Inshore · 60 ft · beaches, bays, inlets and rips

Leopard Shark

Triakis semifasciata. Prime water reaches San Francisco in California right now (61°F at the surface). Fish it 7–49 ft down — that is where 60–57°F water sits off San Francisco.

Leopard Shark identification illustration
LaneInshore · 10 fa (60 ft)
Depth it holds7–82 ft
Prime water57–72°F (workable 57–77°F)
Holds in the column7–82 ft down below the surface, over 7–82 ft of water
Judged onsurface temperature (NASA MUR satellite)
Structurenone

The water column off San Francisco

0 ft26 ft52 ft43 ft of workable water7–49 ft · 60–57°F

The strip is the water itself, coloured by temperature from the surface down to the 52 ft surveyed bottom at that spot — one band per RTOFS model level. The outlined stretch is where Leopard Shark's temperature band (57–77°F) and the depth it holds actually overlap. That thickness is the number that matters: it is how much water you can work, not just whether the spot is warm enough somewhere. One model cycle, not a weekly archive — this holds still while the surface map scrubs.

How it's fished

Squid or midshipman on the bottom in bays and shallow flats on a moving tide.

Region by region — right now

RegionSeasonPrime waterTempFish it atMonths
California in season reaches San Francisco 61°F 7–49 ft
J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
"Fish it at" is where this species' temperature band and its holding depth overlap in the water column, from the RTOFS profile (13 levels, 0–300 m) — the depth to actually put a bait, not just the place. "Prime water" is the furthest sampled station on the 10-fathom lane whose surface temperature sits inside this species' band. It is water, not a sighting report.
Charted grounds on the 10-fathom lane
The Farallon Islands