Florence is deaf( but there’s no need to shout).

I heard a rumor that there were magic fish in South bay. I launched at Shelter at 5am and bought $20 worth of dines from the nice men at the bait barges. I then settled in for the 8 mile ride through the dense fog and darkness to the mudflats down South. Cruising at a whopping 6 MPH and being still half asleep, I let my imagination get the best of me. I conjured up some imaginary friends, not just any imaginary friends mind you, 70’s superstar imaginary friends. I had Paul Lynn in the bow, Charles Nelson Riley was sitting next to me at the helm, and Ruth Buzzy was in the back with Minny Pearl. Ohhh the conversations we had. We saw the unknown comic clinging to a log in the water out in front of Downtown but we had too many people onboard already, and since he was imaginary I figured it was ok to let him be.

Finally go to the back of the bay just before sunrise and like clockwork the birds were diving and the fish were swirling. I wasn’t able to get bit. After about an hour of throwing all my best tricks, plus live bait, I realized I was gonna have to slow down. I let the dine soak and started imitating a crab with a red and green jig. First fish of the day was this huge spotty. Probably my PB SBB but I didn’t weigh him, I wanted to hurry up and get him back in the water. Big spotties like that die easy.
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As I was taking our picture he said to me, “Watergate does not bother me” I laughed and said, “Me either” then I eased him back in the bay.

Hours came and went. Fish were feeding around my boat all day, but It was very difficult to catch anything other than dink spotties. I had given up on the magic fish and the live bait. Then around Noon or so, the fish alarm went off. WFO would be a understatement. I almost want to use the phrase “Once in a lifetime” but I know better than that.

EVERY CAST was an immediate, nice sized corvina. Most of them were this big….
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Many of them were this big…
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I switched to jerkbaits cause they are the most fun. This is what it was like; jerk, jerk, jerk, DRAG RUNNING!!!! I swear it was a fish every cast for over 2 hours. Lures, live bait, dead bait, it didn’t matter. I just kept releasing fish as fast as I could hoping to nail a big one before the action stopped. I lost count at around 40 corvina. At one point I hit a real big one. It ran and ran and ran and I couldn’t stop it, and it wrapped up in a buoy and got away. !@#$%^&*()_!!!!!!

In every war there are some casualties. Whenever I get into a good corvina bite two things happen. Corvina die and lures are lost. Shortfin corvina are the worst C&R fish I’ve ever encountered. Believe me, I tried to release them, but I also knew some would die. No problem really I brought ice. Unfortunately, I lost my oldest and bestest corvina lure. I’ve had this jerkbait form YEARS and caught lot’s of fish with it. Let’s have a brief moment of silence follow by two photos of the ultimate corvina lure. It was a 6” Fenwick jerkbait that I bought at the Chula Vista Sports Authority in the bargain bin for $4.99.
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Good bye old friend.
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Eventually the bite stopped and it was back to nothing again. I ended up keeping 5 Shortfins for various reasons. Out of the 5 I kept, these two are the biggest.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v388/fishtricks/PictureorVideo106.jpg
Shish shaa!!!