A muscular south swell rolled through the area last week, which slowed down ocean fishing somewhat. Winds were not too strong, though, and dedicated anglers willing to put in the time continued to report good catches. The coming weekend looks very promising, for a wide variety of available species.

Capitola seemed to suffer the least affect from the swell. Though generally action slow, anglers fishing near the Mile Reef had decent catches of rockfish and lingcod, and an occasional halibut to 23 pounds was brought back to the Capitola Wharf. Ed Burrell at Capitola Boat and Bait says the bait scattered a bit, but live sardines and anchovies are being caught from the wharf as well as by boaters jigging sabiki rigs near the Marina moorings. The sardines, in particular, are working very well as live bait for striped bass near the surfline at New Brighton. Burrell reports stripers up to 23-pounds weighed in on the Wharf last week. There are even rumors of a couple legal White Sea Bass caught somewhere in that area last week.

On the Westside, Captain Jimmy Charters continues to find limits of quality rockfish in 80-120 feet of water while working the local reefs. "We are seeing mostly blues, blacks and olives," says Rubin, "but also the occasional vermillion weighing up to six pounds."

Salmon fishing is still a viable option for anglers near the Soquel Hole. Gerry Brookes from Reel Sportfishing took his clients to that area last week, and found plenty of action from silvers and shaker kings, but no keepers. Stagnaro's Sportfishing tried the area on Wednesday with similar results. Skipper Ken Stagnaro and the deckhands kept busy releasing the plentiful silvers and 15 "barely undersized" kings, and managed to land six keeper salmon for the trip.

The California Department of Fish and Game announced in-season changes to groundfish regulations last week. Refer to the DFG website for all specific information, but most notable is the decrease of the lingcod minimum size limit from 24 inches to 22 inches, and an increase of the recreational bag limit of cabezon to three fish, within the 10-fish combined bag limit for rockfish, cabezon and greenlings.