Questions About California Sheephead

[Mr. NiceGuy]

Where are the best areas for targeting California Sheephead in San Diego?

From reading everything I can find on Internet, I will guess that a good place to start is in the rocky areas off the end of Point Loma, from the MPL down to about Whistling Buoy #1 in the approach to SD Bay.


A few questions to help narrow my search and new endeavor:

1. Are sheephead hanging out in ANY rocky-kelpy areas around San Diego, or are they more specific to certain areas?

2. Should we lean toward larger baits or smaller baits?

3. What depth range is typical for the older striped males?

4. I'm guessing that catching sheephead is bait specific and that since their feeding habit is nibbling creatures off rocks, maybe a dropper loop rig might be best, with an easy-to-break-off weight?

5. Multiple hooks? How high from the bottom do sheephead typically do their grazing?

6. I saw a huge load of active freshwater crawdads at an Asian market yesterday. Do freshwater crawdads die instantly when dropped into salt water or will these hold up in the ocean as "live" bait?

7. I don't mind going out to suck up some ghost shrimps the evening before, if this works better than mass-killing of crawdads in saltwater.


For fun and variety, I want to focus my attention on learning to target a species I'm not familiar with. I want to explore beautiful places in my kayak I've not yet explored.

On the philosophical side, my preference is learning to target exactly the fish I want to eat and to avoid collateral damage to other species. Under my own rules for killing living creatures and for respect of the awesome beauty of nature, I recognize that I'm an omnivore and I think it's reasonably OK to kill what we eat as part of the natural food chain. I try my best to avoid indiscriminate killing and to avoid species that are not replenishing themselves. I want to respect the sanctity of life and the evolution of other species. I want our fisheries to flourish as much as possible in the face of the massive population growth of so damn many people who tend to proliferate and consume mindlessly and deplete all natural resources to extinction.

My personal challenge for my love of kayak fishing is both for the exercise in the beauty of nature, and to gain the knowledge and skill to go out and catch exactly the fish I want to bring home for a special sumptuous dinner. I try to use 100% of anything I kill, down to the soup broth. From Yanni, I've learned to cook the leftover mackerels I use for bait. When I come home empty-handed, it thrills me that the fish won and will live to see another day :-)