Monterey charter boats continue to post “cookie-cutter” reports. Fishing almost daily, the Check Mate and Caroline from Chris’ Fishing Trips are maximizing their lingcod counts, catching mostly limits of lings each day. Their secret? Live bait. Owner Chris Arcoleo knows it’s worth it to stop and get live bait each day, and his tactic is paying off in the form of multiple big lings for all his clients this year. Randy’s Sportfishing from Monterey also brought in 35 lingcod on their trips this week. More impressive was the four California halibut caught from the Sur Randy on Wednesday’s trip.

Halibut have been slow to show this year. As summer progresses, we’re starting to see a little more consistency in catches of the big flatfish from Monterey Bay. Moss Landing’s Kahuna Sportfishing even has a limited halibut trip planned for August 11. They will take a small load of only 15 anglers and fish specifically for flatties. This would be a good trip to get on, if you can.

Moving up the coast, Capitola Boat and Bait posted a few halibut reports this week of fish up to 24 pounds caught near the Mile Reef and by the SC3 buoy. Most Capitola reports featured good bags of brown and black rockfish and lingcod for the skiff renters and private boaters launching from the wharf.

Lighthouse Point and the West Cliff reefs are holding decent schools of rockfish as well. Private boaters fishing Wednesday and Thursday found a mix of browns, gophers, rosy, and china rockfish, as well as the occasional lingcod and cabezon. Be prepared with your fish I.D. charts, as we are also seeing an increase of canary rockfish, which are not legal to keep.

For bigger fish and more action-packed fishing, heading north towards Ano Nuevo is a smart move when conditions permit. Go Fish Santa Cruz Charters took the beautiful Miss Beth up to Franklin Point on Thursday for good success. Skipper Jim Rubin remarked, “The water was a little bumpy but very fishable. They caught a couple of nice lingcods and limits of big rock fish including blues, olives and blacks.”

We have some big market squid spawns off of Santa Cruz these days, as is evidenced by the numerous squid boats lighting up the nighttime sea horizons. Reports of squid have come in from Pajaro, Rio Del Mar and the Cement Ship area, as well as up the coast towards Davenport. Targeting the squid spawns can often result in catches of white sea bass, and we have received occasional reports of the big croakers in the past month or so. Once the commercial squid net boats reach their mandated quota we may very well have a good sea bass bite on the north side of the Monterey Bay. Cross your fingers.