Spring Surf Fishing 2024: Halibut, Sharks Off To Hot Start

The 2024 season is upon us and a couple species are off to a really strong start. With overall air and water temperatures being much nicer (warmer) than the last two years, I’m expecting a more “normal” spring and summer than the last two. Get ready for a very nice year of surf fishing.

What’s Biting Now?

The two big ones that are off to a really good start this year are halibut and sharks. If you’ve spent any time on social media, you’d have seen plenty of big halibut being caught by some of our local surf anglers.

Above is a 28-inch halibut caught using a 4.75 inch swimbait with a Texas rig and a 1/4oz bullet weight paired with a 4/0 Gamakatsu superline 1/8 oz weighted swimbait hook.

Since water temps never really dipped too low this winter, the halibut bite has wasted no time at all kicking off to a hot start. What about the sharks?

Above is a leopard shark caught on an outing in March. We’ve landed a few of these since and a handful of big bat rays. The sharking game has resulted in 100% hook up ratio to attempts this year and when the sharks have taken too long to bite, rays and other species have picked up the bait.

What’s Biting Next?

Expect yellowfin croaker to ramp up in numbers in the next couple weeks while corbina and spotfin follow.

Sand crabs are just starting to show up with enough consistency in size and numbers for anglers to confidently expect to find them.

Meanwhile, the forecast for the next two weeks looks like it has all the ingredients to warm up the water and trigger the corbina/croaker bite.

With some warmer weather on the way and some milder surf conditions, expect these next two weeks to offer some really nice opportunities to get on something other than a surfperch.