N County: skunk, recon, solitude

Sounds like you found a potential sargo hole. Get the fryer hot if you ever want to come over to the dark side (bait), lol

 

Sargo are delicious, maybe the best eating fish from our local water other than sculpin or rockfish, yum. Just make sure you gut them at the beach under the water (much like opaleye and halfmoon) as the body cavity has some very interesting odors, lol. As for the chain, I have an unlimited supply. It doesn't snag like lead. Not sure why, it doesn't though. Piece of shrimp and a number six live bait hook, 12# mono is all you need, the beefy hook will hold up to a big sand bass, calico or sheep if you hook one. If you ever want to meet halfway, I can give you a pound (or forty) no problem. For the steepest hard structure, I prefer a spider hitch above a surgeon loop. If a fish buries you bad, you can snap off the weight and have half a chance to get the fish to hand, and a couple chain links will just rust away on bottom, not sit there for a thousand years like lead would. Simple enough

 

You sound like me - "seclusion." Seclusion is something that really cant be found anywhere on San Diego waters, be it fresh or salt The closest I've I've ever scored to anything even akin to seclusion is to get in my float tube and just get away from the sand. But eventually, someone will see me hiding around the moored boats (I flyfish) and they'll row, motor, pedal or whatever on over to see what I'm doing. And using pedal power, I cant get away. But we're fishing, right? Beats the daylights out of working.

You got out, and that was huge. I'd spend some time with Werfless. He offered... take advantage.

 

Download this https://nrm.dfg.ca.gov/FileHandler.ashx?DocumentID=199167&inline

Gotta familiarize yourself with species and regulations. With the wardens, ignorance to the law is no excuse.

 

Not wrong. A two lb zebra can't fit a number 4 in it's mouth I don't think...

 

Just clean them under the water, no smell, lol. I find zebras very palatable

 

I think Werf uses size 6 hook because he targets sea chubs (opaleye, halfmoon, zebra perch, garibaldi, etc). They all have perch-like but thicker body, have a lot of guts and bad smell when opened up (not sure about garibaldi though, obviously), and SMALL MOUTH. You can see them here: Sea Chubs and Damselfish Archives - Pier Fishing in California

Most other typical surf fish have larger mouth, like bass, sheep, croakers, surfperch, beans, etc. They can take size 4 or larger hook.

Rock wrasse also has small mouth. Not sure if anyone targets them tho. More of an annoyance.

 

I know several guys who love frying up rock wrasse... They do have a tiny gut pouch, so siding them out results in little waste...

 

Not sure, obviously

 

I have iPhone, there is a link at top to add to books. Not sure how to do it on other phones

 

I've been known to target rock wrasse. Pretty good meat, great yield, plenty of them, no size req. Perfect size fillets for fish tacos. And Where there's one, there's many

 

Do you use some special technique to target them? My experience was that they tend to chew, not swallow, the bait. Tethering bait to hook helps a bit but still they can pull bait off after many pulls.

They are indeed plenty and they do not hesitate to bite. Just that I have quite low hook-to-bite ratio for them. Also most rock wrasses I caught were fairly small... like 8 inch or so. Once in a while I got a bigger one. So far I kept only one rock wrasse.

 

Size 6 or even 8 hooks depending on manufacturer. Circles. Tiny tiny peices of shrimp. They are hard to hook, I find trying to set the hook or swing on them to be unproductive. Just let them eat it and try to dash back in the rocks. Either hook em or ya don't.
Obviously they're in the surf, plentiful in some areas, but I go to MB front end off the rocks, quivira hoapitality ect if trying to target them. Werfs hitch rig with a light weight, just pitch the rig in not far from the rocks. This method will produce opaleye, halfmoon, blacksmith, calicos ect as well. I like to leave the shell on, keeps it on the hook a little better and makes them peck at it rather than just pull it off instantly. With their small mouths and big teeth, any larger sized bait will just get shredded and stolen.
An 8" will yield 2 good tacos. Maybe 12" or a little bigger is about max size I've seen.

Also I believe they are diurnal (spelling?), active during the day and inactive at night. In the morning they turn on like wildfire and feed hard.

 

Awesome!

You use small circle hooks? That was actually another topic I wanted to start here. I read about circle hooks self-setting etc and recently bought some size 6 and size 4 ones. I found it hard to bait with shrimps given its inward-pointing tip and shorter shank. I found squid strips work fine with small circle hook but they are less attractive bait than shrimp. So far I caught one calico on a size 4 circle.

Would you mind sharing a picture how you bait a small circle hook with shrimp?

There definitely are wrasses in MB. I was targeting opaleye using peas there (following this guy's video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rV6195RDpcQ), and caught rock wrasse.

I like how you described wrasse biting. I used to use boiled cut shrimp, and once a rock wrasse bit off a chunk and left a bite mark on it (like the logo of Apple).

Thanks for sharing all the info!

 

I like a size 6 octopus circle. Cant remember the brand. They aren't as aggressively pointed inward like a mutu or demon hook. Though if deadsticking a rod in a holder I would use the more aggressive style circle. I put like a half of a body section of shrimp on there, through one side of the shell with the hook point just punched through the other side of the shell. Still gunna miss some wrasse on that setup, but atleast gets a higher hookup percentage. Bigger ones actually pull decently, if only for a short time..