!!

oooohhhhh, nice fishes!  good job.

Report: glow hoochie behind a slingblade was the ticket today along with fishing deeper water and deeper in the water column.

I eyeballed conditions yesterday afternoon and saw a squid boat working the san mateo coast and had heard there had been one in HMB so that influenced the lure choice. Reports have had a lot more fish coming from close to the bottom so I intentionally tried to keep the presentation in the lower third of the column.

The 8lber came at 45' otw as I was moving from 60' of water into the 70's. The 17lber came at 60' otw in 80-85' of water. Just before I caught the larger salmon I had a halibut that was just as long boatside, but the bottom hook broke off and he was gone - it was the same leader that caught the first salmon and a couple rockfish. Must have been a nick in the line as it wasn't a big thrashing move, just rolled the head and was gone.

The belly on the 8lber was empty, the larger one and one of the rockfish were full of squid.

Ended up with 16 lbs of filets, collars and bellies, plus the scrapings from the carcass for burgers. Oh, and some bonus roe that looks ripe enough for making caviar. No waste!

Not a hot bite, but they are out there - go gettem!

Cheers,
Brad

Nice Fish - Congrats!

That seems like a personal hot bite to me...super dee duper stoked for you!   

The 17lber came at 60' otw in 80-85' of water. Just before I caught the larger salmon I had a halibut that was just as long boatside, but the bottom hook broke off and he was gone

Thanks for the report.

I always find it interesting to see regarding the upper limit a halibut will travel up from the bottom to hit a lure.

In this case 20-25ft up, which I'd consider far for it to decide to put the energy into a long range ambush. Also makes you think about the vis down there.

another halibut was caught at 45' otw in 75-80' of water -- I agree, a crazy distance for it to travel.

Awesome!! Great catch!

Awesome! Congrats and WTG. You’re giving hope to this salmon season

Way to grind out there Brad nice work!

Nice ones Brad!

Gotta Luv a Limit!
Congrats and good job making use of all that orange meat!

Scotty

another halibut was caught at 45' otw in 75-80' of water -- I agree, a crazy distance for it to travel.

That's incredible range. I've seen some amazing days of visibility while diving, but that's not over sand up here in the North. I've been diving down south and only once have I seen a halibut free swimming along. I guess you could randomly come across one mid column, but after many many hours with my face in the water, it's not a common sight.  I'd say 30-35ft is the absolute max over sand they might see from the bottom on even the better days. Definitely cool to benchmark.