Kayak Fishing Day Three!

This is fun! Today I put the kayak in the water at 9:30 a.m., thirty minutes after low tide. This was my third day fishing on my new kayak. The weather was beautiful with sunny skies and calm winds. I ditched the jacket immediately. Today I brought my Lip Grip Scale (so I can hold and weigh fish) and my new Promar collapsible, floating net. It just came in the mail yesterday.

Kayak Launch Ramp

I tied on the Braid Powerplay Jighead and threaded a Berkley Gulp Jerk Shad on and cast it out. No nibbles today for the first half hour then a thud. Heavy fish but didn’t fight. It just came to the surface. Oh my, another nice halibut. I grabbed my net and reached to net the fish. Whoops, she saw the net and dove. I patiently brought her to the surface and tried netting her from the tail. She dove again. It was on my fourth try that I managed to net the fish. I grabbed my measuring tool and she was 24 inches long! Another legal halibut.

I pedaled over to the bait receiver and asked Jeff to take a photo for me.

After taking the photos, Jeff reminded me not to put the fish on a stringer because of the sea lions so I pedaled back over to my favorite halibut refrigerator – the one in Tim Boyer’s Kayak shop.

At the Launch Ramp - Photo taken by Tim Boyer

I went back out to my spot and continued to fish. There were two other kayaks and a skiff fishing with live bait in the same area. I only saw them catch one fish – a nice sand bass.

I had a couple short bites and connected with one more fish. It fought differently than a halibut or spottie and when it came up, I could see why. It was a white seabass. I didn’t even need to measure the fish to know it was short so I netted the fish, took a photo, carefully removed the jig and released the fish. By 11:30 the wind had come up blowing about 10 knots and was cool. The wind was opposite current. Even with and incoming tide, the drift was too fast to effectively fish the jerk shad. I fished until 12:30 p.m. and headed in.

White Seabass

Dana Point Jet Ski and Kayak Shop from launch ramp

Tim located a lower rack space for me to store my kayak. This location is perfect for me as I don’t have to stand on a stool and lift my kayak up to its rack now. I washed down everything, put gear in the truck and stowed the kayak. Time to fillet that fish. Tim set up a table and I got out my fillet equipment. After I cleaned the fish, bagged the fillets, and disposed of the carcass, I had two bags of fresh fillets and I still had halibut fillets at home from Tuesday. Time to share.

I asked Tim if he would like some fillets and he seemed pleased that I asked. I gave Tim all the fillets so there would be enough for him and his family. There is just my hubby and me at home and we still have enough halibut for another meal. Besides, I plan to bring home some fresh rockfish this weekend from a trip to the Channel Islands on the Pacific Dawn out of Ventura Harbor.