About Seal Rock

Seal Rock is an outer-exposed rocky drop-off off Monterey, California, where the bottom falls from the shallows down to about 55 feet. The structure holds a strong rockfish and groundfish population alongside seasonal salmon, making it a productive year-round target. Chinook Salmon move through from March to July and respond to trolling with anchovies, spoons, hoochies, and flashers, or to mooching with anchovies and sardines. Lingcod peak across late fall through spring and take metal jigs, swimbaits, and leadhead jigs worked along the rock, while Black and Blue Rockfish stack up from spring into fall on jigs and bait fished with shrimp flies, squid strips, and anchovies. Copper Rockfish fill in through the summer months and hold near the same rocky structure, taking squid, shrimp flies, and sardines on the bottom.