Offshore Venice LA

[capteddie]

I have been fishing a good bit recently fishing between the fronts. Some of it has been outstanding and some of it was decent. We havent had any real horrible days recently although like I said some days we were working harder then others.

The shrimpers still have some fish on them as well as the shelf rigs. In the last month I havent been out more then about 20 miles. A couple of days the weather was bad although we made days of it fishing inshore for reds and trout.

The first 3-4 days were a struggle with the yf on the boats although we picked up a handful of blackfins and smaller yfs. We also jigged up some scamps and amberjack off of the rigs.


The weather stabilized a bit and the fish went off mostly big blackfins with some good yfs biting.

I pulled up to a boat one day and while we were getting everything ready I threw out a mullet and hooked up instantly. Put a nice 60 pound yf in the box. Figured that was a good sign. I made one drift that day and put 25 blackfin and 4 yf in the box up to 140 pounds. The other two were right around 100 pounds and we were back at the dock for 130.

On the next trip me and Capt Mike had a two boat trip. The blackfin were still out of control which made it a little hard to get to the yfs although Capt Mike did pop a 150 that morning. After we got some good fresh bait we pulled up to another boat and had a good fish come out. After catching and releasing 10 more blackfin we finally got a bait to her and 25 minutes later we stuck the gaff in a 105 pound tuna and called it a day

On Friday I had a father and his two sons in from illinois and we picked up 18 blackfin in short order. We saw some yf but there was no way to get baits to them. We caught and released a bunch more bf trying to get a big boy but that never happened. We missed a couple wahoo and headed in early because one of the boys was sick.

On sat I had three 15 y/os in for a bday party so off I headed with three boys. Let them play with the blackfins for a while and put 15 or so in the box. Started trolling around and missed a wahoo. Ran out to a rig in a little deeper water and put five small yfs in the box. Started jigging the rigs with no luck so I went to a wreck to start jigging. Picked up a couple ajs on the wreck when one of the boys threw in a live mullet and it got hammered by a blackfin. Started cutting up some bait and threw it in and a school of bfs and bonito came right up to the boat. I let the kids catch a couple more and let them gaff the blacks which was an interesting sight.

I threw some more chum in the water and saw a big flash down deep but couldnt tell what it was. Next handful of chum was thrown and a superstud rolled up behind the boat. I had to rig up a 50w cause they all had deep divers on them. Threw a big red meat chunk in and it was on. The boys fought them for a little while before they wore out. My deckhand fought it as well before they strapped me in and I proceeded to kick his butt and get my butt kicked but we managed to get the gaff in and put her in the boat. She ended up weighing 198 pounds.

Fog season is also upon us as one of my pictures shows so be careful running around and dont try it without radar.

[swamp snorkler]

I wish my mom would have got me a Birthday Present like that when I was 15.

Nice report cap.