Free Tuna?

Last week San Diego had "the storm of the decade" according to some forecasters and "the storm of the century" according to the national news. Now, when this happens in San Diego the Tijuana River flows from Mexico, under the border fence and into US waters at a beach known as Imperial Beach. This water is, how shall I say, full of it? "It" being crap...yes, literally...raw sewage that overflows from Tijuana (commonly known as TJ) as well as the tons of garbage and debris. It makes the Tijuana River Valley on the U.S. side look like a recycling center in a pool of thick brown water and it all flows out into the ocean there at the beach. And I"m not just talking about a little flow and then it dissipates into the gorgeous blue ocean. I'm talking a digusting brown plume of water moving north along the beach for miles!!!! Millions of gallons of this nasty stuff flowing into the ocean per day! YUCK!

Click here if you want to see a cool scientific link about the plume and watch as it flows out of TJ.

http://sccoos.ucsd.edu/data/tracking/IB/

I mention this because last week's storm also brought huge waves in the 15-18' range to Southern California and probably bigger in Northern Baja Mexico. These waves apparently tore open some of the aquafarm pens that house blue fin tuna down in Northern Baja. The tuna, having been raised in the pens their whole life are weaker, I imagine, than their free swimming counterparts. It seems the loose tuna got caught up in some currents and have been thrashing around in the shore pound along the beaches in Imperial Beach (IB).

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2010/jan/22/beachcomber-grabs-bluefins-stormy-surf/

Some folks have headed down there to grab up these 20-40lb blue fin in waist deep water and take them home for dinner. I guess the fish are so beaten from the big waves that they're easy to just scoop up and take them home.

Wouldn't common sense tell you...or me...or anyone...that wading waist deep, into chocolate brown sewage water that is flowing from the Tijuana River wouldn't be an ideal place to collect your dinner? No matter how free it is? The risk of getting Hepatitis is so high that there's actually a free clinic down in IB for surfers to get inocculated so they can go surf in the winter when it's huge but the river is doing it's thing and flowing into the water right there.

Is the price of tuna and our desire for it that great that people have to risk getting sick over it?

Winter sharkin'!

With the beautiful weather we're having this winter the sharks on the fly have been plentiful!!! We've had some insane days with blues circling the boat and then a small mako shows up and the blue high tail it outta there as Mr. Mako takes his (or her) turn at the chum bucket and our flies! What a great winter we're having...better not jinx it!

Circling blueshark...

Kicking off the New Year!

Happy New Year everyone! Just returned from The Islands (aka Hawaii) where I spent some unbelieveably relaxing days on the beach and in the 80 degree water. I saw plenty of bonefish but alas the Kona winds kicked up and on the days I had planned to fish they didn't want to play or were hanging out in the marine reserve areas. Brutal to see huge bonefish practically swimming at my feet and not being able to throw a fly at them! Conway made a play on some of them but visibility was tough with all the wind...bones 1...humans 0!

Coming up on the calendar is the Fly Fishing Show in Somerset, New Jersey January 22-24. Conway, and I will be there every day. Conway's delivering his presentation on mako fishing on the fly each day. If you're at the show it's a must see! Check out their website for info and times:

http://www.flyfishingshow.com/Somerset__NJ.html

I'll be wandering around the show, seeing all my fly friends and definitely sitting in on some of the talks. I'm crossing my fingers for good weather...Hawaii to San Diego to New Jersey in January...ouch...that's tough!

Hope to see some of you there!