Last night after work I joined Leapin Bass and his friend mike for a few hours of fishing from the sand at West Beach. By the time I got there both of them had caught a couple of short halibut. They were using various crankbaits and plastics. I started off using a big hammer in clear with red flake for nada. So I switched over to an Excalibur crank. Again not even a strike. The Excalibur was running a little to deep for the shallow water we were fishing. Just before Pete left, being the gracious, gentleman fisherman that he is, offered to give me one of his shallow running Rebel jointed minnows. I tied it on and tossed it around the bait dock a few times. I saw that I only had about 15 min. left to fish so I started walking back towards the wharf. About twenty yards from the wharf I stopped and saw that I only had about 5 min. left to fish. I figured I would just take a couple of more casts and call it a day, skunked. On my second cast I got hammered. I could tell it was a decent fish as it took 2 good runs and gave plenty of head shakes. A small crowd started to form on the wharf as I fought the fish. I finally got a look at it and was pretty sure it was legal. I didn't have a net or anything so I just tried to surf it in on a small wave as I have heard other people talk about on this site. It worked great and I was able to beach it and drag it up the beach a little. As I get it up the beach I hear coming down from the wharf, "is it legal?". I give back "it's close". I whip out the tape and it's not even close at 24 inches solid. Needless to say it made my day. Thanks Pete.

Bowlboy