GORDO BANKS PANGAS

March 21, 2020

Spring season is always a very pristine time in Los Cabos, offering nearly the perfect climate, sunny days in the low 80 degree range, this also is normally a busy tourist period for the entire region. Though now with this world wide Pandemic Coronavirus, countries are going into lock down in hopes that the rapid spread of this highly contagious virus can be controlled. The entire area and the sportfishing business relies on visiting anglers to provide business and that is all going to be shut down until further notice. So our weekly reports will be canceled as well, unless we have something important to report.

This past week the average ocean temperature was in the 70 to 72 degree range. With moderate north winds blowing on and off, the clarity has been sporadic, changing from day to day. Overall the fishing action was more consistent this week, the highlight being a surprising late winter time bite for wahoo, the key to success was live chihuil for bait, slow trolling these candy baits around the area of the Iman Bank, quality sized wahoo were accounted for, with fish to over 50 lb. Light pressure now, as most all foreign visitors are catching flights out of the country as fast as possible, preoccupied about becoming stranded for indefinite period of time.

The yellowfin tuna action was also fairly consistent, no huge numbers, a mix of sizes, including fish to over 100 lb. were accounted for. Most of these yellowfin were hitting the strips of squid. So despite having no charters to speak of, the local fishermen will being able to go and catch plenty of excellent food.

A mix of bottom action also developing, a few nice sized yellowtail were landed in recent days, also amberjack, leopard grouper, red snapper, bonito and others. Red crabs still in the area, but not found as often drifting to the surface where they can be scooped up. A Scattering of striped marlin were encountered on similar fishing grounds, most of these weighed under 100 lb.

There was not much inshore action even being targeted, though early in the week there were a few medium sized roosterfish landed, also a handful of sierra. Still good number of whales being sighted, this is now into the late part of their migration season, these mammals will be heading north in the coming month.

The combined sportfishing fleet launching out of the panga area from Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out an estimated 55 charters for the week and anglers reported an approximate fish count of: 6 striped marlin, 17 wahoo, 2 dorado, 68 yellowfin tuna, 3 yellowtail, 1 dogtooth snapper, 8 leopard grouper, 26 bonito, 74 red snapper, 8 yellow snapper, 2 sierra, 4 roosterfish and 65 triggerfish.

Good Fishing, Eric

GORDO BANKS PANGAS

March 14, 2020

We are now feeling the effects directly related to worldwide panic due to the coronavirus health situation. Very few tourists are now traveling, many cancellations and not many new reservations being made for the spring season. This will surely all pass, but in the meantime many businesses will be struggling to survive.

Weather patterns have warmed back up, feels like any cold weather we endured, is all past us and we will be on a warming trend from now through summer. Ocean water temperature is still ranging 70 to 72 degree, currents and clarity fluctuating from day to day. Winds were on and off through the week, settling down over the weekend. The most consistent fishing action has come from the area north of Punta Gorda, Cardon, La Fortuna and Iman Bank.

Caballito are now much scarcer inside the marina area where these baitfish have been schooling throughout the winter, no sardinas at all to report, mainly slabs of squid, also some ballyhoo. Anglers were saving black skipjack for use as chunk bait as well.

The highlight for anglers has been trying to land a couple of yellowfin tuna, most of these tuna being hooked on strips of squid, sizes ranged up to 70 lb. Finicky fish, in recent days the lighter 40 lb. leaders worked best. No huge numbers of these tuna, some charters landed three or four yellowfin. There was also some very hungry seas lions taking more than their fair share of hooked up fish.

Very few dorado or wahoo even being reported, extremely fortunate to find even one of these gamefish. A few more striped marlin were moving into local waters, not every day though, some days a flurry of marlin action and others no fish found, mostly smaller sized stripers, not many over 100 lb.

On and off through the week there were red crabs found floating on the surface, especially around the Gordo Banks. Main catch when using these for bait were smaller sized tijareta snapper, also some huachinango found as well. No yellowtail reported, though there was an occasional amberjack hooked into over the high spots. Also a few nice leopard grouper in the mix, found off these same rocky areas, hitting on yo-yo jigs and various baits.

Not a whole lot of inshore trolling going on, lack of live bait the main reason, the roosterfish have wanted the live caballito, which are not very numerous recently.

The combined sportfishing fleet launching out of the panga area from Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out an estimated 62 charters for the week and anglers reported an approximate fish count of: 9 striped marlin, 1 wahoo, 1 dorado, 72 yellowfin tuna, 5 amberjack, 13 leopard grouper, 22 bonito, 150 red snapper, 18 yellow snapper, 8 spotted rose snapper, 4 sierra, 6 roosterfish, 8 Pacific tilefish, 6 porgy, 5 hogfish and 70 triggerfish.

Good Fishing, Eric

March 7, 2020

The first week of the new month saw lighter crowds of tourists arriving, as fears of traveling due to corona virus outbreak has spread alarm. We have not hear of any cases locally but our closer monitoring the situation. Mild weather, more than usual cloud cover, no rain though, variable winds predominately from the north, but also switching unpredictably, settling down later in the week. Water clarity a bit up and down due to conditions, also ocean temperatures cooled into the 68 to 70 degree range.

Bait supplies were working harder to find available caballito, also offering squid and ballyhoo. Charter fleets have concentrated efforts from Palmilla Point to Cardon, La Fortuna and Iman area. Still opportunities now for yellowfin tuna, best chances were near La Fortuna while drift fishing with squid or using live caballito. On last Sunday there was a 114 lb. yellowfin tuna accounted for, as well as other fish over 70 lb., though average yellowfin being landed was more like 20 to 30 lb. On and off bite, depending on water temperature, currents, boat pressure etc… No other areas were producing hot action, so the majority of all the daily charters were congregating on the same grounds, creating a pressure situation. Anglers were doing well to land a couple of these tuna.

Off of the various rocking high spots we were seeing increased numbers of leopard grouper, amberjack and various snapper. Though this action varied with consistency from day to day. Anglers were using yo-yo jigs, as well as available bait. We also saw one golden phase leopard grouper, a rare species. Amberjack averaged 10 to 20 lb. though a couple we saw were over 50 lb. Only very sporadic red crab activity reported, currents need to be just right for these crabs to drift to the surface where they can be scooped up with nets for use as bait. There were more triggerfish than any other bottom species,

Every day we are seeing a few dorado, most of them found mid-morning and near shore, averaging about 10 lb. We also saw at least a few wahoo accounted for the week.

Near shore only limited action for roosterfish while trolling live bait, on most days the roosterfish were more active early in the morning. A few sierra and jack crevalle were mixed in.

The combined sportfishing fleet launching out of the panga area from Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out an estimated 58 charters for the week and anglers reported an approximate fish count of: 2 striped marlin, 3 wahoo, 24 dorado, 44 yellowfin tuna, 12 yellowtail, 16 amberjack, 8 sierra, 1 dog tooth snapper, 14 roosterfish, 10 flag cabrilla, 16 leopard grouper, 1 golden cabrilla, 12 bonito, 38 red snapper, 18 yellow snapper, 2 white skipjack, 8 spotted rose snapper, 4 mohara, 4 porgy, 4 hogfish, 2 pompano, 6 barred pargo and 38 triggerfish.

Good Fishing, Eric