Surf Fishing In So Cal

2026 has been the least productive surf fishing I’ve ever experienced. Thoughts?

How El Niño Ruined Surf Fishing in 2026 El Niño surf fishing in 2026 ruined the San Diego surf fishing season. Here's exactly why — the science and whether fall will be good...

FYI, for anyone who hasn’t heard that wire leaders are banned (specifically in So Cal within 1000ft of shore), I’ve switched to these mono shark leaders for leopard sharks and soupfin and so far 100% success rate in terms of effectiveness and durability.

200 LB Monofilament Shark Leaders 200 LB Test Pre-made Shark Rigs for surf fishing. Leopard Shark fishing, Soupfin/Sevengill fishing. All things heavy tackle surf fishing.

If you care about your right to fish, please take 5 minutes of your time to do the following:

Here’s exactly what to do, and it takes about five minutes:

Send an email to both of these addresses:

[email protected]
[email protected]
Subject line: Emergency Regulations: Recreational Gear Restrictions for White Shark

In the body, include:

What species you fish for and roughly how often
Why wire leader matters for landing those species safely and cleanly, rather than losing fish with trailing gear
Your name and that you’re a California resident

California and Shark Stewards Try to Ban Shark Fishing as We Know It White shark gear restriction action has irresponsibly been applied effectively banning shark fishing as we know it.

July was another great month for surf fishing. Conditions have been great and it’s been such a beautiful mild summer in terms of weather and surf. Here’s a nice sargo and leopard shark from a sesh earlier this week. I don’t get too many sargo so this was a cool one to see🤙

We had a bit of upwelling two weeks ago that shut off the hot spotfin bite for a week or so. Since then, the water temp is back up to 70F and while the spotfin aren’t back and biting as strong as they were, the big beans have made their first appearance in numbers and size🤙

Corbina in this photo taped at 24.5”

Swipe ➡️ for some throwback pics.

Every year I like to experience (atleast once) holding the shark rod waiting for one of these guys (more likely “gals”) to bite. I had the pleasure of doing that for this one right here and I think I caught it on my GoPro (I’ll have to check). But even with this being one of the smaller leopards we typically land, they’re all incredibly fun to feel as you sense them pick up the bait and begin to swim away with it before absolutely taking off as you hear the “tzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!!!!!!!!”

Brings me back to the good ol days when and I had just discovered leopard shark fishing and we’d slap a chunk of surfperch on the same setup we’d used to catch that very surfperch… hoping for the best but usually getting snapped off just before getting spooled time and time again as we had no idea what we were doing😂

Gosh it was fun not knowing what was out there and being filled with the adrenaline of every thump! When we had no responsibilities and our biggest concerns were how to figure out how to eventually land one of these beasts before having to eventually go back to school the next fall🥲

Just a bit of a reminder not to rush your accomplishments or goals to learn something. Most often, the real reward is the experience itself and the journey of getting there. Enjoy life🤙

I have never had a year this filled with . Take a moment to scroll through these. This is just a handful of what some of my recent outings have produced. 🤞the hot bite continues!

Showed up to some pretty yuck conditions as the kelp die-off has begun😬 but per usual, Brooke still crushed it. In case anyone was wondering, it’s a good time to catch spotfin croaker and leopard sharks right now.

When conditions have been good, the fishing has been good lately. Enough sharks to go around for everyone in a recent outing as the bite continues to improve🤙

Last Friday seemed to mark the beginning of the summertime species showing up in numbers🤞 Hoping they don’t disappear again. Spotfin croaker, corbina, yellowfin croaker and leopard sharks are all biting nicely!