Dana on Fri

[Vikingj]

JB and I arrived at San Onofre early this AM and although it was do-able we were not that comfortable with the surf conditions so we jumped back into our cars and headed north to Dana. Good thing we did, as I ran into SanO Mick this afternoon and he said the wind came up fairly strong after we left.
We launched from BBch after 8AM and met up with Ray. It was flat and sunny with a gentle breeze - muy hermosa! Fair bite around baitbarge with a few C&R'ed Flatties. We headed out to Doheny looking for some bigger models and I was surprised to see that the berm at the rivermouth did not break through during the rain last week. We had little wave action and even smaller fish action. I saw another yakker pull up a 3' shovelnose guitarfish and he reported a couple other sharks caught earlier. JB and I split up and I got no bites until I found a sweet spot right behind the surf about 100 yds south of the rivermouth. A lotta slashing and raking going on until I C&R'ed a 19 1/2" Hali. He must of been on a bed of pebbles because he had a beautiful camouflaged pattern with big round gray spots on a light brown background ( Many of you probably already know that hali's can change their color/pattern like a chameleon to blend in with their background). Dropped another bait and got more slashing/slicing but couldn't get anything to stick. Finally got tired of leading sardines to the slaughter so headed back to harbor.
Drifted around the bait barge and at about 12:15 there was a wide open on little 'buts. I saw 2 other yaks hook up about the same time I did. I ended up with half a dozen samuri'ed baits and 2 almost legal flatties. The bite was still decent when the wind came and the hungry juvenile pelicans drove me away. PS- Please don't feed the baby pelicans! They have learned to swarm the yaks and you can't even drop your bait. I even had one jump on the back of my boat and try to take sardines out of my bait tank! I had to give him a gentle smack with my gaff handle.

Final tally = 4 big little hali's (19-21") + 1 little hali (12") + 2 good size 'cudas + 1 mac. All added up to a lot of action and a fun day. Good to be OTW with JB and Ray again.
And Yes, Seaslug, your infamous sandbar is still at baby bch!
The Hali's are hungry - Go get 'em.
Wayne