Davis, a long time saltwater fisherman from Huntington Beach, was echoing a certain feeling toward a certain fish experienced by many summer saltwater fishermen. The fish Davis was holding up and admiring was an albacore, the tuna that kicks like a mule and tastes like a sweet chicken on the dinner table.
When millions of albacore silently make their way up the Baja and California coasts each summer, it represents just one portion of one of the most prodigious migrations on earth. After albacore reach the Cape Mendocino area, about miles north of San Francisco, they split into two groups. One group turns left at that point and heads for waters at roughly the International Dateline, not far from Midway Island.
The second group continues up the North American coast to waters off Oregon, then heads west all the way to the coast of Japan.
Their eastward migration ends roughly two-thirds of the way up the Baja California coast. There, albacore begin again the northward journey that takes them within, in most years, small-boat distance of Southern California harbors. Right now, the albacore watch is on.
Early-season results have been disappointing. Since the first albacore were caught on June 25, catches have been sparse or not at all. It was very thin, very scattered. There were four San Diego commercial tuna boats out there and they were fishing right where we were. People wanted to know how close the albacore are, or what the weather was like where the fish are or how long it will be until the fish are within one-day range, which no one knows, of course. When reports go out that the albacore are here, it touches off the closest thing to pandemonium that exists on the Southern California Sportfishing scene.
