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Ken, John Shewey has a book out that I believe is
called "Northwest Fly Fishing: Trout and Beyond" wherein he describes the
how-to's, etc. for fishing for surf perch, etc.
Could be a good book for you or others interested
in some fishing different than salmonids.
Richard
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Monday, July 15, 2002 9:27 PM
Subject: Re: San Diego beach trip
report
Thanks for the response. I never thought I was in any danger of the
rip tide. I've spent enough time in the water as a kid to be very carefull. I
know how to swim with the tide but doing it in waders would be
interesting.
Your the first person that admits to fishing for the red-tail surf
perch with a fly. I'll try it again. Do you have any preference for
tide. Fishing the income and looking for natural holes always
worked. I used an intermediate line and head. Does a
heavy tip or weighted fly really make a lot of difference? It
seemed as though the surf dictated where the fly was going to go at
any given time.
Since you've been there, what else swims that close to shore?
Silvers?
Thanks,
Ken
Karen Crandall & Phil Marie-Rose
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
It is like California fishing... Fishing
north of the "California Mason/Dixon line" AKA San Francisco Bay
:-) A very good Surf Perch imitation for red tails is also incredibly
simple to tie. Take a Saltwater hook in the size range of 6 through 2
and slip on a gold bead. Wrap a lead underbody. Tie in a short tail of
peacock lite brite(1/4 inch or so) or similar material and then wrap an
estaz or similar style body. Best colors are "Peacock" type
colors. Looks kinda like the ever popular "motor-oil" grub used by
conventional boys, but with a short, antenae looking tail. I believe
it's an early pattern (10 years ago) from the vise of Jay Murakoshi.
His newer ones are more complicated and prettier, but this one works like a
charm. Bright crazy charlies (pink, chartreuse, red) also work as do
orange Mini-puffs and really small brown and white and grey and white
clousers. Clousers would be my last choice, not my first.
As to line selection and technique, I use a Rio
Deep Sea 300 on an 8 weight, But any similar line with an intermediate
running line you can handle easily will work well. I hate shooting heads
personally, but if that's your bag, go for it. Take the cheapest rod
you can find, and after the cast, sink that rod tip and touch bottom.
This will give you a direct connection and let you fish by feel,
freeing you up to watch the waves :-) Don't do it with a nice
rod, because you'll need to be replacing the tip-top regularly if you fish
alot (I lived a 5 minute walk from the beach. I replaced alot of
tip-tops). The key to keeping your fly in the strike zone and being
able to work it more than one wave's worth is to concentrate on the troughs
and holes and use a fast sinking line. You're dead on about casting
behind a wave, but if you're not hitting a trough or hole, the hydrodynamics
are going to spit your bug back on the beach pronto! You'll know when
a perch hits. Imagine casting a worm into a school of bluegill and
having every fish tap at the worm within a half second. It's a
tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap that s unique in my experience.
And remember, if you do get sucked into rip,
and they are present during incoming tides, swim perpendicular to it, not
against it. You'll be out of it and into swimmable water pretty
fast. Unfortunately I speak from personal experience.
Phil
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Monday, July 15, 2002 4:50
PM
Subject: Re: San Diego beach trip
report
Just got back from the beach today. I fished the surf at Copalis
Beach, just north of Ocean Shores. While I'm still trying to catch
my first fish in the surf, I wanted to jump in on the safety
part. I fished the incoming tide as we were always told as a kid
that that was the only safe time to swim. Trying to fight a rip tide
is not my idea of fun. The surf is a tough thing to judge.
Large waves just seem to hit you when you least expect it. The next
wave hits hard too but doent look as big.
As far as fishing goes, the wind and surf is a whole new deal I
had a shooting head on a 7wt and that seemed too work fairly well.
The wind was moderate but constant. The surf will pick up your line
and pull it in much faster than you could strip it. If you wait for
a pause between the series of waves, you can find a short lived calm
section of water with some depth to it. Casting just in back of the
last wave will put your there. You can then mend the line by lifting
it over the next incoming wave. This buys some time before a wave
catches your line and drags it wildly back towards the beach.
Casting sideways didn't help. The first wave caught the line and
drug it right back to shore with little time to fish.
I tried to get some idea of what fly to use for surf peach
before I left but people in some of the local shops had no good
ideas. A response on Dan Blantons BB sugested a sculpin pattern to
imitate a crab. I tried that, a shrimp looking bonefish fly, a bright red
wooly bugger, a green epoxy head minnow with no strikes.
I thought this may be like California fishing, but now I don't think
so.
Ken
Sean Grier <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Yeah,
and being from there, remember: If you DO hook a surfer, he'll beat the
crap out of you - whether you land him or not!!!
Glad you had a fun time. The 13 years I was in San Diego, I
never thought of picking up a flyrod for anything more than bass at some
of the local lakes. You've put some great ideas in my head.
As my girls still live down there (though they are up here this week for
a visit), I'll definitely bring my gear next time I visit them.
Great report, Tim.
Sean
Tim Harris wrote:
Just got back from San Diego today
and managed to fish the beaches 3 of the 5 full days I was
there. My first day out I went with a guide from the San Diego
Fly Shop and we hit Mission Beach just north of downtown from 6-10
m. I had very good beginners luck that day and caught my first
corbina within about 30 minutes. Corbina are reportedly the
toughest fly rod fish in the area and I can attest that they are
spooky and reject flies like mad but I got lucky on the first one, a
nice 2.5 lbs fish. After that I got a handful of surfperch
and had a few other corbina follow but refuse my flies.
Day 2 I hit north Torrey Pines/Del
Mar beach from 5:30-9:30 on my own and did pretty well. I
again got a half dozen surfpech to take and my big thrill came when I
hooked a 3' long shovel-nosed guitar fish, a.k.a. a sand shark.
This thing put a serious bend into the 7-weight rod and took a while
to get in, I even had spectators by the time I landed
it.
Yesterday I was back at north Torrey
Pines and again caught surf perch and had more follows and refusals by
corbina. I at least can get in a pod of them now w/o spooking
them right off the bat and get some looks at the fly. I think I
had one take since I had a hit in very shallow water and only the
corbina were in that shallow but I missed the fish.
Most fish were on a small #6 mole
crab fly which I generally dragged behind a Crazy Charlie type
fly. I was fishing a Type 6 sink head the whole time to keep the
whole thing on the bottom in the surf. It was a blast wading
into the breakers, stalking corbina right at the edge of the water,
and just not knowing what the heck was going to eat my fly. Now
I'm pumped to get over to Long Beach and fish the sand beaches
there. If you are in S. California for any reason take
along a fly rod and hit the beaches at dawn, it is well worth it and
is pretty much an untapped fly rod fishery down there. I never
saw another fly angler any morning out there and very few spin
fishers, the surfers are the predominant beach user at that early
hour.
Tim
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