GORDO BANKS PANGAS
November 23rd, 2025

We are now winding down the busy fall season. As we head into Thanksgiving week, we are seeing more families get out on the water as they try to add some fresh fish to their dinner menu and get a glimpse of whales and their babies. Typically, after Thanksgiving we see a lull in tourist activity, as people begin planning for the Christmas and New Year’s Holidays. This week, the weather allowed for good fishing conditions, though the wind forecast was unpredictable for most of the week. Ocean swells were minimal, though we did see North winds creeping in later in the mornings. This did not affect our fishing plan much as we were still able to focus on our go-to fishing grounds.

We had a decent yellowfin tuna bite at the Inner Gordo this week. Not all boats were able to capitalize on this bite as the tuna were a bit finicky. Many captains reported having big tuna boil right next to the boat, though would not bite. Some of these captains even tried going down to 30# test and had no bites. Bait preference varied by day; some days it was live sardines, some others dead sardines or squid worked better. Most of the tuna caught at the Inner were nice size in the range of 40 to 90 pounds. We did see more production early in the week as some boats were coming in with 2 to 5 nice sized tuna. We also saw bigger tuna while slow trolling live chiwilis, small skipjacks, and bulitos. The biggest tuna caught this week on a live chiwili by our fleet was 166 pounds. One sailfish and a handful of striped marlin were also caught while slow trolling live chiwilis and skipjacks.

The highlight of the week was tuna action less than 5 miles from our marina. This bite was consistent throughout the week, seeing more action earlier in the mornings. Most boats found these tuna closer to shore (around half a mile, some days 1/4 of a mile). These boats focused in the areas of La Laguna and in front of Puerto Los Cabos homes. We even saw them closer to Secrets and Marriott Hotel some days. These tuna preferred live sardines. Many boats tried dead sardines and squid in this area and would not get a bite. The average size tuna in this area was 15-18 pounds, though we did see many of them in the 35–40-pound range. Within this same area, we also saw good dorado numbers. Similar to Gordo, we saw more production early in the week as many boats were able to get their limit within the first hours of the day. The bite slowed down towards the end of the week, much having to do with not having enough live bait to chum.

The bait guys continue to net sardines towards the Hilton/Cabo Real area. The sardina supply has been inconsistent. Some days, the sardine supply was not enough to supply all boats. We had a very low supply this weekend. Since we are getting live sardines later in the morning (around 7:00-7:30 am), many boats are not waiting for them and going straight to the Gordo with dead sardines and squid, hoping that the chiwili will come up. Chiwilis were tough all week; many boats were not able to find them at all.

The wahoo bite remained spotty for most part of the week. Friday was a good day for wahoo within the fishing grounds of Iman, La Fortuna, and 25. On Tuesday and Wednesday, we saw more wahoo activity in the Punta Gorda and Inner Gordo area. Most of these wahoo were caught on chiwili, some on Rapalas and rigged ballyhoo. The biggest wahoo this week came in at 67 pounds.

Good Fishing, Brian

GORDO BANKS PANGAS
November 16th, 2025

The week started off great with a hot wahoo bite at Iman. On Monday, many of our boats came in with 4-6 wahoo, while still losing many more. Quality size wahoo averaging 25-35 pounds. On this day, wahoo were hitting almost anything, Rapalas, ballyhoo, jigs, and chiwlis (live and dead). The bigger wahoo came on the live chiwilis. However, Tuesday was much different, we had many boats try for wahoo in the same area and we were able to only account for a handful between 15 boats or so. The rest of the week remained very slow for wahoo a complete switch.

Throughout the week, we still had a few of them at the fillet table every day, though they were a challenge. Most of the boats that focused on wahoo reported losing most of the strikes on live bait (chiwilis). Chiwilis were tough to catch for most part of the week. Captains reported seeing the chiwili deeper and for some reason wouldn’t come up as much, only at specific times of the day. We kept hearing from reports that 8:30 to 9:30 was a better time to target chiwilis. The current made it challenging at Iman to try for chiwili. Most of the chiwili were caught at the Gordo. Some boats trolled their chiwilis at Punta Gorda, closer to shore, and were able to get some wahoo and dorado later in the morning.

The highlight of this week was a hot yellowfin tuna bite at the Gordo. We saw good numbers at both the Outer and Inner Gordo, though we saw nicer size tuna at the Inner towards the end of the week.

On Thursday, we finally started to see some live sardines. The bait guys are netting good size sardines towards Hilton Hotel/Cerro Colorado area. We saw a good supply Thursday through this Sunday. We are hoping sardines are available throughout the rest of the month as we have noticed a big difference getting these tuna to come up to feed on the surface. On Thursday, most of the tuna caught were small footballs. We started to see more quality fish on Friday, tuna in the 30–40-pound range. This weekend, most of the tuna caught were nice size averaging 40 to 80 pounds. In the same area, some boats landed a few dorado as they came up to chase the live sardines. 

Some boats tried specifically for bigger tuna trolling live chiwilis or small skipjacks. We had 3 big tuna this week, all on live chiwilis. The biggest ones this week were 211, 188, and 150 pounds. 

Good Fishing, Brian

GORDO BANKS PANGAS
November 9th, 2025

The annual largest tournaments are now over, though the busy fall season continues. For us, this was one of the most productive weeks of the year, so far. Great action and great weather, plus whales are starting to show in our fishing grounds.

We have had a great run on wahoo for the last 2 weeks. We did not see consistent action like this last year. We are hoping that the hot wahoo bite continues throughout the rest of November and December. Most of our captains are trolling X-Raps, DTXs, and rigged ballyhoo first thing in the morning and then transitioning into slow trolling live chiwilis, if we can catch them. Most days, we are seeing plenty of them. We are hand lining these baits and using tuna veins as our chum line. Throughout the week, many boats were coming in with 2-5 wahoo almost every day, while still losing many other strikes. On average, we are landing 30% of strikes. As you know, getting a good hook set on these wahoo is challenging due to their bony and scissor sharp mouths. One of our boats landed 10 wahoo on Wednesday; the captain reported losing at least another 15, all on live chiwlis. The most productive grounds for wahoo were Iman, La Fortuna and 25. Surprisingly, we did see more dorado this week, most of them in the 15–25-pound range. These dorado were caught on chiwili while looking for wahoo, a couple of them on ballyhoo.

While slow trolling chiwili for wahoo, a handful of 40-50 pound tuna were also caught in the same area, though there was not much tuna action to report at Iman. Earlier in the week, we did see the small football tunas come up, though the live sardine supply was limited. Around mid-week, we did not have any live sardines available; we mostly used squid and dead sardines. Even though Iman’s tuna bite was hit or miss, we did get a few nice tuna while drifting dead sardines and squid. The better tuna bite came from Inner and Outer Gordo. 

The Tuna Jackpot tournament on Thursday and Friday definitely added extra pressure as many boats concentrated in the areas of both Gordos. Many of our captains participated in this tournament. Congratulations to team North Star with Captain Romelio (our local bait guy) for winning first place with a 253-pound yellowfin. Captain Chuy and Jerry had the third heaviest tuna at 190 pounds, though they were knocked out of the big prices as the winning teams were in all jackpots. These big tuna came from both Gordos. Most teams reported landing a handful of tuna, though most of them were under the 120-pound mark. Same situation with targeting wahoo; most teams were able to land them each day of the tournament, though they were in the 30–40-pound range.

Good Fishing, Brian