Also known as White seabass, Atractoscion nobilis. Bait, technique, tide windows, and where the bite is on right now.
White Seabass — California's premier inshore croaker — kelp ghosts that haunt the squid spawn. Also called White seabass, Atractoscion nobilis.
White Seabass is also known as: White seabass, Atractoscion nobilis. California's premier inshore croaker — kelp ghosts that haunt the squid spawn.
Regional names can confuse anglers and cause misidentification. The table of common names below covers the most-used alternatives across Australia, New Zealand and the US:
Key to correct identification: check the regulations-authority species sheet for your state or territory before keeping any fish — minimum legal sizes, bag limits and identification guides are published by each fisheries department and are the authoritative source.
Hero spots in our coverage where White Seabass is in season for June. Click through for the live forecast.
Out of season across our covered spots in June.
White seabass are a grey-light fish — the bite is almost always best in the first hour of dawn (and the last of dusk), so be anchored or drifting over the squid before the sun cracks the horizon. Find the squid and you find the seabass: scan the sounder for the spawning balls of market squid on the bottom along the kelp lines off the SoCal mainland (Palos Verdes, La Jolla, Point Loma) and especially the Channel Islands — Catalina's front side, San Clemente, Santa Cruz and San Nicolas. The deadliest method is a dropper-loop rig: a 2/0–4/0 hook on an 18\" dropper above an 8–12 oz torpedo sinker, baited with live (or fresh dead) squid, fished right on the bottom in the squid. Hold the rod, feel the soft 'tick-tick,' drop your tip to feed line, then come tight and swing — they mouth a bait before committing. Up top, fly-line a live squid or sardine on a 25–40 lb fluoro leader along the kelp edge and let it swim into the stringers. The hardcore SoCal play is throwing a surface iron at grey light: chuck a Tady 45 to the outside of the kelp and wind it steady and slow just under the surface — a big WSB will boil on it. When you mark fish stacked over hard bottom, switch to the yo-yo: drop a heavy iron to the deck and crank it fast back up. These fish dig for the kelp the second they feel the hook, so fish 30–40 lb mono or 50–65 lb braid with a fluoro topshot, a stout 7–8' rod and lock the drag enough to turn them. They're a soft-mouthed croaker, though — don't horse, just keep steady pressure and gain line on the head-shakes.
Current is everything — a dead slack tide usually means a dead bite. You want a moving tide that lines the squid (and the seabass) up in a predictable feeding lane, ideally a moderate flow rather than a raging spring run that makes anchoring over the squid impossible. The magic overlap is a tide change that falls right at grey light: the last of a building tide rolling into dawn, or the turn happening in the first hour of light. On the kelp edges, fish the up-current side where bait stacks; over open squid grounds, the seabass swing through to feed hardest as the current starts or stops the water moving. If the tide is slack and flat at sunrise, fish hard anyway through the change — but the grey-light-plus-moving-water window is when the gators eat.
White seabass are tied to the moon through the squid. Market squid spawn in pulses, and the spawns — and the seabass feeding on them — tend to fire up around the darker phases; the few days around the new moon are the classic SoCal 'WSB on the squid' window, when boats anchor over the spawning grounds at the Islands. Bright full-moon nights can scatter the fish or have them gorging all night and lockjawed at dawn, though a strong squid spawn will hold them regardless of phase. Solunar majors at first light overlap beautifully with the grey-light bite. Bottom line: chase the squid reports, and weight the dark-of-the-moon mornings.
California state-water rules govern white seabass — there's a minimum size, a daily bag limit, and a long-standing reduced limit during the spring spawning months, all set by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, so check the current CDFW saltwater regulations before you keep one. Separately, much of the SoCal and Channel Islands reef and kelp habitat falls inside Marine Protected Areas (MPAs / MLPA network) where take is restricted or banned, and bottomfish you'll catch alongside seabass — Pacific groundfish, rockfish, and species like grouper and amberjack farther south — run on annually-set seasons with depth and area closures that change year to year. Limits and seasons differ between state and federal waters and are revised regularly, so always confirm the current rules with the state agency before fishing. No numbers here are a substitute for the live regulations.
US state size & bag limits for White Seabass: CA
Olli-Mikael Vaittinen has fished his whole life. Fifteen years of fly fishing, guiding seasons on Norway's Lakselva — his favourite Atlantic salmon river — and a blue marlin landed in Vava'u, Tonga. Founder of Fishare — the app that puts the data behind the decisions every angler makes on the water.
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