The rock of shore-bound cliffs was not distant. I look like I’m really getting older, but I can assure you I have plenty of life left in me.
Boarding the Monte Carlo
The Monte Carlo, departing from San Pedro, California, serves as one of 22nd Street Sportfishing’s headboats. Others, including relatively small charter boats, float among the docks. My son and I would board a big one. The Monte Carlo carries as many as 70 fishermen in style. And we didn’t know it yet, but we were after calico bass.
Traffic is notoriously bad in and around Los Angeles. I truly feared my son, Matt, and I would never get there on time, but he arrived early in his Kia at Hotel Ziggy where his mother and I stayed. I may never forget being up early for him. I not only wasn’t tired; I felt the presence of nature in that hotel room. The same you feel when you have a habit of getting up before dawn at home to go fishing. After we left West Hollywood, we arrived at the dock within 45 minutes. Among the first fishermen there, we found the office hadn’t yet opened.
A week or so in advance of June 21st, I had booked the trip online. I also spoke to someone on the phone to be sure all the details meshed, but the process is easier than I thought it might be. I had only to present my driver’s license and pay when a window in front of the boarding area opened for service. Rod rentals are a separate matter and not expensive. Get them inside the tackle shop. Just make sure the reel functions. My drag didn’t work! Exchanging the combo for another was easy, but just imagine a good fish breaking off.
I also bought hooks and sinkers. They might have been a little pricey but not unreasonable. Strong hooks size 1, torpedo sinkers of three ounces, and egg sinkers of a quarter ounce. When the clerk gave me a package of the little sinkers, I held back protestation—just in case. I imagined they might have a special purpose.
Calico bass hit anywhere from the surface to bottom 50 feet down.
Calicos Hit Top to Bottom
They do. Over bottom 35 feet to 50 feet down, they allow you to ease live anchovies down slowly. The mid-column is fished rather than plunged through. Since the anchovies are about seven inches long and swim, the weight doesn’t take them down nearly as directly as does a three-ounce sinker. Other fishermen use the little sinkers, too. Standard practice. You don’t get snagged, and though they will take anchovies to the bottom, many calico bass swim in that middle range and they can even be taken from the surface. If you want to bring your own tackle, I suggest size 1 or 1/0 hooks, bank sinkers from an ounce to three ounces, quarter- and half-ounce egg sinkers. Maybe some barrel swivels, too.
About calico bass at the surface, another name for them, kelp bass, gives you an idea why. Though they inhabit rocks at the bottom, kelp reaches nearly to the surface, and the bass associate with it. We saw many bass over the course of our trip take live anchovies up top. Whenever one of the mates slung a bunch out there, sometimes a few bass would splash and boil. They chum that way.
I stand with a bass I caught in front of a tank full of live anchovies.
Feed Them Anchovies
Another bait offered is squid. Matt and I never tried it, and we never observed anyone else doing well with the stuff. Bass—and they look like smallmouths—would clearly seem to prefer fish forage. But the squid might be intended for some other species like Pacific halibut. I’ll discuss halibut in a moment.
The international gamefish association lists the world record calico bass at 14 pounds, seven ounces, caught not far south of San Pedro at Newport Beach in 1993. Fish over five pounds are not frequently caught, and of well over a hundred calicos caught during our outing, one of them might have weighed four pounds. Matt’s biggest about 17 inches; legal size is currently 14 inches, and the limit is five. Between Matt and I, we kept seven. I caught six bass and a pacific mackerel about a foot long. Matt caught so many bass, he lost count.
When was done fishing, he came into the cabin and joined me.
Tension at the End of the Trip
He’s only 26 and physically fit, so when the pressure to fish at the boat’s stern increased near the end of the trip, he managed to maneuver through the crowd. I ended up a basket case sitting inside the cabin! Tidal flow became very heavy, the bass hitting constantly, everyone taking turns and hooking up while rotating positions at the stern from the left side to the right. Several or more anglers used colored diamond jigs or jig and plastic combinations. Each type of lure scored bass.
Other Species … Such as Halibut
Some of the fishermen aboard regulars, the popularity proves that many feel the cost worthwhile, and its not expensive as ocean trips go. A bonus—in my estimation a tantalizing one regarding the possibility of halibut—is that other species can get caught. Calico bass are not the only species hitting live anchovies. Smaller sand bass, less common, take the bait on occasion. Matt caught one. But about the underlying incentive probably shared among many on the boats to catch something special, Pacific halibut do frequently get caught on headboats. The world record is 67 pounds, five ounces. Considerably larger than East Coast fluke, they swim in a more streamlined shape.
Naturally, we most wanted to catch one of them. And by fishing live anchovies on bottom, targeted them. Once, I fished an anchovy directly down from the rail, on bottom, when I felt a more subtle take than what I had grown used to from bass. I tightened up and felt that familiar soppy feeling of a fluke glomming onto the bait, but my attempt to set the hook failed. Four halibut did get caught aboard the Monte Carlo that day, the largest 9.6 pounds.
Going in as in going out, a father and son team.
Delicious
You can just imagine how good halibut would taste, but Matt felt happy to try his calicos and the meat from those I kept. We had our take filleted on the boat, though a fee is charged. Altogether, the boat might have carried 30 fishermen, so we waited patiently in line, while fillets got cut with speed and precision.
Other Outfits
Other outfits throughout the Los Angeles area serve many other fishermen, and as I began to mention earlier, 22nd Street Sportfishing offers more expensive charters for tuna and other large gamefish species as well. If you visit the Los Angeles region, any of the options are a doable way to enrich a business trip or make a vacation even more interesting. Most of us who fish like to wet a line here and there, so San Pedro may be a valuable notch on the belt. If you go, I’d love to hear from you about the trip. I hope you find the mates and captain friendly, helpful, and knowledgeable, as we did. Just be sure to tip. Not everyone does, and a young mate felt surprised when I put a bill on his palm.
The shipping in and around Los Angeles is legendary.
Afterwards, Matt and I got some ice at a service station. He left me with his mother in West Hollywood and took the fish home to Hollywood proper, where at the time, he lived with a few friends. I still feel curious about how calico bass tastes. After his mother and I had flown back home to New Jersey, he told us they tasted great!
The article originally appeared in New Jersey Federated Sportsmen’s News.