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UPDATED: October 9, 2026

ORANGE COUNTY — Absolutely crazy offshore fishing in local waters with the best strip running from the drop-off out to about 12 miles. In addition to dorado, yellowfin tuna there were even wahoo in the mix. Captain Brian Woolley’s Dana Wharf Sportfishing report: “We had another solid week of fishing here and had a lot of fish caught. Water temps were pretty stable this week staying in the 72°-74° range. The offshore scene has been focused on the yellowfin tuna. We saw and caught mixed grade of fish on kelps, meter marks and dolphin. The kelp-paddy fish have been 3 to 15 pounds and the fish on the dolphin pods has been a much better 20- to 40-pound grade. Light-line approaches for kelp paddy fish has been best with 15- to 20-pound test mono and small no. 2 and 4 hooks being perfect. Plenty of fish were caught this week on the sniper jigs in the 40- and 60-gram range and these have been a great alternative to live bait. On those same kelps we’ve seen a few dorado in the mix and some skipjack as well. There are tons of bullet tuna around as well.”

Woolley’s report concluded with an update on the local kelp bed bite, with lots of calicos, a few smaller yellowtail and such on tap.

OCEANSIDE — The Oceanside fleet was situated squarely in the center of the local tuna strip stretching just offshore out to about 12 miles and extending from Dana Point to La Jolla. There were huge scores of yellowfin aboard all the boats out of the SEA Center recently. Of course the mix was on the smaller side, with fish ranging from a couple of pounds to the low teens mostly, as you might expect seeing the success rates on those ¾-day trips. Local fishing along the kelp beds again produced prodigious numbers of calicos, most of which were released, as well as some tiny yellowtail too. There were some decent fork-tails though and lots of bonito.

SAN DIEGO — Some crazy pier fishing reports lately, including the catch of a Sierra mackerel from the Balboa Pier reported by Anton Smith. Sand bass scores surged in recent days but the big news continued to be the local yellowtail snap on the small yo-yo jigs and dropper-loop gear. In addition, a crew trip saw not only 50ish nice yellows landed, but a dusk snap on quality grade white seabass resulting in 37 of those boated as well for the crew of the Daily Double. It’s been the full-day runs that have really put the wood to the yellowtail while recent ½-day runs, especially the afternoon ones, that got the bass good. The Mission Belle had 109 yellowtail for their full-day Friday.

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