On Saturday March 14 over 300 anglers will gather at Portuguese Hall for the Annual Sand Crab Classic Perch Derby. In its 11th year, this fishing competition has become a durable community event, and has raised tens of thousands of dollars for the Monterey Bay Salmon and Trout Project. Prizes are awarded for barred surfperch as well as sea perch such as black or striped perch.

Competitors will have to work hard Saturday morning to outdo last year's Grand Champion Grace Volz, who broke all the records with her 16  ? inch, three-pound barred perch, the biggest we have ever seen.

So far this has been one of the best years in memory for surf perching. Beaches around the Bay from Pacific Grove to Cowell's Beach produced great numbers of perch, and an amazing number of big fish in the 14-15 inch range. As beach structure has flattened out, the bite has slowed somewhat, but there are still plenty of perch on the prowl. The question is, where to catch them, when, and what to use.

Common wisdom suggests the two hours before and after high tide as the best perching period. Local fly fisherman Tommy Lee Baker has gone against the grain lately, saying "I am liking medium or so tide right now with the way the beach is structured. I had to work hard to scratch out eight fish, nothing bigger than the photo, all BSP. Lots of walking, 8-10 casts then on to the next decent looking water." Tommy Lee ties his own surfperch flies. The fly pictured above is called the Trilobite.

The beaches towards the center of the bay seem to have retained the best structure from our big winter swells. Fishing from Marina up to Rio Del Mar should be productive for anglers on Saturday. Using the classic Motor Oil Red Flake grub on a light leader with a sliding sinker nearly always gets results. The "drop shot" rig is very effective as well, especially if using bait. Besides grubs, the two-inch GULP sandworms , especially in "Camo" color have been a favorite this year. Bait anglers can find good success with shrimp bits. Mussels, clams and especially sandcrabs are also premier baits for both surfperch and seaperch.

We've received no official confirmation of salmon season opener on April 4, but the California Department of Fish and Wildlife has announced our local rockfish season will open early this year on April 1, 2015. Newly released regulations from the DFW include "an increase in the lingcod bag limit from two to three fish, a sub-bag limit of five black rockfish within the 10-fish Rockfish, Cabezon, Greenling (RCG) complex bag limit" and a season from "April 1 through Dec. 31, in 40 fathoms (240 feet) or less. Take and possession of bronzespotted rockfish, canary rockfish, cowcod and yelloweye rockfish will remain prohibited statewide."

Send your reports and fishing photos to Bushnell at scruzfishing@yahoo.com.