CENTRAL & NORTHERN CALIFORNIA FISHING MAP
Fishing Hot Spots
From Point Sal and Pismo up past Port San Luis, Morro Bay and Big Sur, around Monterey Bay to Santa Cruz and Half Moon Bay, through the Golden Gate into San Francisco Bay, out to the Farallones and Cordell Bank, and north past Bodega Bay, Point Arena, Fort Bragg and Humboldt Bay to the Klamath and Crescent City at the Oregon line. Tap any star or dot to see what it is and what to fish there.
More map layers
Fishing & access
Marine chart layers
Parks & rules
Safety: these are planning references. Use current official charts, weather and marine alerts and proper safety equipment before heading out.
Lake guides for this map
Month-by-month patterns, fish, ramps and rules for each water:
Fishing Hot Spots by area
Piers, harbors, rocky points, bays and offshore banks. Tap one to fly to it on the map.
Rockfish on the rocks, salmon offshore and stripers in the bay
Central and Northern California is cold, green water. Rockfish, lingcod, cabezon and kelp greenling live on every reef and rocky point from Morro Bay to Crescent City, and that is what most sport boats fish. Surfperch fill the beaches, and the piers give jacksmelt, perch, kingfish and, in season, Dungeness crab.
King salmon run offshore in summer when the season is open, and up the Klamath and other rivers in fall. San Francisco Bay has its own fishery: striped bass and halibut in summer, and white sturgeon in winter in San Pablo Bay. Albacore come within reach in warm-water years.
You need a California sport fishing license, except on public piers. Salmon seasons and rockfish depth limits change every year, and sturgeon need a report card. There are many marine reserves along this coast where you cannot fish at all. Check the California Department of Fish and Wildlife before you go, and watch the bar crossings at Humboldt, Noyo and Crescent City.
BigJoe’s gear for Central & Northern California
What BigJoe would bring to fish these waters.
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Map sources & checks
- Coverage
- Central & Northern California. Mapped features come from public datasets and can be incomplete or out of date: a missing reef, ramp or wreck does not mean it is not there.
- Map data
- OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL) — retrieved October 7, 2026
- World Database on Protected Areas (UNEP-WCMC & IUCN), Protected Planet — retrieved October 7, 2026 (license: Protected Planet terms)
- Hot spots
- 68 hot spots, each with its own source (tap any star to see it): OpenStreetMap mapped feature (43), Marine Regions gazetteer (18), OpenStreetMap marina or harbor (7).
- Protected areas
- 89 protected areas from the official list above, drawn in dashed red. Fishing rules inside them are set by the managing agency; check with them before you fish.
- Chart layers (Charts button)
- GEBCO ocean depth and OpenSeaMap buoys, lights and markers, plus official NOAA nautical charts in U.S. waters. GEBCO and OpenSeaMap are useful references, not official navigation charts.
- Weather & tides
- See Weather & Tides for this area: NOAA/NWS forecasts, NOAA buoys and NOAA Tides & Currents, with Open-Meteo models where NOAA has no station.
- Dates
- This page last updated October 15, 2026. Each dataset keeps its own retrieval date, shown above.
⚠️ Planning reference only, not for navigation. Use current official charts, weather and marine alerts, and proper safety gear before heading out.
See something wrong or missing? Tell us and we will check it against the source.