Butts to the Bones (10/2)

[Latimeria]

Hurricane swell is coming, so Friday looked to be the best day from the Marine Forecast to get out and get some bonito!  I wanted 5 small shark size and 5 of the bigger models, well that was my goal prior to launch.

Plan A

Conditions couldn't have been better and what a great full moon on the trip out!  The camera phone pics didn't do it justice!



A little texture in the morning, but it would smooth out to grease soon after this picture.



On the way out, my buddy wanted a few calico if I got any so I stopped and dropped.  No bass on the meter, but I got this beautiful rattler!  The colors from the sunrise made this sucker pop!



I went on a hunt for bait...  and finally found some.  It wasn't everywhere, but there were good balls of sardine and mackerel around!  The mackerel were all 7-12 inches with a few bigger ones in the mix. 
Then the smaller shark bait sized bonito started to show!  Plan A was working and got easy limits of perfect bait sized bone!



These are perfect sized one's, but I had to stop after my 5th and it was killing me!  lol



I had to think of a Plan C as I wasn't sure what I wanted to do besides find bigger bones to fill a 10 fish limit and I had tons of live bait available.  I saw a bigger swirl and wasn't really sure what it was so I tossed my surface iron and instantly hooked up!  I got it to the boat and it was a good 5-6 pound calico!  I went to bounce him, but I underestimated how big he was and half way up and a quick thrash by him sent him on my gunnel and back in the ocean.  hahaha, oh well. 

I did some power drifting with the trolling motor and got a bunch of bass, all shorts.  (Calico and Turd rollers)

Greasy Waters!



I then get thumped and know what I have...  a legal halibut!  Plan B has now focused to Plan C!  A Butt Hunt!



I weed through more turds and then get right back into the Butts!



This one was a good sized bigger then the first one.



I then have a really decent one on.  I get it to the side of the boat and it's in the 11-12 pound class of fish when a quick head shake 2 inches from the gaffs sends him back down!  Ugh, but I'm not done yet.  I probably had over a dozen halibut bites, as the one's I missed, all came back looking like this..





I get another boat side and can't tell if it's legal or not, but looks aright around the right size.  no net, so i decided to bounce him and we all know how well trying to bounce a possible legal halibut into the boat will turn out.  Note to self, don't bounce a halibut as you'll never get him in the boat!

I then get another!  This is crazy!  This one was definitely a short, but probably 20".  I tried to tail grab him, but he didn't want any part of that and bolted while leaving my wet at the gunnel.

I was ready to start thinking about looking for bone when I got my 6th Halibut, another legal!  A NorCal Limit!



Time to get back to Plan B...

I really was heading home, when I came across these weird wakes in the water.  Turns out they were big balls of big bone!  I started throwing the big megabait on my bass gear and just had a field day!



Hundreds of 7-8 pound fish swimming all around the boat in this flat clean water was surreal!



That was about 30-40 minutes of some absolute fun fishing!  My arms were sore and I needed to get back so packed up and made the run. 
I was so glad for a day like this and now planning on making crab stuff halibut tonight for dinner!  Grocery shopping at its finest!

Thanks for reading!

[jrodda]

Epic day for sure! Butts bass and bones. Cool to hear the larger bonito come through, sounds like the sight to see in person.

[SevengillTheVC]

Wow! I was wondering where the Tuesday report was, but this one will do, this one will do!

[vdisney]

Totally stoked for you and envious at the same time   

[skrilla]

Honey hole!