I headed down to Morro Bay with the idea of catching some bait, and then heading out to a cove I knew that had produced some good perch and rock fish in the past. I fished the south T=Pier for about 1.5 hours with nada. Not even a bump. I went into Tognazinni's to have a bite to eat and ran into a fishing friend from the area. He told me my next location was a bust as well, but something told me to keep at it.
A while back, this same person told me of a beautiful beach a bit to the north in southern Big Sur. I asked and he said it would likely be better as the creek entering didn’t have as much flow. What the heck. I decided to head north to Big Sur and check it out. Well, my friend was spot on. The creek was flowing at a much loewer volume and was fairly clear. The end result is shown below. Sand Dollar Beach. What an absolutely gorgeous spot, but in its winter attire it had very little sand.
I’m not sure the pics are showing, but while wet, it was absolutely gorgeous. A lonesome beach with some cool surfers willing to chat with an old fisherman (and gave me some tips on the structure) and one heck of a trough right out front of me. My setup was a 8.5' Ugly Stick steelhead rod matched with an Okuma Ceymar C40 with 10 lb main line. I used a c-rig with 8 lb fluoro leader and either Gulp SW's in camo and bloody as well as sand crabs. There were tons on sand crabs on the exposed sand flats, but most were larger than I wanted. It even held quite a few of these.
The Barred surf perch weren't huge with my best going about 9 to 10", but I got about 10 in about an hour before I hid from a down pour with my new buds.
It slowed down and I got back at it and a school of these made a showing.
I thought at first they were Walleye surf perch, but looking at them they don't have the black tipped anal fins of Walleyes, so I think there are Silver Surf perch. Who knows, I'm a geologist not a fisheries biologist and all I know is they bit my line and were a pretty cool catch. One was about 7", which was the biggest I've ever seen.
Alas, the day was running out and I still had to trek 3 hours back to home. I ended up catching about 16 perchies in an absolutely gorgeous setting. Nothing huge, but a good bite none the less. I picked up my gear, wished my new friends well, and nodded a good bye for now to the beach, but it knows that I will return. What a great day to be alive.
Thanks for the vine, and here's to good catching and adventures.
