Fishing babble

My first recollections of fishing is from the rocks at Playa Del Rey with pieces of shrimp. Catching small calico bass and opaleye. Fishing from the Malibu Pier catching baby halibut, perch and tom cod. As curiosity began to take over and I started to explore, there were other people fishing from the pier using BIG tackle.....by that I mean something bigger than 6 lb test on a freshwater setup. 8 - 10 ft poles, penn jigmasters, surfmasters with 20 and 25 lb test. As I watched, they would just have a sinker tied on and underhanded cast the sinker way out. Then a leader with swivel on one end and a hook with a live anchovy - and clipped the swivel on the line and let it slide down their main line. And wait. Of course they were halibut fishing and on occasion they would hook one. Lower a big net down to the water and guide the fish in. People would be gathered around 'ooing and aahing'. I remember meeting an old black man fishing on the pier. He said his name was Sammy.....Sammy Davis. I did not think about this until much later....but I'm relatively certain he was Sammy Davis Jr's father! He even looked a lot like Jr. As I fished more and more, I noticed the seasons - and the fish that came along with it. The winter was mainly rockcod fishing, squid fishing for white sea bass and calico bass. The surface action limited anyway - so if you wanted to fish, it was rockcod. Synonymous with rockcod was squid. Rock cod seemed to always be available to catch. I am not sure if anchovies were tougher to get in the winter or not - but my recollection was getting squid for bait in the winter time. Just about 50 years ago, we lived in a rented house in Gardena - around 1967. The landlord was a fisherman. His name was Hiro Hirabayashi and he fished a LOT. Once he found out I did too - he would take me fishing occasionally and give me tackle. My dad would go fishing on boats on occasion - but he wasn't really into it, and he would go by himself. He would bring home calico bass and yellowtail and we would feast for weeks. Later he would take me to the landings and drop me off, but he would not go with me. I think it was because he got seasick. Matter of fact, now that I think about it - I cannot remember a time he went fishing with me on a boat, barge or pier. I do recall fishing on the Playa Del Rey rocks with him - but that's about it. My best memory fishing with Hiro was after we moved out of the Gardena rental - and my folks bought a house in North Torrance. It was a winter seabass trip in 1970 on the Point Loma - Eddie Diehl running the boat. We fished an area south of San Diego - called Tijuana Flats. The weather was windy and the water was lumpy. There were other boats in the area - along with small commercial boats (these were no bigger than 20 to 25 foot boats. They were called rat-trappers - rod and reel fishermen. The weather worked in their favor - the rocking boat would yo yo their jigs for them automatically. I watched them as their rods were left in the holders - and they would hook fish. Live squid bunched up on a heavy salas 6X, yoyoing on the bottom. We were drifting in an area called Tijuana Flats in rough weather. We didn't really have to yoyo, the boat was doing that for us. I recall seeing small boats (rat trappers they were called) with rods in holders on both sides hooking and catching fish. I recall the boat being in the trough trying to hang on in the stern - everybody was fishing on the port side of the boat. We would catch fish in waves. I'd look towards the bow and see people hook fish in sequence towards the stern. I caught two (2) fish that day - the numbers I remember were 32 and 25 pounds. For some reason, Hiro was having an off day and did not have one - so I shared and gave him one of mine. A good day. It is 2017 - Hiro recently passed away. A sad day that was. Fishing for sand bass and bay bass in King Harbor with Dewayne, Marty and Mark. Right under the Harbor Master's window no less. Fishing on the Toronado for bluefin with Bryan. Fishing for striped bass at Quail Lake with Craig - before it was open to the public. Fishing and pinheading on the Freedom with Mel. Going on the half day boats out of Redondo Beach with Brian. Sneaking into Churches and Golf Courses to fish for bass in their lakes with Craig and Brian. Grey scroungers thrown into the aquaduct water going into Quail. Fishing was always more fun when you went with your buddies. Buddies that were just about as proficient at fishing as yourself. God forbid going fishing with a guy that was way better than you. That would be embarrassing. Besides, we were 'meat-fishermen'. Catch as many as you can, as often as possible. After a while, taking non-fishermen fishing did get to be fun. Not only that, I sort of grew out of killing as many fish as possible. But it took a while. Fishing was serious business! Like, I could not imagine taking a non-fisherman fishing for bluefin at San Clemente Island. Except for one guy. George Mowery. He was one of our neighbors when we lived in North Torrance. We did not get to be buddies right away. But after a while, we got along pretty good. He liked to fish - so I am not sure I could call him a non-fisherman, but somehow he always seemed to catch his share. His tackle was more rental tackle-ish for a lack of better description. He refused to buy anything more than he needed - and bought on his own without any input from anybody. For example, I recall he went on the Toronado bluefin fishing. He was using 20 or 25 pound gear - way too heavy for bluefin fishing really. But for one reason or another, he would catch one. I mean, the boat had 30 or 40 people, and there were maybe 6 bluefin. Bryan and I would have the bulk of the fish 4 out of the 6, and there was George. He got one. Not even sure when or how, but he would have one in his sack. All with his patented 'shit-eating' grin on his face. Most of the time when we would go fishing, the way he fished just invited a comment. 'George, you may want to try.....', 'shuddup' he would say. And he would smoke these 5 cent cigars. Made everyone want to puke. Especially in the galley. People would ask him to leave. There weren't any rules against smoking in them days. Yuchhhh. Just for shits and giggles, I tried smoking one......tasted as bad as they smelled. I had a long acquaintance with Russ Izor. The first time I went on the same boat with Russ was in 1974. He was running the Indian - and the apartments I lived in had a lot of folks that like to fish and chartered the Indian - owned and operated by Russ Izor. I had known of Russ for many years before. The legendary Russ Izor of 22nd Street Landing. He had built and run many many boats. His favorite and only place to fish - as far as he was concerned, was Catalina Island....his island. It would be many years after that when my mother talked me out of being a vagabond and asked me to work in the health food business she had started. A few years in, she decided that running a health food store was not the right 'fit'. Besides, she had two other sons she had to figure out what to do with. Pushing the right buttons and saying the right things - I started college at the ripe old age of 27. I started working on boats to pay for rent and school. I'd run into Russ here and there - by that time, he had stopped running boats and was running Izorline - a fishing tackle distributor. Working on boats and in tackle shops - I started to run into Russ a lot. He would even invite me to go fishing on occasion. After I got out of college I entered the corporate world and eventually bought a house. Not sure where I ran into him again - but I find out his house is a mere mile away. We would go fishing and hang out quite a bit. His wife Louise (Lura) was a former flight attendant for Pan American Airways - so there would always be lots of classy ladies at their house. Even ended up marrying one of those ladies. Jeesus. What a tangent that was. I was actually going to write about some thoughts I have been having lately in regards to long range fishing. On one of the trips on the Royal Star, I had just landed a 253 chunk fishing with a tuna heart (on Blake's suggestion). A good fish. When the deckhands stuck four gaffs in it and brought the fish aboard, I noticed liquid squirting out of the tuna's butthole. Huh? A closer look reveals the fish was in spawning mode and was squirting eggs all over the deck. That scene's been swirling around my head for a while. That fish was caught at Isla Clarion - one of the two remaining places where long range boats can fish. So the area is a spawning zone for yellowfin tuna. I have been catching the brood stock. On the first few long trips I took - the fish were just placed in the holds. Out of sight, out of mind - until the boat got back to San Diego. But on the two boats I have been fishing for the last 7 or 8 years - the fish are bled, gilled and gutted before being place in the RSW tanks. And you get to see what form of critters this fish has been eating and whether it is male or female. After working on many boats and cleaning many many fish - I can about tell when the fish are ready to spawn. All the local tuna I have caught locally in Southern California never had much for roe or milt sacks. But these bigger fish down in long range land - had well developed roe and milt sacks. I did not realize how well developed and far along they were until that 253. They are actually spawning during the time we are fishing. So I have been dealing with the thought of killing brood stock yellowfin tuna at their 'hatchery'.