BY Merit McCrea
SAN DIEGO – With the unseasonably warm waters off California’s southern coast we’ve seen tuna surge into the grounds southwest of San Diego already, bluefin, yellowfin and even an albacore was caught. The first San Diego fleet albacore in years showed up on a gaff April 30 aboard the boat Tribute out of Mission Bay San Diego.
The spread of fish appears to be extensive, with the 2 and 3-day trips spread farther south and finding yellowtail and some dorado too already, and it’s bombed all the way into 1.5-day range, even closer already.
We caught up with Tom Milkowski who caught a 40-pound albacore, yes, an albacore, out of San Diego aboard the Tribute out of Seaforth Sportfishing in Mission Bay. It was a 1.5-day charter with the Wicked Tuna charter group said Milkowski.
They’d pulled in on a meter mark just after grey-light, threw some bait into a circle and fish popped. He’d quickly butt-hooked a live sardine and tossed it out, got bit and was on. At first color folks at the rail assumed yellowfin, but as it came into full view were surprised to see a long-fin circling below.
The fish was the first aboard the boat that day, a 40 pounder – on 40-pound XXX Izorline. Capt. Mike Pritchard was at the helm.
By 9 in the morning Milkowski had that albacore and a pair of bluefin in the hold. But he wasn’t done, and would end up providing those two bluefin to others. Later in the day Capt. Pritchard found a spot of fish that included some monsters, up into the 200-pound class according to Tom.
Milkowski pulled a greenback mackerel out of the hand-well and pined it on 50-pound Izor, ran up the rail with it and pitched it into the foaming mass, got bit and managed to land a 130 bluefin.
He said there were times when they had as many as 6 fished hooked at once, and there were plenty of casualties along the way. Ultimately they settled into a several-hours-long plunker with generally a couple or 3 fish going at a time.
The bluefin mix was several in the 30-pound class, most in the 40- to 60-range and a handful of the bigger ones landed.
While the offshore mix included yellowfin tuna in the 25- to 30-pound class, a few dorado and some yellowtail, most of the recent scores were all about the bluefin tuna. In recent days the night jig fishing has been slower, with the better bite during daylight on fly-line.
Nevertheless, tackle recommendations are similar to last season’s summer tackle – 30 or 40 for fly-line, 50 or 60 for iron and plug during the day and a heavy outfit for night jigging.
At the Rockpile, Coronados zone the yellowtail scores surged, with the San Diego posting 159 yellows last Wednesday. Dock talk had news of a San Diego salmon taken as well, New Seaforth ½-day run.
