Long paddle for La Jolla sanddabs

Yesterday I did a solo kayak trip in La Jolla. Parking was tough because I showed up later than most, but unloading gear without a headlamp was nice. The surf was less than a foot, which made for a super easy launch.

I finally figured out how to turn on contour lines on my fish finder, which meant I could actually plan out where I wanted to go. My plan was to bottom fish in 300 ft to try for a squarespot rockfish for my lifelist, so I set a waypoint a few miles out and started paddling.

Unsurprisingly, the bottom there didn't have any structure, but the day was more of a proof of concept than anything, so I dropped pieces of squid down to see if I could pull something up. Right away I had savage little bites, and I started pulling up sanddabs. The first one was a longfin, which is a new species for me! (And yes he was missing an eye.)

Longfin Sanddab (Citharichthys xanthostigma) - new hook & line species #647

The sanddabs were coming up two at a time, and this photo shows my deepest kayak catch at 312 feet.

The majority of the sanddabs were Pacifics, but on one of the drops I caught both species, so I was able to do a side-by-side photo. The length of the pectoral fin is the obvious ID characteristic, but there are other differences as well. Sometimes the pectoral fin can be frayed and shorter than it ought to be, so scale size (and therefor lateral line scale count) is another way to quickly tell the two apart.

I caught a few Pacifics that were big enough to keep and stashed them in a walmart bag in the shade. They came home with me and were delicious.

Pacific Sanddab (Citharichthys sordidus)

While I was sanddab fishing I had some juvenile fish use my kayak for shelter. I'm pretty sure they were halfmoons. They ate little bits of squid that I dropped over the side. Perhaps I should bring microfishing gear whenever I kayak in case something weird shows up?

Mixed in with the sanddabs were a few small rockfish, but none of them were squarespots. Here's a halfbanded and a blue.

Halfbanded Rockfish (Sebastes semicinctus)

Blue Rockfish (Sebastes mystinus)

For the remainder of the day I paddled over to the 100 feet deep area near the kelp where other boats typically fish. Along the way I had a genuine shot at a mako that was finning at the surface, but I tangled up my lines and missed my chance. In the shallow(er) water I caught other species including copper rockfish, gopher rockfish, kelp rockfish, California scorpionfish, ocean whitefish, and Pacific chub mackerel.

Copper Rockfish (Sebastes caurinus)

Ocean Whitefish (Caulolatilus princeps)

My last fish of the day was this gopher rockfish that ate both of my baits.

Gopher Rockfish (Sebastes carnatus)

Here's the the route for the day from my Garmin app. The sanddab spot is in the upper left, and the end of the day was below where it says La Jolla Tide Pools.

Miles: 10.09
Hours: 6:51

This trip was more of a skills building session than anything, but I'm quite happy that I picked up a new species! Next time I'd like to focus on finding structure in deeper water so I can catch some decent fish that aren't sanddabs.