About & methodology

Pier Scout is a personal, one-person project — not a company or a licensed guiding service. It's built by someone who fishes piers and jetties for fun and genuinely likes teaching other people how to do it. The actual problem it's trying to solve: a lot of pier-fishing information assumes you already know what a tide is, why it matters, or where snags happen — and that's exactly where beginners give up. Every pier and jetty page has a Simple / Technical toggle for that reason — Simple mode explains tides, snag risk, and conditions in plain language; Technical mode shows the same real data without the explainer text.

The one non-negotiable rule behind every page: real, verifiable data only — never fabricated or simulated. Every coordinate, regulation, species claim, or structural detail needs a real, citable source. When something can't be confirmed confidently, the page says so honestly (a low-confidence note, or an explicit “not yet assessed”) instead of presenting a guess as settled fact.

Concretely, each entry draws on:

• Coordinates — OpenStreetMap and Overpass API way/polygon geometry, cross-checked against Wikipedia infobox data and satellite imagery.
• Vegetation & kelp — Kelpwatch.org (Landsat/Planet kelp canopy data back to 1984), CDFW Aerial Kelp Surveys, and Esri World Imagery Wayback compared across multiple independently-dated captures — a real feature holds up across dates; a shadow doesn't.
• Jetty rock & depth structure — NOAA Digital Coast, NOAA ENC Direct to GIS sounding/depth data, and the USGS topobathymetric model for Southern California.
• Tides — NOAA CO-OPS station data, using the genuinely nearest real prediction station, not just the first one found.
• Species & regulations — current CDFW ocean sport fishing regulations (14 CCR Title 14 / California Fish & Game Code) for season, bag, and size limits, cross-checked against real fishing reports for what's actually caught at a given spot.
• Consumption advisories — OEHHA's regional fish consumption advisories, checked per location rather than assumed from a neighboring pier.
• Fish photos — real CC-licensed photographs from Wikimedia Commons or iNaturalist, with the photographer credited; a species with no verifiable photo simply shows none rather than a stock or guessed image.

Every location page ends with a Reference sources list of the actual URLs used, and species regulation pages link each size/bag rule directly to its official CCR/FGC citation. Regulations change — always confirm current limits against CDFW before keeping fish.

Pier Scout's vegetation, rock/depth, and tide data are real research aids for choosing where to cast — not official navigational or safety information. Conditions on a real pier or jetty (wave run-up, submerged rocks, slick footing, a tide turning faster than expected) can differ from what's shown here and change faster than any page can track. Use your own judgment on the water, and for anything safety-critical, check official sources — NOAA marine forecasts, the U.S. Coast Guard, or local lifeguard/harbor authority postings — not this site.

Everything here — regulations, structural notes, species data — is provided as-is, for informational purposes, with no warranty of accuracy or completeness. Fish & Game regulations and closures can change on short notice; always confirm current size, bag, and season limits directly with CDFW before keeping anything. Pier Scout and its creator aren't liable for a citation, injury, or loss that comes from relying on information here instead of verifying it yourself.

The artwork, branding, and original writing on this site are the creator's own work and protected under copyright; the real data cited throughout (tide/weather/regulatory sources, fish photos, and so on) belongs to and is credited to its original real source on each page.

Regulations, closures, and even coastline conditions change — nothing here is claimed to be permanently correct. If a fact reads as outdated or you can point to a better source, real corrections are genuinely welcome:

ContactPier Pal — contactpierscout@gmail.com

“Pier Pal” is this project's contact name, not a separate company or team — it's the same one person building Pier Scout.