What To Do When Your Game Plan Changes? Stan Kaplun Reports In From SD Bay.

Brad Butler in the foreground and Jeff Cox in the background.

Quick bay report from San Diego. Jeff Cox, Brad Butler and I, fished San Diego Bay the other day in solid pre-frontal conditions. We had the intentions of making bait and drifting for Halibut, but with a complete lack of wind, that was very difficult to do. We quickly changed up the game plan and fished Spotted Bay Bass for the rest of the morning.

Once we found them, it was wide open. We ended up putting over 80 fish in the "bloodbath", and could've easily had over 100 if we had converted on just half of the mixed strikes. Brad also stuck a Halibut on the swimbait at the end of the day that was just short of legal. Baits of choice were various colored 3"-4" swimbaits, as well as the SPRO RK-Star 55 in Chrome/Pink Black. Although this bait was designed by Mike McClelland for Salmon and Steelhead, it can be very effective in the bay's if fished properly. Just like the majority of SPRO baits, it crosses over from fresh to salt extremely well. I've done the "fresh to salt" conversion with their jerkbait, swimbait, rat, bucktail, and now their crankbait.
 

The retrieve didn't matter much with the swimbait or crankbait. The fish hit the swimbait on the drop, dragging it on the bottom, or burning through the middle to upper water column. It was the same story with the crankbait. Whether I burned it, slow rolled it, or did a "jerk and pause" retrieve, the fish were on the chew and tore the baits up.

Jeff's boat was loaded with a variety of Cousins rods this morning between the three of us. My fish were caught on a Raze 79H PT and 704S. Jeff's fish were also on the Raze 79H PT, as well as on the 76 medium Raze rod. Brad's fish came were on his Cousins Raze 701S and on the SSW 83L-T .

With the low water conditions still in all of our lakes around California, bay fishing is alive and well and as you can see the equipment used is standard for both fresh and salt water.

Another good day on the water!

 Until next time -Stan Kaplun-