Anglers –
September 26, 2015

The closer we reach to the month of October we expect the tropical storm season will be over with, though with ocean water temperatures still holding in the 84 to 88 degree range, we must still monitor all Eastern Pacific forecasts with caution. At this time there is a pair of low pressure areas far to the south, off of the Mexican mainland, will be interesting to see what develops of these systems. Presently, local conditions are calm as can be, in the early morning there is that hint of Fall Season in the air, though mid-day heat and humid index is still reaching over 100 degrees. Last week we had some heavy rainfall, scattered throughout the region, not much wind associated with the passing of this storm front, though rainfall of up to four inches were recorded. The desert landscape will definitely be turning a fresh shade of green in the coming weeks.

These latest rain squalls, with strong currents pushing in, contributed to off colored water closer to shore, this seemed to have slowed down action for species such as dorado and wahoo, though a handful of these fish are being accounted for almost on a daily basis. Some wahoo up to 40 pounds were accounted for, a handful of anglers were fortunate to land one of these elusive speedsters. Most of the dorado being found now are small juvenile sized fish. Supplies of sardinas were now more scattered, off of La Playita area, only the smaller clear type sardinas were available, these baits do work as dead bait for tuna, but are not the same as the normal sardinas we find, this preferred species has moved south out of our range at this time. Other options for bait has been to search local super markets for giant squid slabs, which is never a guarantee. Caballito also have been available, as well as chihuil or skipjack on some of the fishing grounds.

The inshore grounds off of Fiesta Americana Resort near Cabo San Lucas continues to produce good numbers of yellowfin tuna up to 20 pounds, also with an occasional dorado or wahoo from this same area. Iman Bank has been another productive region, with a bit more of an opportunity of finding some bottom structure species, as well as tuna, dorado or wahoo. The best place to have a chance at hooking into the larger grade of yellowfin tuna has been off of the Gordo Banks, though we have not heard of any monsters this past week, many tuna in the 50 to 70 lb. class and a few up to 150 pounds were reported. Some days single boats had as many as four or five nice tuna, other days were tougher and landing one tuna was considered good. These yellowfin are definitely holding on these Banks, though are fighting strong currents and at times seem to be filled up on the natural food source that is present.

Billfish action was somewhat scattered as well, though on any given day you could hook into a striped, blue or black marlin, also chance at sailfish, just no big numbers of any of these species at this time. The black and blues have been lurking around the high spots where the food chain is concentrated.

Reconstruction crews are pressing now to finish up the work on Hotel El Ganzo, which was devastated by last year’s Hurricane Odile. La Playita Panga area work is progressing as well, still has a ways to go to have all of the necessary conveniences.

The combined panga fleets launching out of La Playita, Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out approximately 85 charters for the week, with anglers reporting a fish count of: 7 sailfish, 1 striped marlin, 480 yellowfin tuna, 35 dorado, 8 wahoo, 15 white skipjack, 22 bonito, 14 rainbow runner, 4 dogtooth snapper, 18 yellow snapper, 2 amberjack, 10 cabrilla and 15 barred pargo.

Good fishing, Eric

Anglers –
September 19, 2015

Everything is still calm on the weather front of the North Eastern Pacific. Last Sunday we did cancel out fishing charters due to heavy tropical thunderstorm activity early in the day, since then, the rest of the week has been dry and anglers enjoyed great ocean conditions. Water temperature are now ranging from 85 to 87 degrees, clarity is clean and blue in most areas, still a bit off colored inshore north of Punta Gorda.

Supplies of sardinas remained plentiful near the marina entrance and are now being found along beach stretches close to Cabo San Lucas, where they had not had these schooling baitfish available until recently. Most consistent action now has been for various sized yellowfin tuna, action was centered from Santa Maria to the Iman Bank and most of the yellowfin being accounted for are fish in the 10 to 20 lb. class, though other areas produced decent numbers of tuna 50 to 70 lb., with several fish up to 150 lb. landed. On the Gordo Banks a variety of sizes of yellowfin tuna were seen breezing on the surface, some of these were cow sized fish, though these fish proved finicky, with all of the natural food source and strong currents sweeping through, the fish are not always in the feeding mood. Best action for numbers of fish recently has been either near shipwreck of the Santa Maria area or around the Iman Bank, though the Gordo Banks also produced some quality action mid-week, before slower days later in the week.

Dorado and Wahoo action slowed back down, though there were some of these fish being found, just not a consistent bite. Strong current also limited bottom action to sporadic numbers dogtooth snapper, various pargo and snapper species. The warm water continues to attract rainbow runners into the fish counts.

Several black marlin were also landed this week, largest weighed in was a 335 lb. specimen, all of these were hooked into near the Gordo Banks, while trolling with chihuil, caballito or skipjack. This is the time when billfish grand slams are possible, as striped, blue marlin and sailfish are also now being found on local fishing grounds.

Not much inshore action this time of year, though local beach and dock anglers have hooked into a few snook recently, though these fish have proved very elusive this season, a handful of nice corbina to 10 lb. were also taken from the shore, as well as quite a few sierra off the San Jose Estuary, a bit early in the season for these fish, which do normally prefer cooler water.

The combined panga fleets launching out of La Playita, Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out approximately 61 charters for the week, with anglers reporting a fish count of: 4 black marlin, 8 sailfish, 2 striped marlin, 15 dorado, 5 wahoo, 280 yellowfin tuna, 18 white skipjack, 8 bonito, 11 rainbow runner, 6 dogtooth snapper, 8 yellow snapper, 5 cabrilla and 13 barred pargo.

Good fishing, Eric

Anglers –
September 13, 2015

This week started off with the passing of Hurricane Linda within several hundred miles from the Los Cabos area, this system gained category three status as it followed a path parallel with the Peninsula, before turning further west and then weakening. The main impact felt in our region was first off the closure of all port activities for both Tuesday and Wednesday, as ocean swells became stormy and dangerous, with seas reaching 15 ft., winds were never too strong, some gusts up to 40 mph. There was some much needed rainfall recorded, scattered, hard squalls at times in isolated areas, on and off, as the outer bands of Hurricane Linda were holding quite a bit of moisture, some areas reported up to 3 inches of rain. Local Ports reopened on Thursday morning and each day since has become calmer, though there has been a strong current running, which contributed to greener water conditions. With weather now settled down, we expect conditions to rebound quickly. Of course we are now in the midst of the stretch in peak tropical storm season where things can change rapidly over night, at this time no new named storms are to the south, there is one area of low pressure that we will be monitoring closely for further development. With local water temperatures now averaging from 84 to 88 degrees, conditions are still ripe for rapid storm formation if environmental conditions dictate.

This is always the most tropical and humid time frame of the season, though with a couple days of cloud cover and some rainfall, this was a welcome relief from so much direct sun which had been prevailing, we can actually start to feel the first signs of Fall Season in the air. The busy season will be starting within a matter of weeks, time to prepare for the crowds of anglers that are scheduled to arrive.

Charter fleets recently have been concentrating on the grounds from Santa Maria, Red Hill, Gordo Banks, La Fortuna and Iman Bank. Although inshore baitfish are now not as abundant as pre-storm, commercial pangeros were able to net sardinas around the marina jetty area and just offshore they were jigging up caballito as another bait source option. On the fishing grounds themselves there were bolito, skipjack and chihuil schooling, these were being used for whole and cut baits. Yet another option was to purchase slabs of giant squid for use as additional chum and chunk, always a good deal when specifically targeting the giamt yellowfin tuna. Red Hill had been a hot spot for the schooling tuna, lots of fish up to 20 pounds, though this action then shifted south towards Santa Maria. Before the storm the water had been clean and the wahoo action was good, especially to the north of Punta Gorda, many wahoo to 30 pounds were landed as anglers trolled lures and baitfish. Now we wait for clean water to return and we do ecpect that action will pick back up.

The larger grade of yellowfin tuna are still holding around the Gordo Banks, first day out after the storm there was a 145 lb. and 294 lb. tuna brought in to La Playita, Puerto Los Cabos. Also a blue marlin was landed from a 23 ft. panga based out of Puerto Los Cabos Marina that was estimated to weigh over 700 lb., it was taken on a large live bait on the Iman Bank. There was also a 300 lb. class black marlin landed, as well as a number of sailfish and striped marlin, so definitely some variety available.

Strong currents made it tough to fish the bottom structure, though a handful of snapper, pargo species were landed, both on baits and yo-yo jigs, as currents slack these fish should become more active. Dorado were once again few and far between, after a flurry of action the past couple of weeks, as water cleans back up, we should see more of these dorado in the fish counts.

The combined panga fleets launching out of La Playita, Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out approximately 62 charters for the week, with anglers reporting a fish count of: 1 black marlin, 2 blue marlin, 9 sailfish, 4 striped marlin, 22 wahoo, 17 dorado, 310 yellowfin tuna, 25 white skipjack, 10 bonito, 18 rainbow runner, 5 dogtooth snapper, 10 yellow snapper, 7 cabrilla and 8 barred pargo.

Good fishing, Eric