June gloom hasn’t hurt deep sea fishers

Summer can’t get here fast enough for harbor area anglers hoping to

get a couple of good albacore fishing trips scheduled. Longfins are

still staging in an area off Baja Norte and haven’t started any kind

of migration into channel waters. There is excellent fishing for big

albacore for fishermen booking on multi-day trips where full limits

are being caught. Al Devito of Laguna Beach joined this outdoor

writer on a seven day trip aboard the deluxe sportfisher, Searcher,

running out of Fisherman’s Landing, 619-226-2403, which resulted in

prime fishing for albies, big yellowtail and 100 pound class

yellowfin tuna.

The Searcher trolled the outer waters for big schools of albacore

and then headed farther south to Alijos Rocks for a couple of days of

tackle busting tuna fishing. Devito fished a hot stick and landed a

lot of big yellows and tuna. Co-captain Tom Calabrese, a harbor area

local who grew up working on sport boats out of Davey’s Locker, feels

that albacore should be within one-day range of the Newport Harbor

based fleet by the Fourth of July weekend. Water conditions in the

channel are ideal with lots of bait and just the right water temp for

this early in the season.

Local fishing remains good for passengers fishing all day, half

day, 3/4 day, twilight trips and six pack charters out of both

Davey’s Locker and Newport Landing Sportfishing. Barracuda are

schooled up a few miles off the beach and around Catalina Island and

there have been good numbers of logs sacked by anglers. The sand bass

bite has also shifted into high gear and limits of 2- to 5-pound

sandies are being targeted all along the coast. Sand and calico bass

have moved up to shallower water between Huntington Harbor and the

stringer kelp beds off Laguna Beach.

Gary Thompkins of Costa Mesa anchored up his 25-foot Skipjack just

inside the oil rigs and caught an easy limit of big sand bass fishing

cut squid on a 1 oz. jighead painted white. While live and cut bait

is accounting for the bulk of the fish being harvested, plastics are

also effective, especially under the lights while fishing a twilight

trip.

White sea bass still continue to show up at Catalina Island with

live squid being the key to catching a big croaker. The Cat Special

has been the top boat of the Newport fleet for the past couple of

weeks with good counts on yellowtail, sea bass and there has also

been a pretty steady pick on calico bass on the lee side of the

island. Jack Williams of Huntington Beach decked a 34-pound sea bass

while fishing on board the Cat Special on a recent trip to Catalina.

It’s too early in the season to expect any reports on marlin but

it’s not unusual to hear reports of jumpers and tailers around the 14

Mile Bank as early as the Fourth of July. An indication of better

water conditions are the number of blue sharks showing up around high

spots in the channel along with some catches of mako and thresher

sharks for private yachts and anglers fishing with the Bongos

Sportfishing fleet based in Newport.

Fresh water fishing continues good at local lakes, catfish and

bass are taking over top billing with the higher water temperature.

Irvine Lake is being stocked weekly with thousands of pounds of

channel catfish and fishing has been good in Woody’s Cove and off

Trout Island. Laguna Niguel Lake continues to produce good catches of

bass and catfish and the Santa Ana River Lakes are prime for night

time catfishing.