newbie to ocean fishing and yak fishing
 

I love fishing and always wanted to fish for dorado and yellowfin but never have. I just bought my second yak, a stealth-14, rigged for fishing. It has a bait tank and lorance ff and 4 rod holders. My tackle includes a penn 500 mounted to a penn rod with roller guides, a daiwa spinner that can hold 18# test mounted on a 7.5' Berkeley big cat and a couple fresh water bass rods and reels. I'm wanting to get a serious rod and reel but before I invest several hundred $$$ I want to go out with someone who can show me the ropes and hopefully some local spots where I'll be able to hook into some dodos or tuna without having to go into Mexican waters as I do not have a passport. Any help and suggestions would be greatly appreciated and I thank you all in advance.

Don't think you'll be finding dodos and tuna round these parts.

If there are dodo or tuna off the California coast how far out would they normally be? What kinds of fish can I expect to catch in San Diego waters?

Yellowtail, White seabass, thresher shark, ling cod, calico bass, halibut,. Some of the main fish people target here.

Last season, I think it was mid August that was the peak. There was a small window where the Tuna fishing was decent on the u.s. side. About 25 miles off Point Loma was the closest.

I'm not sure too many Dodo's were caught closer than the 9 mile bank, but even then, most of that and the tuna action was more like 50 to 70 miles southwest of San Diego.

Its a very rare event (mother of all el ninos) that brings YFT or dorado in to kayak range off So Cal. Sammons hooked a marlin off Scripps pier along time ago. That same day a buddy and I caught 3 dodos from a skiff off Marine street in 120' of water. If you want to target tuna or dodos from your kayak you're going to have to get to mexco. But there are a bunch of great sports fish to target from the kayak around here. Ggiannig89's list of Yellowtail, White seabass, thresher shark, ling cod, calico bass, halibut is a good start. Add to that all the rock fish, white fish, sculpin, sheaphead, bonito, and baracuda. Just in south sd bay I've caught sand and spotted bass, spotfin and yellowfin croaker, corvina, bonefish, bonito, leopard and smooth hound sharks, and bat rays up 50 or so lbs. Plenty to pull on.

If you just got your kayak you might want to start with easier trips to the bays then inshore. You'll get the feel for your kayak and start to see what you will need. The gear you have should be fine toget you started.
Mike

Just got some 30lb mono for the penn 500 and some 25lb fluorocarbon for leader. Also some 1-0 and 2-0 live bait hooks to get me going in the bays. I hope to catch some Halibut however that may not happen. The only legal halibut I've caught was 28 inches head to tail. All the others were quite small. I'll fish for anything that's good eating. Most important thing is to have fun out there.