Alright, it's now 4 days into winter break and I haven't fished!!! Dang flu!!! I thought I'd occupy myself by puttin together some of the events/memories of this year, and I definitely want to hear the same from you guys.

This year was probably the most significant in my fishing career thus far. I learned more this year and met more people than any previous year. The "discovery" of the fastrac minnow earlier this year was a definite event. I couldn't even tell you how many halibut and white seabass that thing produced this year. I started fishing Lake Los Carneros this year which was really fun. I remember I used to get home from school, dump my backpack in the house, grab the rods, float tube etc. and rush over to carneros before it got dark, almost everyday of the week. It was a welcome break from the school week. -oooohhhhh my stomach, hold on...-ok, I'm good- I met a bunch of people this year who have definitely influenced my fishing in a positive way. Brian #2, Daniel, leapin bass, Pete (wilderness outfitters, I might have met him last year, but I don't remember), Paul (harbor tackle), all the guys at the sportfishing club... I fished the pro/teen up at the delta in July. That was really cool. My first real experience in tournament fishing besides bass-n-tubes. Really fun, caught senko fish (my favorite kind of soft plastic fishin...) and buzzbait fish (my favorite kind of topwater fishin...). Then we all remember the white seabass in the harbor this year. Need I say more??? Hoo nelly, that was a belly scratchin good time. Not only in the harbor though, the white seabass seemed to make a really good showing this year. As for sportboat trips this year, I had an awesome year. The best was probably that trip with Brian Kettler, and Rob on the Seahawk, dominating the white seabass. I got a 23lber, and a few other legals (limit was 3 so I only kept 3 and the rest went to other people for their limits, which is what #2 and Rob also did, I think I had like 5 legals). That 23lber is my biggest wsb to date. The number two best trip would have to be the 3/4 day Seahawk ventura madness trip. Merit heard about a wsb bite off of ventura, so we ran all the way down there on the 3/4 day boat. Not only that, but we couldn't get em to bite on livebait, so Merit bought live squid for us from another boat, and that set em off. Some of the biggest sandbass I've ever seen coming over the rail, along with white seabass. We got the squid late in the day so we couldn't fish long. This was with Daniel, #2, and Daniel's dad. I got like 2 legal wsb and one short. Daniel's dad got a TOAD sandie, like a 5 or 6lber. Merit let us fish well past our alotted time, and we had to pull into the ventura harbor to get gas/bait for the next day's albie run, so we ended up back in SB at like midnight or some ridiculous hour. Unbelievable effort by Merit to get us the fish. 3rd best trip this year had to be on Merit's boat once again. I think I went solo on this one, to San Miguel. Pretty $hitty conditions, and it was blowin pretty good on the frontside (surprise, surprise...) but the last stop of the day, we hammered the johnny bass on plastic. Every cast was a solid 3, 4lb johnny. Most of the folks who couldn't fish plastic were either sick, in their bunks, in the bow, or done fishing, so it was just guys throwin plastic in the stern. We had a rotation going, so that by the time you got from one corner to the next, you'd catch a fish, throw it in your sack (or toss it back) and start again in the rotation, it was great. Let's see, what else...fishin the pipe in my skiff, bringing only plastics and catchin calicos like everytime, goleta beach halibut in the surf, Frank's angel shark (and his mystery fishes...) that wouldn't fit in my net, chasing dolphins in my skiff at goleta beach... Man, this was a bitchin year. Your turn!!!
-Brian

LAST EDITED ON Dec-19-00 AT 09:53 PM (PST)

Hookup!
This year WAS pretty sweet. The highlight of my year was of course the 15-12 largemouth at San Pablo. That fish was the culmination for me of so many hours of trout plug fishing and experimenting with gear and lines and plugs etc etc. To have the right setup and be at the right place at the right time with the right plug on the end of my line. And then to have Summer there to get all the great pictures. That was a definite high point. Other great memories, of course the seabass trip on the Seahawk to Santa Rosa with Brian and Brian #2. We start out with a bunch of log barracuda in the grey which turned into a decent seabass bite. I put 3 or 4 in the boat and Brian bags the 23 pounder before we ran around to the front side where it gets stupid. I caught 9 legal seabass that day, something I don't know if I will ever do again, not to mention at least a dozen just humongous cudas. Speaking of cudas, I finally got into some good surface iron action this year on two trips on the half day. The first was down at the horseshoe kelp with Jason and a full boat. We pulled in and fish were foaming everywhere. I was throwing a Tady A1 and caugh 18 cuda and 6 nice calico. The cuda were wolf packing your iron on every cast blowing out of the water. I even had an estimated 20lb seabass roll, head out of the water, on my jig but miss it. That was fun. The other trip was with Pete and Susanne Skarda. I got them set up with some Tady 45'and we knocked them that day. Don't remember how many cuda and bass but it was real good.

I did a lot of fishing at Margarita this year in hopes of catching some bigger bass. Caught a few over 5 and on one particularly good night I caught a 7-0 and my buddy Austin caught a 6-3. I think our best 5 that day were around 22 to 23 pounds, a really nice bag for Margarita. Don't think I ever reported on it, but the last day that I fished Margarita in June I missed two fish that were both 8 pounds throwing a 12 inch slammer. The first fish boiled and hit it, missed it, and then chased it to the boat with two 6 pounders one on either side. It was a mental picture I will never forget, those 3 big ol bass just eyeballing my plug 10 feet from the boat. The second fish did the exact same thing, this time flanked by 4 pounders. By that time I was jumping up and down the boat! Never did catch a striper this year down there but tried hard at it and saw a few boils. One of these years I'll get one. I did catch a nice 10lb striper this year at Morro Bay on a swimbait, that was cool, my first saltwater striper.

What else? Goleta float tubing was great this year although I didn't hit it up nearly as much as I would have liked to. Had a fun day with about 6 or 7 guys, Ben K, Brian, my Dad, Ben Hallock, Leapin Bass, we were all out there. The 32" halibut I caught at the end of the day was a nice bonus! Only fished the harbor a little bit too but caught a decent number of short seabass. Brian, Brian #2, and Leapin Bass were just killing me witht thier reports. The fish sure have gotten bigger over the years. 3 or 4 years ago we never caught legals. Last year I got 4 legals, and then this year it busted out and Brian had a 13 and a 15 pounder, not to mention the many other legals caught!!! When am I moving back to SB???

Tournament bass fishing was a new deal for me this year. My best tournament was at Clear Lake with John "Swimbait Johnny" Lake in November. We did the trout plug/swimbait thing and brought in a 21lb bag. That was a great redemption after fishing the WON pro/am there as a AAA in the Spring and coming in about 400th place. Had some fun too with the guys in the SB Bass club fishing at Margarita and at Cachuma. Learned some good jig tips from Dennis Wright and had a blast at Margarita throwing the swimbaits again for 5th place there.

2001 To do list:

Go to Willow Beach with Mike Shaw and fish for monster stripers.
Fish the early spring at San Pablo for giant bass.
WON Bass Team tourneys at Margarita, Clear, and the Delta.
Get out seabass fishing at Rosa at least once.
Go salmon fishing out of Half Moon bay or Monterey.
Catch frog fish like crazy on the delta in August.
Catch a few halibut at Goleta Beach in my tube.
Catch a fish period at Lake Chabot (peferably that 13 pounder that chased my plug! )

Yeah, this was by far my best fishing year ever. It was the first year I started seriously tubing the ocean and I think that open up a whole new world for me. Not only because of the fish but because of the confidence catching all those fish installed in me which I believe helped me catch more fish everywhere I went. I also set quite a few records and firsts for myself this year (Albacore, Yellowtail, White Seabass, California Halibut, Barred Surfperch, King Salmon, Calico Bass, Great Barracuda, Pacific Barracuda, King Mackerel, Wahoo, and a few others). I got to see not only one but two opah caught. With 7 legal seabass from the tube and 24 legal halibut how can I possibly complain? Freshwater was topped with a 22 inch Largemouth and a 21 pound King Salmon. I float tubed the sierras for trout for the first time which was an incredible experience. I got two 17 inch and one 16 inch smallmouth out of a stream in Delaware where it's practically unheard of to catch bass over 13 or 14 inches. Los Carneros gave me a 19 incher and several 18 inchers (last year my biggest fish there went 16 inches). All in all an awesome year.

Rob - after last year's salmon trip out of Monterey I'm planning on doing it again next April. I really liked the boat I was on. Of course after catching a 30 pounder that early in the season it's kind of hard to complain about anything. Now that I've done it once I've got a few tricks up my sleeve to try out next time. Last year my work had a conference in Monterey and that's when I went. I don't think we're having that conference again but I want to head up there and fish anyway. Probably within the first two weeks of the season. We should try to hook up - maybe Brian would be interested as well.

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

Pete
Salmon fishing in Monterey is definitely on my list. Lets figure out a weekend and plan ahead. I am mostly interested in going on a mooching trip not a trolling trip. I think that is what you were doing right? Monterey is only about an hour and a half from my house.
Do you know when the season opens up here? I think it's in March or April but I know they are always messing with the regs.

-Rob

LAST EDITED ON Dec-20-00 AT 02:12 PM (PST)

Rob,

My trip was mooching. At the end they trolled for a little while for a couple of guys who hadn't caught any. They picked up one and it was the smallest one of the trip. I went on April 8th and the season had only been open a little over a week. We were mostly fishing about 60 - 80 feet down but I got my big one around 20 feet while experimenting with different depths.

http://www.geocities.com/leapinbass/other_images/000408_salmon.jpg

I was thinking mid-April. I wanted to see if my cousin and his wife wanted to make a weekend out of it and go to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. He's never seen the new tuna tank they have and being the tuna fisherman he is he needs to see it - it's very impressive. Of course my kid will only be a few weeks old at that point so it may have to just be a bonzai run up there. Either way let's plan the trip.

Pete

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

C'mon now, what do you mean MAYBE Brian would like to go... Is it even a question??? Monterey salmon would be super fun. There's no way in hell I'm going to float tube in the ocean in Monterey, but as long as I'm on a boat, I have no problems (there's a, uh, small great white population up that way...). What would be extremely ridiculous would be to take like a week off of school or so, plan the salmon trip a couple days before a bass-n-tubes, go fish margarita, camp out, drive up to monterey the next day, fish monterey, stay a couple days, drive up farther, fish bass-n-tubes, and then come home. Oh yeah. I don't think it'll happen though, I've missed enough school this year.
-Brian

As I sit here laid up w/a broken arm reading about all things fishing I came across this Y2K recap & that got me away from wondering about when I can fish again to being thankful for the timing of the injury & the year I have had. I thought I would share it as you have. As always we start in the bay catching halibut & bass (brushing up on the hookset). I got a bonus honeymoon trip this year (along with Leapin' Bass) starting with tarpon in Puerto Rico to wahoo in Barbados. April we started fishing yellowtail in Ensenada, getting warmed up for the season. May takes us to La Paz with an outstanding trip of tuna, roosterfish, and dorado topped by a 55 pounder. Our first albacore of the year hits the deck of our boat "Striper" on 5-30-00 in Ensenada. This starts out another killer year in Ensenada for yellowtail up to 30lbs, albacore up to 35lbs, yellowfin up to 28 lbs, dorado up to 30 lbs & bluefin up to 40 lbs. On 9-16-00 I experienced a better bite than I have ever imagined. A quadruple jigstrike on bigeye turned into a wide open bite for 2.5 hours of complete madness. I ended up with 3 bigeye tuna from 71 to 81 lbs. When we finally started back early we were quickly stopped again by albacore. That then turned to small yellowfin topped by 2 dorado. October calls for another trip to La Paz for tuna & billfish. We did well on the tuna & dorado but no records broken just some hearts. I lost a huge yellowfin on 40# after over 2 hours. My brother lost a black marlin around 4 to 5 hundred pounds. I did manage to hang on to a 90 lb sailfish. 1 last trip to Ensenada to retrieve the boat & catch a few more football yellowfin. Late october brings the "Striper" to Morro Bay. The first trip brings 2 opah & 4 albacore topped by Leapin' Bass's 46 pounder. The early november trip starts off with my brother getting a 70 lb bluefin followed by a wide open bite on quality albacore topped by my personal best a 54 lb. The last Morro Bay trip pays off again with 6 more quality longfin. My season ended a little early due to a football game but I guess I can't complain.

Hey wait a minute, you're that guy from WON!!! Har har. Finally found your way to the board eh? Glad to have ya.
-Brian

Hey Josh - maybe your broken arm is payment for such an awesome year! :) You forgot to mention the salmon at your mom's place. That may have been old hat for you but it was awesome for me. I just wish it didn't take me 12 hookups before I finally landed one!

Check this picture of Greg out. His second legal halibut out of 3 total halibut! And yes - he's in your float tube, I hope you don't mind. He had to break in the "mini-Striper?"!

http://www.geocities.com/leapinbass/other_images/001123.jpg

Cool Pic of Greg & my tube. I did forget to mention the salmon, always a good trip. Dan's wife actually wrote the article that's why the horrible absence of your pig. The 2 farmers took the real "Mini Striper" out to the bay yesterday 12-21 and besides catching sandbass all day brought aboard & released a Black Sea Bass approx. 80 - 90 lbs according to the farmers.

I forgot about that mini-Striper. I guess the tube could be the "portable-Striper".

So what you're saying is that the BSB was probably about a 40 or 50 pounder :)

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

My best year also, in fact it was mind blowing for me. Here it is in somewhat random order...

60+ calicoes on double 1/2 day (the captain had at least a 100), most were Wham fish, the rest were Slimy Slug fish.

No day under 8 bass from a boat all summer.

3 Yellow Tail on rubber ( one was on the slide ).

Sickest Sand Bass spawn ever. Started late and slow in mid-July, but lasted until September. Sat in the Sea Horse wheelhouse and watched top to bottom metermarks of Sandies for a 1/4 of a mile. I had never even seen bait mark like that. 7" swimbaits were demolished, clouds of legal bass 5' underwater, surface fishing for them in 120', way too many days of boat limits in an hour. Sick I tell ya, Sick. So good I got bored.

2 5lb Gophers on the rubber ( never seen one over 8" before that day)

5 legal 'butts in 7 days. All off the docks after work, all on Whams.

Fished 5 really fun float tube tournaments. Never did all that great, but it was fun. One was in freshwater, first time in 15 years fishing the stuff and it showed. Yet, one of the best times I had all year.

First Dorado ever. Maybe 15lbs, on 12lb, it was the best fight I've ever had period. So good, I'm trying to go to Loreto in May just to get Dodo.

Got my first tube in mid-July. Fished at least 3 days a week after that. Discovered the wonderful Spotted Bay Bass, and learned how to catch them, Sorta. Best day was 20+ legal spotties, with one that was a solid 5lbs. Spun me around 3 times before I got him in.

Fished Calicoes from the tube a couple times. One day I had 9 very legal ones, and lost one that would've gone 9+. If only I hadn't gotten antsy and tried to horse him in.

Last but not least, I helped make a new angler. 10lb 6ozs. If only I could find a dumb bass that big.

Can't wait till Mateo is big enough to go fish with me. I already took him on his first Tuna trip in my head. Some day...

Amish Ed
That's a great year! 5lb spotted bay bass is a monster. All your guys' reports are making me wish I still lived in So. Cal. =)

Yeah, he was HUGE, and the most beautiful golden head with tiny gray spots. I actually caught him 3 times in two months. Lived between these two boats about 20 yards from a ledge dropping off into the main channel. The worst day I had in Newport though was the day I watched this guy fishing live bait in a rental skiff catch him and just dump him into the cooler. Watched him cast right into his hole, and new it was over.

I didn't even realize how good I had it this year until last night when I sat down to pot my Y2K results. Thanks Brian for reminding me.

As for feeling jealous, I find myself in envy of you. Living in south Orange County there just isn't much freshwater or Striper or Salmon. So, I understand. Maybe we could plan for a day when a bunch of us could meet somewhere on the coast this spring.

Happy holidays to all,
Amish Ed

This was indeed truly one of the most incredible years ive had since getting my first boat in spring of 88" besides thounds of calicos,we caught many huge whiteseabass many over 40lbs to 481/2lbs(biggest ever for me or my boat)halibut up to 36lbs(on plastic off ledbetter)more nice yellows than I can count(to 31lbs also on the plastic!)48 dorado in 3 trips(caught within 12-18miles of danapoint)45 albicore in two trips off avila(35 in one trip for two guys!) had the privilage of winning angler of the year for my fishing club,and last but not least got meet and fish with lots of new people on my boat!....Great Year Indeed!...Larry