Weather and sea conditions were cooperative this week, which meant good fishing every day. Some of the afternoons were blustery, but mornings lent themselves to the pursuit of local rockfish, lingcod, seabass and Dungeness crab.

Commercial crab season starts this weekend so it's bound to get a bit crowded out there with hundreds of pots. So far, for the sport crabbers, it has been a bonanza. Short soaks are producing full limits of crab, with very few shorts in the mix so far. The crab are big, and meaty with hard shells, just the way we like them. Once the commercial boats get going, fresh live Dungeness will be available at the Santa Cruz Harbor, directly from some of the boats. Prices are lower than the fish market, and you can't get crab any fresher. The usual areas are producing - 180-220 feet of water off the North Coast, straight out of the Harbor, and along the muddy edges of our marine canyons.

Fishing for rock cod remains steady and productive, with schoolie rockfish biting willingly from our local reefs. South Rock, an area in 90 feet of water southeast of Lighthouse Point has clouds of rockfish schooling, with some nice lingcod on the rocks below.

For bigger game, the Giant Humboldt Squid are still around. Todd Fraser at Bayside Marine reccomends fishing 200 feet of water near the Soquel Hole for the huge cephelopods. Fraser also notes an upswing on the seabass bite from Wilder's Ranch up to the Four and Five-Mile areas. "The sea bass are being caught on the bottom and a few half way down," Fraser says. Squid is still the preferred bait for bass, with live squid doing the best, whether fly-lining, or sending it down for deeper fish.

Talk about an ongoing institution, The Monterey Bay Salmon and Trout Project held its Annual Albacore Dinner last Saturday night, in conjunction with the Castroville Rotary Club. This was the 35th year for the dinner and by all accounts it was a smash hit. Door prizes and silent auction items helped raise funding for MBSTP projects, but this fine organization can always use more help.

MBSTP is a non-profit organization seeking to restore the native salmon and steelhead trout population in our area, and operates a local hatchery as well as providing education and habitat restoration efforts. Donations are always welcomed by the Project, and for a limited time, funding donations will be matched by an anonymous donor, up to $10,000.

For those of us with more time than money, volunteers are also needed. Hatchery work, steelhead trapping, and educational outreach are a few of the volunteer avenues available through the Project. For contact info, check the website at www.mbstp.org.

Pictured Above: Captain Mike Baxter used live bait to fool this big ling Monday morning.