Gone Fishing
Article & photos by Fred F.
Spring time brings both warmer air & warmer water at our local beaches. This brings the sand crabs & thus the surf fishing season is started.
With starbucks in hand, Tommy & I loaded up our gear & headed down the Ted Williams Pkwy at 7 am Tuesday morning heading for Torrey Pines State Beach.
Parking at this time of the morning was no problem and we were on the beach in nothing flat. I started scouting for sand crab beds, watching for their antennae with the outgoing waves. It took a little time but we found a good spot & loaded up the bait box with good sized crabs & started fishing our way down the coast.
The water was a tolerable 60 degrees and fishing the incoming tide has generally been productive. We fished & walked & talked (likely more talking) down a mile & a half of beach refreshing our bait as we went, before we got to my old favorite spot just below “Bathtub Rock”.
By now the sun had burned off the fog, lines of pelicans & flocks of sandpipers were gliding over the breakers.
Tommy caught the first fish. A half pound Barred Surf Perch that happened to be busting with babies. We took a quick photo of her & turned her loose.
A half dozen casts later I caught one about the same size & did the same with it. Ive always believed in catch & release fishing whenever I could. An dhaving a camera brings the “fishermen’s story” down to size.
Mine was the last fish caught that morning & as the tide was about to crest we decided to call it a day. Besides, lunch at Tommy’s favorite hole-in-the-wall restaurant was beckoning.
The whole outing took about 5 hours out of the day & aside from a few bucks worth of gas and the (annual) expense of a fishing license it cost us next to nothing.
As for fishing tackle, we used ultralite rods & reels normally reserved for trout or crappy.
Quarter ounce barrel weights & #6 baitholder hooks.
The only specialty item was a “sand crab trap” which is a basket 8” X 10” made of 1/4” welded wire. This is used to scoop up crab laden sand & rinse with the tide to provide bait.
If you want any more info regarding surf fishing please don’t hesitate to ask.
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