June is packed to the gills with good fishing…and it’s already begun!  This month is when surf fish become settled in after winter and are driven by their spawn to search out as much forage as possible.  Spotfin, Yellowfin, Corbina and Halibut are on the hunt for their next meal.  

This month also serves up two grunion runs that promise to bring big fish near shore…and finally, on July 1 we will again be able to collect a few grunion for bait.

The big recent news has been the amazing spotfin bite.  Fish have been caught from Ventura to San Diego.  Some of the biggest fish have come from central Orange County with anglers beaching more than a dozen 20+ inch fish in the last two weeks.  No question the best bait has been shrimp.  Both ghost shrimp and market shrimp have enticed a large portion of the catch…while larger soft sand crabs have been the ticket too.

June will be a solid month for corbina, croaker, halibut and smaller barred and walleye surfperch.  Best bait will be a soft, dime to quarter size, sand crab….and in areas where you find the “micro” crab, a collection of three to five on the hook has always produced.  This month, is also a good time for the use of exotic baits like ghost shrimp and lug/blood worms.  You’ll find that the big fish will seek out these baits, especially during low light situations.

This is also a great month for halibut fishing.  Productive tides will be near low and high peak tide periods, and during relaxed tide periods, known as “neap tides”.  Best spots will be near rock/dock structure but also at low tide along the open beach.  Because halibut will be chasing fin bait, especially grunion near shore, spoons like the Krocodile, drop-shot rigs, swimbaits and hard baits will all work to catch these fish.  And one last tip, over the last two years there have been more halibut caught on white, cream, light gray lures (all of the above lures)…which matches with my observations that squid eggs, a white oblong globe, continue to be a halibut’s favorite meal.

Good luck and let me know what you see out there,

Bill

CHECK OUT GRUNION RUN DATES HERE

Have a great month at the beach and please send your fish reports to: fishthesurf@mail.com

Santa Barbara/Ventura:    Improved water quality and warmer water temps this week improved fishing in the Santa Barbara zone. Tons of small BSP all along the stretch with anglers still seeing but not catching corbina. Leopard shark fishing remains good with one angler landing and releasing a 5.5′. White seabass fishing in the Goleta area really picked up this week with quite a few 16”-22” fish landed. Still no legals but tons of activity. The big news was the continued excellent halibut fishing. Anglers using hard baits and light-colored swimbaits landed numerous halibut to 32” with the best area being from below East Beach to Hope Ranch.  Although, this seemed to be the “hot spot” very little attention to halibut happened north of there where Hope Ranch, More Mesa…all the way to the Hollister Ranch, must be holding halibut and few larger white sea bass.  Look for the bite to turn on again in the middle of this month when grunion again come ashore.

Ventura: Fourteen Scouts, working on their fishing merit badges landed 50+ barred surfperch along the beach in Ventura using Gulp. Barred surfperch to 13” were caught using soft sand crabs between the Ventura jetties along with a handful of yellowfin croaker. Corbina fishing continues very good from Oxnard to La Conchita with anglers using flies and live baits like crabs, shrimp and worms to entice corbina to bite.  Look for corbina fishing in Ventura/Oxnard to continue good with bigger fish making their way into the mix near the end of summer and into Fall.

Tackle/Bait Santa Barbara: Hook, Line and Sinker.  Ask for Ben and tell him Bill sent you–I promise he’ll take good care of you!

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South Bay:  Water has warmed in the South Bay, and even though it has remained dirty with kelp and grass, fishing improved with corbina and barred surfperch being caught at both Hermosa and El Segundo this week. Anglers have told me that stacking three “micro” crabs on a hook was the trick, by simply matching the hatch.

Fishing in the South Bay has been slow for over a month.  It looks like the most likely reason is that dirty, cold water has been trapped in the bay…which is not unusual for this time of year.  What comes next is a series of large south swells that will scour out the bad water and replace it with clear warmer water over the next month.  The first spots to come back to good fishing are often Hermosa and Manhattan…and this week shows that trend is moving right along.

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Purchase Surf Fish Tackle HERE

Need advice or have questions:  Email Bill at: fishthesurf.com

Orange County:  Bolsa Chica State Beach continues to kick out lots of small, barred surfperch, walleye and sub-legal halibut. The big news this week came from Sunset Beach where the winner of the Redondo Rod and Gun Club’s Surf Fishing Derby (spotfin and yellowfin division) with an amazing three spotfin to 20”, two corbina, yellowfin croaker,barred surfperch and various sharks to take the top prize. His secret was collecting a good selection of larger soft sand crabs in Torrance and transporting those to Sunset Beach.  

I often talk about “being prepared” before you go to the beach…I’ve actually done a video about it (HERE) and it works.  Those anglers who are prepared with everything from their camera to their bait, before they go to the beach, are always the most successful.

Tackle/bait:  Big Fish Bait and Tackle, Seal Beach

San Diego:  Torrey Pines checked in this week with anglers telling me that even though there is still a lot of kelp and eel grass in the water fishing has been good for barred surfperch and smaller corbina. The most successful anglers have been using three to four “micro” sand crabs stacked on the hook. 

Blacks beach continues to kick out calico bass, sargo and spotfin for anglers using soft sand crabs and Market Shrimp. Imperial Beach checked in this week and continues to have good spotfin and barred surfperch fishing for anglers using ghost shrimp, with one angler fishing just above the dirty water, landing several spotfin over 20”. Lastly, both Imperial Beach (around the pier) and San Diego Bay checked in this week with covina from the rocks for anglers using long-cast Krocodiles, near and after sunset.

  Tackle/bait: Pacific Coast Bait and Tackle/ Seaforth Landing

The beginnings of a series of tropical storms are on the tail of T.S. Amanda and will begin to push more warm water north into the California from storms forming just off off the coast of central Mexico.

Conditions To Watch This Month

Synopsis: June and gloom.  That’s what we’ve been getting so far…and that’s exactly what we expect!  June often has marine layer in the morning and late afternoon, light winds, warming water and improving beach conditions.  Look for big surf from the South to be the story this summer with swells already pushing warm water and sand up the beaches.  June also has great tides for surf fishing and two grunion runs that will help bring big fish near shore.

Water Temp: Warmer, 62-66 from SB to SD. Water warmed a bit this week and will continue to warm because of a series of South Swells. “Amanda” is our first Mexico Tropical Storm, and it looks like over the next two weeks we may have our first central Pacific hurricane…and with it…warmer water!

Tides:  Decent tidal movement through the next week as we make our way closer to the New Moon on June 14^th. Tidal changes between low and high will be in the 3-4′ range over the period making for good all-around halibut to croaker fishing.

Great tidal movement over the remainder of the month with some large tidal changes coming near the end of the month, as we ramp up for the full moon on June 29th.

Swell:   Seas are robust with a series of swells coming north from the South Pacific. South swells from a series of storms with 45′ seas off Antarctica and New Zealand will fill in today and by Monday go from head high to well overhead into next week, on South facing beaches. For West facing beaches, some wrap around South swells will fill in, but overall, the surf on West facing beaches should stay waist to chest high over the next seven-day period. Amanda, the first tropical storm to form off of Mexico won’t affect our surf but provide promise for this summer’s hurricane swells from the south.

Look for a series of four more South swells to grace the beaches over the remainer of June.  Depending on the size of these swell groups we may see warmer water fill in quickly and fishing both near and offshore turn on.

Wind: Typical June gloom winds for the upcoming week with light side shore winds in the morning on South facing beaches and offshore winds on West facing beaches. Look for your normal June afternoon winds of 10-15mph from the Northwest in the afternoons.