San Francisco Bay Fly Fishing Report

Capt. Kevin DeGulis reports on 10.18.18

Bay 

Wold Series Bite! Too bad the Athletics are in the playoffs anymore but who cares we have striped bass in the bay! The past two weeks have been a blast out at Crissy field, but it can be entirely tide based.

For example, I got to Crissy at 6:30 am, the tide was slack at 5:22 am so, in theory, the tidal flow should have been running for about an hour. As I walked to the water, I noticed the tide wasn’t running strong quiet yet. Right at 7:00 am the water was moving and clean, hooking into fish at 7:12 am, the water was utterly dirty by 7:50 am. In conclusion, I had a 45 minutes window of having a chance of hooking into something.

Not saying I am a 100% right on with my hypothesis, but these kinds of situations happened to me over and over again this past season.

yes that striper was fantastic 

So people have asked, “where do I cast.” “how far are the fish.” an experienced surf flyfisher will say “cast everywhere” so do it!

I think its the simplicity of it for me, I don’t need a boat; I don’t even need shoes to catch fish from the surf.  One quote goes well with fly fishing the ocean “Once you get there let me know”- Steve Adachi.

 I believe this means you will never get there; it’s a goal that can’t have a measurement because let’s be honest humans will never fully understand the ocean.  

Surf

We had our latest surf clinic at Stinson Beach, up in Marin County. Stinson not only is incredible town but my favorite beach to fish in the entire migration. We had the pleasure of the Diablo Valley Fly Fishermen club members for the clinic. 

In the morning the wind was high, but we seemed to do just fine because the wind was coming from the northwest. 

After a couple of hours of casting and instructions, the group headed out for our second go at fly fishing the beach. 

Evan Praskin of Strokeventures Fly Fishing was able to get into an excellent striped bass feeding in the milky foam whitewater only 40 feet from the beach.

Overall an incredible day at Stinson Beach, the next stop was Big Sur. Before the striper season would officially end on the coast I wanted to check out Carmel and Big Sur to do some recon. 

I have always heard that the stripers stop going south after Monterey but I wanted to check it out for myself. sure enough, I hooked into one perch, with no signs of stripers. 

Exploring highway 1 has been a blast fish or no fish, the amount of water that is fishable throughout the California Coast is overwhelming. A good thing! As you start the journey of fly fishing, the surf remembers you can bring a rod to any beach if you are traveling to any coastal area give it a shot.  For example, George Revel fishing for Steelhead on the shores of Russia.

Or back in 2016 when fishing for Atlantic Striped bass on the coast of Nantucket, Mass. 

If you have a business meeting in New York City, a family vacation in Miami. A visit down to Southern California remember to bring your surf fly rod, a wallet of different types of shooting heads, flies, and your handy dandy travel stripping basket. You never know what surf creature you might run into when ocean meets lands.

Walk down to the beach, take your shoes off and fly fish on the beach.