The Stern Saver Fishing Report

At Stern Saver, it’s all about the fishing! Please let us know what’s biting in your neck of the woods. We’d like to know what you are catching these days, where you caught it, how you caught it and when.

Saturday April 7, 2012    Monterey Bay, CA

King Salmon Report:
On Saturday, I went to Moss Landing, Monterey Bay for the salmon opener and brought two long-time friends who had never been salmon fishing before. We entered the opening day derby with 80 other fishermen, some which are the best charter captains and fishermen down there. We got there Friday night hung out at the harbor, had a few beers, and sized up the crowds that were going to be launching that next morning. We decided to launch at 7:00am after the rat race, which was a good idea b/c the lines were short.

On the fishing grounds at 7:40am, we got ready to drop out gear outside the fleet of 150+ boats three miles off Moss. Unfortunately, one of my new Cannon downriggers broke down so we were left with only one to stack with. We get two lines in around 8:00 and it’s not long before we get our first fish a 25.5″ keeper. I decided to stay tight with the area we hooked up and repeatedly passed the same spot getting takedowns on every pass including a double hook up. On one pass, I was reeling in the gear when my lure got nailed by a decent fish and I had a good fight on my hands. I got it to the boat and realized it was a good bit bigger than the others we’d hooked, so I decided to net it myself, b/c no one on board knew how to net a fish but me. We landed the fish, a nice 31″, 13.5lb king. The bite slowed for us around noon and the winds really picked up so we trolled home for a bit and were in by 1:45pm. All of our fish were caught using a blue/white hoochie/kajiki behind a red/silver Hot Spot flasher at 45-90′ OTW (on the wire).

When I got to the dock, a buddy came over and saw my fish and said, “dude, I think you’re going to win the derby with that fish!” Sure enough, it did! Overall, we hooked six fish, landed three, released one (1/2″ short) and farmed three. Those barbless hooks make salmon fishing incredibly challenging. If you let that line go slack, they spit the hook and wave goodbye. Weather was great, the morning started with a 10-15mph Easterly wind which died around 11:00, then picked up again around 12:30. Swells were 3 feet.

Captain  Khahn Tran, owner of North Cal Sportfishing Charters www.northcalsportfishing.com went out Saturday, Sunday, and Monday from Moss Landing here are his reports: Saturday,
It was wide open bite with limits reports @ 8am. My boat didn’t get to finish early but we were done with 8 fish to #13lb by 11am. We lost as many as boated. I also introduced 2 newbies to the Monterey Bay salmon fest. The fish were caught all over the bay. But the main fleet was off Mulligan. We were north of the fleet #43/57 and between 30′ to 120′ OTW. My blue dancer behind a UV sling blade did most of the damaged today and my UV Glow behind an 11″ red/white dodger were close behind.

Sunday,
Same location, tackle and depth for 7 nicer sized fish by 11am. Stayed out for another 3 hours looking for the devil fish. Lost 4 more before calling it a day.

Monday,
Tuff day for the Connie T crew! Ran to my #s from the previous days to find the fleet have moved over from Mulligan’s. Boy, there were a lot of boats on the water for a Monday. We played dodge boat for an hour before making a move to cleaner water. Michael on the CarolSea and I ran south til we spotted some bait at 45/52. Michael’s crew hooked 7 and landed 5 fish, one shy of limits. My boat hooked 10 but only managed 1 for the day. Tuff day on the water! The fish were between 80-100′ OTW.