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UPDATED: April 10

ORANGE COUNTY — Capt. Brian Woolley reported “More great water helped the local bass action keep rolling along well for the ½-day anglers. 66°-67° water locally had both the calico bass and the sand bass biting well for early season action. Sliding egg sinker setups and dropper loops fished best for the sand bass and there was some calico bass on the fly-lined sardines, rubber lures and hard jerk baits. Anglers at the bottom had good sheephead as well as some nice sculpin and whitefish. The rockfish season kicked off well for us too. Locally the vermilion rockfish have been biting well. Nice mixed bags of bocaccio, flags , specks mixed in. A lot of quality sculpin and whitefish being caught out deep too. The 8- to 10-ounce double-dropper loops fished best for the rockfish on the coast. Out in the deep water on the 14 (Mile) catching required a bit more work. Current along the bank made it a little tough but there were nice quality rockfish caught. Big bocaccio, nice chilies and bank rockfish were the main catch. Jig anglers fished 300- to 400-gram jigs just fine. And finally at SCI the Fury had a great opener too. Lots of rockfish, whitefish and other mixed bottom fish. The calico bass fishing in the kelp was noticeably good for early April with good water movement and fun fly-line fishing along the kelp edges. Good mixed opportunities and a great way to kick of the 2026 season.”

Scores showed the Fury had put on 50 big bass on their most recent SCI overnighter, to go with all those big bottom grabbers.

Over at Newport Landing the Thunderbird was on that run and also scored some solid calico action to top the great bottom action and full bags. They also connected with bonito pretty solid on Saturday so those too biting at that island. As for the local action out of the two Newport Bay docks, Davy’s Locker and Newport Landing, it mirrored the Long Beach action as much of it was fishing the lower shelf. Perhaps the only difference was a little bit heavier on the sculpin action and slightly lighter on the rockfish.

OCEANSIDE — The Oceanside Sea Center kept the action going with their local ½- and ¾-day trips. It was good to see their local rockfish results were on par with the rest of the coast. For years prior to that fleet arriving in that harbor it seemed as if the area just didn’t have the local resource to offer, but it clearly does now. Most anglers managed to put a half-dozen or more bottom biters in their bags on the 3/4-day runs and ½-day divided their days between bass and bottom.

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