Total fish count out of Virg's Landing last week was 974 albacore and 5 bluefin tuna caught by 189 albacore anglers. Big fish honors went to Freddy Otte of Paso Robles who bagged a 39 pounder while fishing aboard the Princess. Sergio Rizzo of Whittier nailed a 35 pound albacore on the Admiral and Jerry Reynolds took a 34 pounder on the Princess.

"August, September and October are the prime months for albacore fishing, so we're just about to enter the peak of the season," added Neil. "We'll be running daily albacore trips, weather permitting, every day through October. Our trips depart at 11:00 pm and return around 7:00 pm the following evening."

Another hot spot for albacore last week was off the Santa Cruz coast. Despite unfavorable conditions, anglers were reporting steady action on a mix of "peanut" sized fish (10 to 12 pounds) and 20 pound class fish.

"I went out for a short trip on Monday with two friends and we landed 12 fish to 25 pounds," reported Don Sorci from Bayside Marine. "Several of the other boats that day were coming in with catches of 20 to 25 fish."

According to Sorci, they were trolling rootbeer feathers and purple and black cedar plugs to locate the albacore. "We only had dead bait, and we still caught 5 fish on one of our stops," he said. "If we would have had live bait, we probably could have kept catching fish for hours. The key to putting numbers in the boat is to leave the first fish you hook hanging so it will attract other fish. Pretty soon you have the entire school feeding under your boat."

The majority of the albacore are currently 40 to 50 miles offshore, but Sorci said they were locating fish as close as 17 miles before the rough weather set in. "All we need is a good stretch of calm conditions and the fish should start moving closer to the coast," he explained. "The winds tend to push the warm water currents offshore, but they will move right back in with a few days of calm conditions. The fish counts should continue to improve over the next two months and we expect to start seeing some of the larger fish by mid September."

While the Central Coast is currently experiencing the most consistent albacore fishing, anglers to the north are also getting in on the action. "We made our first run of the season and nailed 68 albacore to 30 pounds for 18 anglers on Thursday, August 22," reported Mike Harbarth on the New Aggressor in Bodega Bay. "We found the fish 58 miles out on a 210 degree heading. We caught our fish trolling Mean Joe Greens, Mexican Flags and swim baits. We also caught over 30 fish on one live bait stop."

Judging from the latest reports, it looks like big numbers of fish are spread across our entire coastline and all we need is a break in the weather to experience wide open albacore action. The next two months are the peak of our albacore season, so it's time to break out those 30 pound outfits and get in on the action.