Weather: Odd for this time of year, we have had the winds continue to blow from the northwest and north on a fairly consistent basis at 10-20 knots for most of the week. There is a day or so where it died down, but overall it has remained fairly steady. This morning our temperature at 6 AM was 65 degrees and it has been in the low to mid 60's all week. Daytime highs have been in the mid to low 80's.

Water: The water on the Pacific side has remained rough due to the steady winds, and it has also remained colder than normal with the water on the beach starting the week at 62 degrees and ending at 65 degrees. Offshore at the Golden Gate and the San Jaime Banks it warmed just a bit to 66 degrees. On the Cortez side it was considerably warmer with the near shore temperature ending the week at 78-79 degrees while offshore it was still a warm 75 degrees. Surface conditions on the Cortez side were much better as well with seas at 4-6 feet near home and 2-5 feet a bit farther north.

Bait: Caballito were the main bait this week but there were also plenty of Mullet available here. The better Mullet were found in San Jose since the bait guys there use a throw net to catch them and the guys here use treble hooks to snag them, but since most of the game fish were found near to the beach, mullet seemed to work better than Caballito. The price was the normal $3 per bait and I did not hear of any Sardinas.

FISHING

Billfish: The Striped Marlin bite has gotten a little better with a few boats managing to get multiple releases, but we are still seeing a lot more fish than we were last week. Most of them have been tailing down swell on the surface and have shown little interest in eating, but once in a while a hungry fish is found. Due to the water conditions, most of the fishing has been close to home and on the Cortez side of the Cape. There are plenty of Mullet near shore and the Marlin seem to like them and are being caught within a mile or two of the beach. With the water temperatures warming up we can expect more Blue and Black Marlin to be showing up as well. As soon as we see a steady 82 degrees with bumps to 85, be ready!

Yellowfin Tuna: This week was a repeat of last week for the Yellowfin Tuna as the fish remained just off the beach between Gray Rock and San Jose. The best bite was early in the week and early each day, but the fish remained in the area all week. The fish were small at 10-15 pounds with an occasional 25 pound fish in the mix, but at least there were some being caught. The normal areas offshore on the Pacific side were just to rough for most of the boats to get too.

Dorado: There was some decent Dorado action again, but it is still not red-hot. Most of the fish were between 10 and 15 pounds and they were all caught close to shore in the warmer water on the Cortez side. Slow trolling live bait worked well once the fish were found. There were no large schools found, but enough small groups to keep things interesting. Some boats were able to get three to five per day while others just got one or two.

Wahoo: I did not see any Wahoo come in this week but heard of one nice fish that weighed 80 pounds, and of other smaller fish that were found close to the drop-offs along the Cortez coast.

Inshore: Roosterfish were a matter of the right place at the right time. One of my friends did excellent on Monday with many fish in the 40-50 pound class and again on Saturday with 5 that size.. Slow trolling Mullet in 50-100 feet of water instead of the normal 20-30 feet resulted in these larger fish, and using 30# flouro-carbon leader really helped. Most other boats did all right, but not that well, with an average of two fish per trip. There are still Sierra being caught as well as Amberjack and Grouper. Almost all this action is taking place close to the beach on the Cortez side of the Cape due to the rough conditions on the Pacific side.

Notes: It was a windy week and as a result there was little if any fishing taking place on the Pacific side. Most of the action was close to home and near shore. I really hope these unseasonable winds quit and we have a chance to check out the Pacific Sea-mounts, there might be some decent Tuna out there. I had a friend loan me a pile of CD's this week so my listening was varied, this report was written to the sound of Bush, Sinister Grin and Dave Crimmen. Until next week.