Got out ther about 7:30am due to interrupted sleepy time by my 3 yr old. The pier was alone with only abou 4 anglers through the whole pier. I fished the very end of the pier to enjoy the view. Used anchovies for bait. I used a mooching rig with sliding sinker. Kept casting out and getting bites. Finally caught a bullhead around 9:30am. Kept getting bites and getting my bait stolen.

Getting frustrated with the bait stealing thievs, I casted out with half an anchovie and left the line with just some slight slop. I watched my line get bit and start tighening up, I SET THE HOOK and nothing but a bunch of white/gray feathers. Ah hah, turns out the thieve was one of those diving birds(don't know the correct name) I kept casting in different direction, but the damn bird kept diving and taking my bait. Well around, 10:30am the breeze kicked in and the bird for some reason left.

As soon as that happened, I re-baited and while talking to some tourists from the central valley my line started tightening up and pulling, Set the hook and had a fish on. I reeled in a nice 15" halibut which was released. After that it died down, other fisherman started showing up.

The only thing that pissed me off was this guy with his g/f who were fishing next to me where my buddy caught and released that small lingcod. Well, I'm sure they caught the same one as it was the exact same size and location and they decided to keep it. Even after the fact that I told him Lings are off limit not to mention that it would have been undersized anyway. They had it in a bucket full of water.

The hightlight of the day came when these kids (16-17 yrs old) hooked something BIG. The kid was trying to muscle the thing in, then I told him take your time. He looked at me and said "What do I do??" in raw amazement. I coulndn't help but laught cause he was so excited.

Well he got a nice lesson on pump and reel down. Setting the drag, cause he had it too lose. When he finally did get it close enought to see, what I thought was a monster halibut turned out to be a skate. The thing must have been around 40 lbs becuase its wingspan was at least 36" and the length at least 48" easy.
Well it took off for another run and by this time there were about 25 spectators. We had no way of getting it up and told him there's no way he's going to pick up that thing but we tried anyway. As soon as we tried pulling the line up, SNAP. Turns out he had his leader tied to a sinker slider and the weight on the other swivel. The plastic slider broke. Even if it were rigged right it would have been hard. He wasn't planning to keep it, so he didn't mind it flopping back into the water and slowly swimming away.

Crabbers were doing OK. I caught and release 3 small crabs.

Thanks,
Eli
www.anglernet.net