Weather conditions for the weekend look decent for inshore anglers. Winds will be gusting higher in the afternoons, so an early start to the day is recommended. We may see some bigger wind-chop wave activity over a dropping south swell of medium strength. We’ve had no new tuna reports since last week.  Everyone is still holding on to hopes the big pelagic bluefin tuna will show up in numbers again, as they did last year. Water temperatures on the outside are quite warm and there’s plenty of bait. If that bite does shape up it can last into December.

During the week, that south swell roiled the waters along the northern shores of Monterey Bay, as well as the North Coast areas above Santa Cruz. The fish are still there, and they were still biting, but fishing a little deeper seemed to be the key to success. Launching from Monterey, Chris’ fishing Trips sent in reports of rockfish limits up to 210 cod for each of their trips. Every trip managed at lest one legal ling co as well. From Santa Cruz, most charter boats headed north for the best success. The ling cod count was much higher for the Santa Cruz boats this week. As fall progresses towards winter, we’ll see the ling cod numbers increase as they move into their wintertime spawning grounds. Go Fish Santa Cruz took advantage of conditions to test the jumbled rocky reefs of the North Coast this week. Skipper JT Thomas reported, “We fished at Franklin Point today with Wa and his team from Nashville. They caught quality rock fish including big vermillion, canaries, yellow tail and browns. They landed two ling cod weighing up to twenty pounds. They threw back ten short lings.” Rodney Armstrong on the Knot Alone submitted a similar report saying, “On Monday, we got to get up the hill a ways and fish shallow water. We finished up quickly with wide open fishing. We had limits of rock fish for six of us plus four nice lingcod to 15 pounds and two nice cabezon. Filled the cooler in no time at all. One of the best bites we had in a while!”

Fishing for halibut is still going strong, both in shallow and in deeper waters. Surfcasters  who find calm waves and clear water can hook up multiple small halibut right from the beach. Most are sub-legal size which makes it important to treat the fish gently and release quickly. Boaters fishing 30 to 70 feet of water are reporting steady catches and even limits of halibut caught while drifting live bait, bounce balling squid or hoochies or throwing swimbaits.  Surfcast perch numbers are increasing as is the average size of fish. Stripers, sadly, are still a no-show for the beach anglers around the bay.