Bay Area Fishing Report for August 31, 2025: Stripers, Halibut, and Rockfish Bite Strong

Artificial Lure here with your San Francisco Bay fishing report for Sunday, August 31, 2025.

Let’s start with the tides—today kicked off with a high tide peaking at 6:14 am and you can expect another high tide around 4:44 pm. The only low tide falls at 10:10 am. We’re on a low tidal coefficient day, so current is soft and the swing between high and low isn’t dramatic. That’s good news for bass anglers—striped bass get active around these smaller moves and tend to hold steady on structure near decent current breaks. Sunrise lit the water at 6:38 am and we’ll keep light until about 7:40 pm, plenty of time for a full day’s bite.

Weather’s fair—expect mild late-summer temps, mostly clear skies, and a light morning breeze. That means surface action stays solid till wind picks up late afternoon, especially on the flats.

The past few days have seen fantastic striped bass reports. On August 29th, Lovely Martha ran a half-day out of the City and hit their limits—20 stripers in the box and lots more released, along with three solid halibut to round out the trip. Bass mostly ranged between 22–30 inches, and the crew took most fish on live anchovies drifted near Alcatraz and the South Bay piers. Jerkbaits and paddletail swimbaits in white or chartreuse are still producing well from shore, especially along Crissy Field and the Berkeley Flats. Vince Goes Fishing recently put out a vid on surf casting stripers with jerkbaits—definitely worth a watch for technique.

Halibut action has slowed just a notch from peak summer, but it’s far from dead. Keeper flatties are still coming from the channel edges off Treasure Island and along the Oakland Airport flats. Top producers remain soft plastics bounced slowly near bottom, plus the live bait crowd drifting herring or anchovies with a touch of glow on the rig.

The rockfish and whitefish crowd found easy limits up north—yesterday’s big boats from Bodega and the Marin Coast turned up over 5,000 rockfish and nearly 2,300 whitefish, confirming the late August deep-reef bite is heating up. If you’re itching for variety, drift deeper for black or vermilion rockfish using squid strips or medium-size swim jigs.

Crabbing remains closed in much of the Bay, but late spring pop-up trap tests around San Francisco proved highly successful for Dungeness—if regs loosen up this fall with rope-less gear, expect some fresh local crab on the table.

Best baits right now:
- **Striped Bass:** Live anchovies, drifting or slow-trolled. Jerkbaits in bone, chrome, or chartreuse from shore. Paddle tails on ½-ounce jig heads.
- **Halibut:** Live herring or anchovy, soft plastics (white, motor oil, or sardine colors).
- **Rockfish:** Squid strips or curly tail grubs fished deep.
- **Surf/shore:** Silver spoons, bucktail jigs, and small swimbaits for a mixed bag.

Hot spots to check today:
- **Berkeley Flats:** Still reliable for both stripers and halibut in early light.
- **Alcatraz Rock/Channel:** Strong for stripers on both tides, especially near structure.
- **Crissy Field shore:** Top surf-casting for bass; stick near pilings or outflow channels.

If you’re new to the Bay, make sure to double-check updated 2025 regs—catch limits and gear allowances can change quickly. The season’s winding down for some species, but today’s conditions are ripe for a mixed-bag, especially if you hit the water early and work those tide swings.

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