Fort Bragg Albacore Tuna Report 8-23-24

We headed southwest into a flat calm ocean and found the temp break approximately 12 miles offshore and kept running a few miles to look for cleaner water. We put in and hit a double within half an hour of setting gear at 14.5 X 12.5, which is about 25 miles from the harbor. Then slowly started picking away at that area with a lot of singles and found a increasing south wind chop. By 10am we had 7 fish and the south wind was quickly building, based off the forecast for the wind to get nicer offshore we decided to look further west and avoid the chop. At the 30 west line we found another temp break and cobalt blue water and picked up another 3 fish quickly with a few short strikes, then the bite died. A few boats from the morning reported the fish starting to bite firs pretty good back at original location but also reported wind chop that was about 5 to 6 feet. We started trolling that way and took a beating at that heading and opted to take a more friendly angle trolling northeast toward the harbor, we ended the day with 10 fish and got off the water at 3pm with a pretty rough ride home. Everyone was happy to see the protection of the cove after a rough ride for 20 miles.

Fort Bragg Albacore Fishing Report 8-24-24

We headed west into a choppy ocean toward Friday numbers, at about 15 miles from the harbor we watched a boat flip a handline fish over their rail faintly under their deck lights before the sun had even risen which I presume they hooked while running in the chop. This was 15 miles from the harbor on a 240 true degree heading. I looked at the sonar and saw tuna marks at 100 feet down so I sprinted to the back of the boat and threw a line out, within 5 seconds it was fish on. We started tossing whatever lines we could into the water and couldn’t get any more bites. I continued to work the area as the sun picked up into the sky and the wind died and started picking up doubles and a few triples to have roughly 20 10lb to 15lb tuna by noon. The weather got significantly nicer in the late morning, and was very pleasant by noon. After a 1 hour lull in the bite, I decided to hold my ground and wait it out for the fish to come back up in that area since most boats only had 5 to 10 fish else where. Luckily, we started hooking triples and quads of 20lb to 30lb fish and put in 10 really nice sized albacore. At one point I even looked back after our spreader bar kept getting hit and saw a marlin chasing and attacking the spreader bar multiple times. Unfortanlty after a minute or so the marlin dove off without getting hooked, this seemed to be a common story for a few boats but one boat did land a marlin which is a once in a lifetime experience for most people while fishing NorCal. At 2pm we had 30 fish and pointed toward home, cleaning fish while trolling nearly all the way to the dock on a calm ocean. We caught all 30 fish within about a 1 miles circle, as I didn’t stray much and worked a 1 degree temperature break. Surprisingly we didn’t find any more fish but everyone was pretty happy after a very successful day on the water. A lot more Tuna action is on the way for 2024 and we are very excited to get out there and chase em for the rest of the fall.