Mission/Pacific Beach 10/18 - 10/19
Posted: Sun Oct 19, 2025 1:44 pm
I’ve really been blurring the line between Mission and Pacific Beach lately so I’ll call the weekend “both”. I think the LG towers are all pulled in for whatever reason so no marker to go off but I was approximately where T-21 would be and south. There was an early high tide both days so I tried staying out of the way of the surfers, especially the weekend city school.
I started Saturday with a pre-dawn stop at the pier for crabs and found nothing. I didn’t look particularly long because I’d brought lots of clam and Gulp worms to use, and it was cold. But I didn’t see signs of crabs anywhere under the pier (around 5:30-5:45ish if you want to look back at where the tide was at this time for reference), so I hopped back in my car and headed south.
I got a line in the water by about 6:30 and immediately caught back to back to back perch on salted clam. First three casts about 15 minutes. Small perch but I figured it was about to be an epic day!! Naturally, I changed everything I was doing and didn’t catch another fish for at least an hour. I settled on Gulp sandworms and was getting slammed with the “bloody” type. Not sure the final count but I’d guess 8-10 over 2.5 hours or so.
Back at it Sunday and while it was definitely a slower bite, I still ended with 5-6 over the same 2.5 hour window. Gulp camo worms were the bait of choice, with my clams being all but ignored save for a couple bites here and there. Lots of bites overall on the day but not as many takers.
Some general observations…
No crabs anywhere. A passerby mentioned seeing a few large ones on Saturday, but they must not have been where I was.
Little to no grass/kelp. This was a nice change from the past few weeks. It wasn’t totally absent but it wasn’t an issue.
Salted clams worked until they didn’t. The bloody gulp sandworms worked great on Saturday. The camo worms worked better Sunday. Perch certainly are finicky! The next baits I’m going to try are shrimp and squid.
I used mono line Saturday and braid Sunday, and mono has been a much less frustrating experience. The braid has been tangling, especially with my leader. I’m sure it’s user error but I seem to spend a lot more time tending to the braided line. I use 15 pound fluoro leader with both the 15 pound mono and braid. I do like how the braid casts, so perhaps the solution is switching to lighter mono line. I’m definitely still finding my way out there!
I started Saturday with a pre-dawn stop at the pier for crabs and found nothing. I didn’t look particularly long because I’d brought lots of clam and Gulp worms to use, and it was cold. But I didn’t see signs of crabs anywhere under the pier (around 5:30-5:45ish if you want to look back at where the tide was at this time for reference), so I hopped back in my car and headed south.
I got a line in the water by about 6:30 and immediately caught back to back to back perch on salted clam. First three casts about 15 minutes. Small perch but I figured it was about to be an epic day!! Naturally, I changed everything I was doing and didn’t catch another fish for at least an hour. I settled on Gulp sandworms and was getting slammed with the “bloody” type. Not sure the final count but I’d guess 8-10 over 2.5 hours or so.
Back at it Sunday and while it was definitely a slower bite, I still ended with 5-6 over the same 2.5 hour window. Gulp camo worms were the bait of choice, with my clams being all but ignored save for a couple bites here and there. Lots of bites overall on the day but not as many takers.
Some general observations…
No crabs anywhere. A passerby mentioned seeing a few large ones on Saturday, but they must not have been where I was.
Little to no grass/kelp. This was a nice change from the past few weeks. It wasn’t totally absent but it wasn’t an issue.
Salted clams worked until they didn’t. The bloody gulp sandworms worked great on Saturday. The camo worms worked better Sunday. Perch certainly are finicky! The next baits I’m going to try are shrimp and squid.
I used mono line Saturday and braid Sunday, and mono has been a much less frustrating experience. The braid has been tangling, especially with my leader. I’m sure it’s user error but I seem to spend a lot more time tending to the braided line. I use 15 pound fluoro leader with both the 15 pound mono and braid. I do like how the braid casts, so perhaps the solution is switching to lighter mono line. I’m definitely still finding my way out there!
