I decided to hit the harbor tonight and to my surprise met Pete (that's leapin bass for those of ya that don't know it) and Mark out there. That was cool, I wasn't expecting to run into anybody. I threw the castaic swimbait and got pecked at a couple times but no fish stuck. Pete got bit a couple times but also had no fish, besides the typical short halibut earlier in the day. Pete had one fish follow up to the boat leaving a nice blue streak in the phosphorescence. So, the harbor really is tougher than a fish farm!!!! Coulda fooled me a couple weeks ago. The wind was blowing into the harbor instead of out of it like Sunday when I got a couple fish. The wind also didn't quit. It just kept a blowin all night. Usually it'll die off at around dark. Apparently there were similar condtions on Saturday when it was tough for Pete. Maybe the seabass just don't like the wind. My new theory is that when the wind blows into the harbor, the fish go to the back of the harbor but when the wind blows out of the harbor the fish move to the mouth by the bait barge and that's when we always get em. Next time when the wind is blowin into the harbor I'm gonna hit the back and see how many fish I don't catch back there. Ok, good luck on your tuna trip coming up Pete.
-Brian

It was kind of a bummer. Mark's been on vacation since he got his 32 incher a month ago and I was hoping to put him into a few more. You may be right about that wind theory we'll have to go back in the harbor and give it a try sometime. I also have a theory that the wind/current coming into the harbor carries the smell of the receiver into the harbor instead of out which could not only drive the seabass that are already there back into the harbor but may also not draw any new ones in. On the other hand it the current in going out of the harbor the smell may be out there taunting them.

Looking at my diary I found that in the past month or so since we started getting the seabass at the harbor I've got 19 while the tide was falling, 7 when the tide was rising, and 12 right at low tide. I've also only had 3 windy days out of 10 trips - two of them I got skunked and one of them produced 2 fish. This could mean the falling tide does have something to do with the seabass bite or it could mean the falling tide just happened to occur in the morning and evening when they were feeding (or both).

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You can't catch tomorrow what you kill today - please practice catch and release.