Targeting Sharks

[awalvatne62]

Hello all. Was on the old forum years ago and found out its gone and has resurrected now.

I used to shark fish weekly when I was in Florida on the gulf side. Mostly hooking into bull sharks and black tips. (Dreamed for a hammerhead and saw them occasionally but never hooked into one unfortunately) Anyway, I was wondering if anybody has any pointers into land based shark fishing out of SD County mostly. Main targets would be thresher to start out. In reality I'm fine with landing any toothy friends at this point.
So hoping some of you could give pointers into shops that deal in this subject, gear, what to spool up with out here, and tips on where to hunt for them.
Thanks in advance for the advice and I will be researching on my own as well. Would prefer to stay off of piers but have seen that is where a lot of threshers are hooked up at unfortunately (hate how crowded it gets and with sharks you tend to draw crowds)

[galen]

Land-based thresher would definitely be a baby, and quite a lucky catch at that!

[KamWalsh]

I used to shark fish quite a bit when I lived in San Diego. The shark fishing isn't nearly as good in SD as it is on the East Coast, but it can still be a lot of fun. From shore, I mostly fished with casting tackle during sunrise/sunset/nighttime for soupfin, leopard, and sevengill sharks, which don't need very heavy gear compared to what you're used to. 40lb conventional or spinning 9-12 foot rod with 130lb rub leader, wire leader, and sputnik-style sinkers is all that's needed. I never targeted threshers in the surf but fished for them a decent amount from boats and have seen it become relatively popular in recent years, although it's still not very widespread and you'd have a hard time finding a tackle shop that will be of much help involving that particular fishery. If you check out the terrafirmatackle website, that would probably be your best bet for seeing shark rigs specifically geared towards California. Might not be worth it to buy them (probably less expensive to rig yourself, and although I've never met him he's somewhat of a controversial figure since he has deliberately targeted great whites on many occasions throughout his career and even posted a photo posing with a dolphin that he accidentally caught and killed), but it would be a good source to see how to model your rigs after.

People will generally not freely give up thresher spots, but since I don't live there anymore I don't care haha. Some areas they frequent include north county beaches around Oside and Carlsbad, as well as the Silver Strand near Imperial Beach. Unlike most other sharks, threshers are primarily diurnal and usually don't bite at night. To target them, you primarily fish a bait underneath a float or balloon so that it stays suspended near the surface or midway through the water column. If targeting them from a beach, kayaking out or dropping baits seems to be a necessity compared to the more bottom-feeding species I mentioned above. Whatever gear you used for doing that on the East Coast is probably a good choice; I would go lighter when fishing from boats but no reason not to go heavy from shore (better releases too). Another thing of note is that since you'll be most likely targeting them during the daytime, you'll have to deal with crowds of swimmers and surfers which might make kayaking out and fishing baits a nightmare and you might even attract some unwanted attention from individuals who want you to stop. One other thing of note is that you have a pretty high chance of hooking a juvenile great white from the beach if you're kayaking out baits and fishing them under a float in certain spots, which is a great way to get in huge trouble -especially if you're fishing during the daytime with beachgoers around. I'd even recommend using heavy (130-200lb) mono leaders and circle hooks if you're specifically targeting threshers, as the average sized ones you catch from shore usually won't bite through the mono but a great white will right away before it turns into a problem. Another thing that might mitigate gws bycatches is by using small baits like mackerel, which is also your best choice for threshers since they have small mouths and teeth and generally feed on small baitfish.

You are also correct in that it's much more popular from piers, but I was never a fan of that fishery because of the crowds. Some piers even have their own resident crews ("crews" sounds better than "gangs") that claim ownership over the prime areas at the ends of the pier and are known to sometimes not permit newcomers to fish there. Not to mention, it's very impractical to land decent-sized sharks from the piers without killing them with grappling hooks (although I've seen some creative contraptions designed specifically for catch and release that were successfully used, essentially much larger versions of the lobster hoop nets used for smaller fish) and piers frequently are hotbeds for illegal fishing activity. It's pretty crazy how differently game wardens will approach and speak to you when you're fishing from a pier vs. when you arrive back to the launch ramp in a boat.