I'm pretty sure I picked about 350 tomatoes off 3 plants just in the last month or so.

This batch of salsa went straight into the pressure cooker (and thus a different recipe)

Quote from: Tim524 on Today at 07:47:08 AMGlad you got the boat back in action and found a few fish

So what do you think the white stuff is  ??

The best thing I can find at the moment.

Quote from: jrodda on Today at 05:42:28 PMNice trip! Interesting variety. Glad the bass rod got broken in right. Which one is that?

We've got a 6 pack co-worker trip coming up next Friday. I'm hoping the bite keeps up or pops off even more. Very exciting to see so many paddy yellows along with a couple dorado caught very locally. I could probably get in on this season with a tiller livingston...............I shouldn't think about that. Save money for a little bigger boat.........

I'll get you the numbers but it's the big bass rod with cork handle teramar.  I forgot the number offhand.

As for thinking bigger than the Livingston...  That's the way to do it!  LOL

Get them Pelagics!

I think I figured out the baitwell issue but could not find the loose wire on the electrical system for the trolling motor.  I decided to give it an ocean run anyway and see if I could find any of the LJ yellowtail.  The YT in LJ have just been off the charts this year and I unfortunately have not been able to participate.

I got an early start, but not at O'dark thirty.  There was an early stiff south wind which gave me pause before running up to LJ thinking about having to come back with that in my face, but the marine weather channel had me convinced it wouldn't be too terrible.

Apparently, they weren't selling bait to the public at the receivers and the mouth of the inlet was packed with people trying to catch mackerel.  I had to squeeze through and decided to look for bait on my own.  I didn't see sh!t... No bait, no mackerel, no signs of life. 
I get to LJ and cound 64 boats and 52 kayaks.  I stayed on the outside circle and would dare entering that arena.  I casted my small iron looking for something to use as bait and started to get bites.  I was a little taken back as they were all BIG Lizard fish!  I mean 10"-12.5" models!!!  I stuck them in the livewell as a back up.

I started slinging the surface iron and picked up a few bonito (Little 2-3 pound models).  Too big for bait and not big enough to really have too much fun fighting them in.  I switched it up and started dropping a deep iron with a small squid strip.  I did bring two squid with me so I had to make it go a long way.

At this point the bites came with a little more frequency.  I picked up a dozen assorted bass and even dropped a lizard fish down on an iron with an assist hook and immediately caught a few more nicer grade Sand Bass. 

I picked up some nice sculpin and a vermillion and saved one little strip of bait just in case.  One thing I noticed was all of this white thick soupy and fibrous material floating in the water.  It was everywhere for miles and I didn't want it getting clogged in the motor or bait pump, but it was hard to get around.  It didn't smell at all, but when I scooped some into a bucket, it was thick like a chowder and weirded me out.  I have some ideas what it could be, but haven't had any confirmation yet.

My next drop and I use my last piece of squid.  It wasn't long and I'm on with a bruiser!  It was on the bottom and I was thinking lingcod but saw this really nice male Sheepshead (20-22") hit the surface.  I decided to grab my lip gripper on him and as I reached over the gunnel noticed my lure to the right and the fish just sitting next to my boat without the lure in its mouth.  WTF!  I tried to get a quick lip grab on it, but it was gone.  I didn't grab him by hand since I could see all of these amphipods crawling all over its body and thus went for the lip gripper since I was going to release him anyway.  Oh well, still a really nice goat.

The bite never got hot, but I saw some HUGE cuda caught by guys trolling by.  Probably 40" models yet I strangely couldn't get a cuda to hit any surface irons. 
The NSF pulled up and started brailing wiggles with eyes and now 75 boats surrounded his boat.  If there were any fish left in LJ, they were around the NSF for sure.  I heard some big hooting and hollering so I know some yellows were caught.  I was ready to leave, but only managed a few more little bonito.

I decided to troll on the outside of the fleet for a little bit and had an absolute screamer!  Unfortunately, it only stayed on for about 5 seconds before unbuttoning.  I grab the big bass stick and cast a colt sniper to the area when I got bit and I hook up right away!  Definitely a YT!  I kept it out of view to the fleet for the most part and finally got him to gaff.  Not my usual YT I've caught over the last few years, but a scrappy 10-12 pound model which was perfect for the rod and reel I was using.  (Jeremy, I broke in the new bass stick properly!)

Well, the wind started to kick up and I decided to head to the barn.  I kept a few for dinner and released the rest.  (I'll put pictures up when I get home from work)

I really need to find the issue with my trolling motor, but otherwise was really happy being back out on the pond!

Thanks for reading and until next tide!

Pics...

Well, that's my code for someone and it's making me miserable.  Non-stop micromanaging and tapping "their" watch every time I get out of my chair to do something.

Needless to say, someone is going to break... Me or the Penguin... but I expect the sun to start finally shining when it does.

Thank god it's Friday...

My wife realized we need to be a little tight on the purse strings this year, so we decided to stay local.  I was thinking about maybe some camping up in the mountains, but my wife like Glamping over camping.
Before I knew it, she had a floating cabin booked for 3 nights at the puddles.  Even though it is really close, I'm looking forward to some chilling, boozing, fishing and grilling out on the deck in a few weeks.

Maybe time to Carp fish!

Last minute I saw there was a night event going on.  I was thinking about heading down after work, but the Emperor Penguin at work is unwieldy.
I had dinner and was planning to head down when a beer and digesting food in my belly decided for the recliner instead. 

Thursday nights are a weird night to have night fishing, but the park is open to 11:30 so will definitely hit the next one.  Maybe if I can get enough advance, I'll get Homa to cook up some kabobs and we can catch up some cats?  I'm pretty sure it'll only be Homa and Squatch, but the invite will be open if you want to join in. 

I'll keep you posted.

Quote from: sasquatch on July 06, 2026, 07:25:31 PMGlad to hear the console is tight. Hope the other stuff is minor.

Me too....

I thought about hitting LJ in the morning to test out the boat fix.  On the morning of the 4th, I finished sealing up the seams and was ready for it to dry by my shakedown run.  I actually flipped past the news and saw hours and hours of lines and too many people down at the beach, so I decided to opt for a little lake fishing.  With the boat sitting for 3 months, something is always bound to freezer up or not work and with the guys working on my center console, they were also bound to potentially break something without knowing since this boat has a bunch of little intricacies.

I headed out to Jennings and there were a few boats dropping in.  No sweat as I wasn't on a timeline.

The lake was beautiful but awfully warm and sunny.  First thing I noticed was my newly installed bait pump was on but not pumping so I guess I have a air leak in the line somewhere.  I did get it to go so I know it works, but air is getting in somewhere.

Second was the trolling motor.  I would occasionally get the spot lock to work, but the motor wasn't responding.  I think I have a loose wire somewhere not giving it 24V of power since it turns left no matter which arrow I hit on the remote and then just beeps and does nothing. 

In any case, that makes fishing pretty damn tough in this lake.

I cruised around a bit and only saw 5 bass total all morning.  I hooked the first one for all of 1 second and had another appear out of the blue when I was ripping my bait in to cast again.  Other than that, they didn't want anything to do with my creature bait or anything else I put in front of their face.

I moved around and found a big submerged brush pile with what looked like fish on it.  There was no wind, so I knew I could cast there for a bit. 
A few casts in and I hooked a small bass but he wasn't big enough to pop the worm hook out of the creature bait.  I switched to a night crawler and went to fly line it in his face when a swarm of bluegill came up of all sizes!  I was going to keep a few but decided to just release as I caught well over a dozen before that little bass decided he didn't want all of the bluegill feeding without him and I got a little 11" bass on the crawler. 

Then I see explosions out in the middle of the lake!  They looked like stripers, but definitely weren't largemouth!
I metered some big fish and tried everything but no luck.  The lake is in an apparent shad spawn as there were tons of wiggles with eyes out there all over the lake.  I even started trolling but nothing.
I called it quits when I started burning to a crisp and found out the lake has Wipers in it.  I do remember a picture with someone catching one a few years back, but apparently there are still a population in there that like the mid water column.

Looks like I have a new target when I finally get the trolling motor and bait pump situation resolved.  At least the center console seems rigid and safe again!

I'll get pics up later, but I'm here at work at the moment.

Thanks for reading!

Quote from: jrodda on July 01, 2026, 08:19:10 PM

Quote from: Latimeria on July 01, 2026, 07:11:30 AMWell Koga sent me some AZ bass plastics from 5150 so I'll have to try them out.  To be honest, they look like great little baits!

The little 2.5" swimbaits? I've caught a few on those from him, solid play.

6" dropshot worms.  Good freshwater bass stuff

I really do love all of that old west sort of look in those towns and BTW... That is a LOT of JERKY!

I just felt like seeing what everyone's plans were for the holiday...  Feel free to add your own answer.  lol

Well Koga sent me some AZ bass plastics from 5150 so I'll have to try them out.  To be honest, they look like great little baits!

Any updates?