OUTDOORS / PETE THOMAS : They Were in Right Place at Right Time

It was a sight most fishermen dream of.

Yellowtail, breezing across the surface in a school so large it seems to span for miles. And you are in the only boat on the scene.

Such was the case Wednesday morning for the 52 anglers aboard the First String, a three-quarter day boat out of L.A. Harbor Sportfishing.

Skipper Pat Conklin, noticing a group of birds diving on small fish in the Horseshoe Kelp area a few miles outside the harbor, took his customers to the area and put them on top of a bite they won’t soon forget.

“I’ve never seen this many fish,” said Conklin, 40, a longtime South Bay skipper. “You couldn’t see the end of them.”

And after a few scoops of live squid were tossed over the rail to chum the yellowtail into a frenzy, his passengers couldn’t stop catching them. Conklin’s arm-weary anglers, chasing one strong-swimming yellowtail after another up and down the rail, boated 137 fish ranging in size from 12 to 25 pounds.

By this time, other boats had moved in to get in on the action. Conklin and his bunch had had enough.

“We could have caught more, but we ran out of squid,” he said.

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Across the channel, along the shores of Catalina, overnight boats were working on a fair run of white seabass. The counts haven’t been big, but the fish have, averaging between 20 and 40 pounds.

“It’s kind of like a one-boat deal,” said Brian Walker, skipper of the Grande, based at 22nd Street Landing in San Pedro. “Some are getting a handful and the one who gets right on the spot gets the better bite.”

The Grande had nine white seabass Tuesday, the largest a 44-pounder, and landings from San Pedro and Long Beach were reporting similar counts on Wednesday.

Calico bass and barracuda have been keeping fishermen busy between seabass bites, and Walker said he has seen schools of yellowtail on the front side of the island, but of yet has been unable to get the fish to bite.

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Despite the runs of yellowtail and white seabass, the focus for many anglers this weekend will be on flatfish.

More than 1,000 fishermen will be plying the coastal waters from the Palos Verdes Peninsula to Point Dume in the Santa Monica Halibut Derby hoping to hook into the catch of a lifetime--in this case a halibut named “Big Bertha,” a specially tagged halibut worth $1,000. If Bertha is elusive, anglers can still land two grand prizes--trips to Alaska and Cabo San Lucas--for the catches of the day.

The tournament, based out of Marina del Rey, begins at 5 a.m. Saturday and lasts until 5 p.m. Sunday.

However, catching any legal-sized halibut might not be that easy. Fishing for halibut has been slow in the bay in recent weeks.

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“Halibut fishing it a little slow,” said Phil Campanella, who operates Malibu Sportfishing. “I think the water is too warm for them and they’re out there in deeper water.”

Perhaps, but tournament chairman John Bourget said he had heard reports of two halibut weighing 39 and 37 pounds being caught by a commercial fisherman last weekend. And an angler aboard the Happy Man out of Marina del Rey caught a 27-pounder Sunday.

Last year’s tournament was won on a halibut weighing 33 pounds, 6 ounces.

Participants this year can monitor the tournament by calling a free hot line set up by 976-TUNA: (310) 328-5850.

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Add halibut: A primary goal of the derby is to obtain information that could help restore a declining California halibut fishery in the Santa Monica Bay.

Tagging efforts of derby participants and other volunteers are beginning to provide researchers with information about the species’ migration habits--one fish tagged in the bay was recaptured in Morro Bay in 250 feet of water--and proceeds over the years have been used to help fund a hatchery facility in Redondo Beach that has raised more than 100,000 juvenile halibut, many of which have been released into local waters.

The ultimate goal of the project, headed by the Los Angeles County Natural History Museum with the support of Southern California Edison, is to determine whether the halibut fishery can be feasibly enhanced by hatchery-raised fish.