Halibut at the 'rio

YakSailor · 08-13-2006, 04:22 PM

From the first bite, Austin knew. He knew from the tell-tale deadweight tug and the slow z..zz..zzz..zz..zzzzzzzzz....z.z. Was it a rockfish? A mac? Maybe even a large sandbass?

No.

Not this time. His lure was at the bottom.
Could it be seaweed? No. Seaweed did not have an attitude like this. Austin's first word was, "halibut." Then, the request, "Dad, get the net." After that, the coaxing:

"be a halibut...puh-leeeeeeeeeez be a halibut.
halibut.... halibut... halibut... halibut.. halibut.
It's gottttaaaa be a halibut.... can't be anything else.
Keep the line tight...but not too tight...drags OK....stay outta the kelp....up...up....up." ZZZZZzzzzzzzzzZZzzzz...."No! come back! up, OK...steady....steaaaaaaadeeeeeee.....I can see it...here it comes... it's color now.....yeah! Dad, it's a HALIBUT!!!"
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Who: YakSailor Sr., Jr.
Where: Leo Carillo
When: Aug 13, 2006, 9:30-11:30am
Water Conditions: 2 ft rising tide, 18 ft visibility, 70Â°F water temp. Baitfish everywhere.
Air Conditions: Sunny, 10 mph wind, about 72Â°F
Craft: Hobie Mirage
Setup: Daiwa Capricorn 3500 with 8' graphite rod, 12 lb Stren Fluorescent blue monofilament. P-line flouro. Daiwa 2500, Cajun Red 12 lb mono, on a 7' fiberglass Mr. Big Fish.
Lures: Big Hammer halloween colors, Gary Yamamoto MORG on weedless worm hook
Target Phase 1: Rockfish
Target Phase 2: Fish of the flatatious nature
Catch: 2 Calicos, 4 rockfish, 1 Halibut, 23". The calis and rockfish released.

Slept in this morning to catch up on the jet lag from our vacation. We took the red-eye back and needed the rest. We got out dry, and as usual, Potto was just coming in from a morning of rockfish catching. We chatted and Pete gave us the run-down of the local happenings. He was feeling lucky and was planning on landing without stowing his gear. We wished him luck and made our way straight to the rockfish wavepoint. My plan was to defuse the skunk by catching rockfish right away. After that we would spend some quality time fishing the floor for flatware. At the first stop there was plenty of kelp and we metered fish immediately:

We hooked up on almost every cast with rockfish and macs:

We each got a nice checkerboard:

After the rockfish fun, it was time to bounce at the bottom. I kept snagging weeds with the BigHammer. Austin was fine with his weedless setup. It only took a few minutes before he caught his flattie. I did hook onto what felt like a flattie, but it took me into deep kelp. I tried everthing to get it out, but too no avail. No matter, one halibut is enough.

potto · 08-13-2006, 05:04 PM

Awesome job on the flat kind.

Today I was being absolute lazy. Arrived at about 8ish, and went for the live bait setup today. First cast brought me rockfish, then more rockfish. Finally spanish and green macs. Kept those and threw back the lizards.

Current much stronger today compared to yesterday. The spot where I fished, 3oz wasn't enough to keep the line less than 45 degrees.

Man I hate that! Obviously John must have found a nice spot where it was workable.

As I was coming in I met John and Austin and gave them a run down of yesterday's fish report. Landed with all my gear out.

Talked to a diver about the Leo area, and it was interesting what he said. Hmmmmmm.

Hey John, High tide was at around 1 today. What time did you catch the flat monster?

Here is a pic of my first cast this morning. Nice red.

cappo5150 · 08-13-2006, 06:45 PM

way to go fellas

Thresher · 08-13-2006, 06:47 PM

Nice. Gotta get my lazy butt off the couch and fish.

creekster · 08-13-2006, 06:48 PM

great day there john...as always...

J Woodman · 08-13-2006, 07:10 PM

Way to go 'Yak and Mini-yak. I should have joined you, as you did better than me.

YakSailor · 08-13-2006, 07:51 PM

Hey, Potto. Thanks for the pics of the rockfish. We caught the flattie at around 10:30am. I might add that after we netted it, we gill clipped it AND roped it to the yak. I've lost too many halibut due to not securing them properly. We also decided to try the cheeks, and I must say that it's the whitest flakiest meat on the fish!

**Carnivore** · 08-13-2006, 09:16 PM

Cool halibut thanks for the pics and the report.

sourcreamnjive · 08-13-2006, 10:34 PM

Way to go on the Flattie! Thanx for sharing your day!

BlackLion · 08-14-2006, 07:49 AM

John/Austin,

Nice job on the flattie!! What an awesome time you guys had before that as well! Great report and once again, thanks for the pics.