California Pinto Spiny Lobsters! (2/25)

[Latimeria]

With the exciting pictures I saw of the Pinto Spiny Lobsters from another fisherman here in SD, I was real hopeful of finding a Pinto or Green Spiny here in SD this night.



I really wanted to fish a little more North but my buddy was dead set on fishing SD Bay again.  Not my boat so not my call.

We had quite a few BIG ships roll past us as the evening went on.  A little too close if you ask me.  hahaha



30 hoops pulled and we still didn't get a single lobster, even a short one.  The one thing that was crawling though was the crabs, of all shapes and sizes! 

Lots of swimmer and sheep crab...



and more yellow and red rock crab than I ever remember catching.  All on Mud bottom so I have no idea why there were so many.



We finally got a short lobster and were stoked just to finally stop blasting out goose eggs on the white board.  We adjusted nets at this point and got a visit from the navy since we were a bit close.  The guy was really cool and we shared intel with him.  He told us the guys that were in the apparent "Hot Zone" only got 4 legals between the 5 boats that were set up there.  Not a good sign.

We kept (or I should say my buddy kept) pulling and pulling hoops.  We caught well over 2 dozen legal rock crab, but many had eggs so we let a lot go.  It was already 2:00 am and all we could manage were 2 legal bugs (which we were super stoked for) so we decided to pull and drop in front of the ramp just as a last quick drop hail mary.



Well, my buddy measured out a wrong amount of line and we watched one of the heavy nets slowly sink 10 feet below the boat.  He was going to jump in, but I was like, there has to be a better way.  I grabbed one of his jigs and tied on an extra hook on some 100# test he had onboard and went fishing.  Well, he went fishing first but had zero luck, so we switched and tried to see if my abilities to lose a lure in the tree was better.  Well, damn, I got it!  We recovered the net and reset but I was about done when all of a sudden 10 cops with their light blazing all stopped in front of the ramp with some suspects in the middle of them shouting... WTF!?!?

Well we had to stay out there until they left and pulled our last set about 3:45 am and found another lobster!  It was a short, but just a random place for a bug along with another big crab.

Long story short was I didn't get home until 5:00 am and was exhausted!  I spent the day cleaning, cooking and shucking the crabs for the meat (what a process that was) and now have a bunch of things to do before starting work on Monday.

Well, not the successful lobster trip for Pinto's I was hoping for, but I did bring home the good haul of crab.  Definitely my best ever haul of them.



Well, so much less fishing for me coming up soon now that I'll be back at work, but it's been one hell of a six month run of fish fo me, I'm pretty good for a bit.

Until Next Tide!

[jrodda]

Too bad no pintos but good to bring home something different in the crabs. You had an excellent run of fishing the past 6 months from the yellowtail units to everything else, glad you made it to the other side in one piece, albeit with some shots in the shoulder.