October 22, 2011

Busy times now in the Los Cabos area, large crowds of anglers continue to arrive, visitors are being greeting with ideal weather patterns, no storms on the horizon, clear sunny skies and diminishing winds. This is tournament time as you all know, the Bisbee Black and Blue just finishing now and the WON Tuna Jackpot just around the corner. Water temperatures now in the 84 to 86 degrees, a bit warmer than normal, should drop closer to 80 degrees soon, as days are progressively shorter and cooling.

Sportfishing fleets are traveling in all directions to search for the best possible action, with the most consistent areas now in the direction of the 95 spot, Gordo Banks and north to Iman Bank. For whatever might be the reason, anglers have had to search and work harder than would be expected to find cooperative fish. Supplies of sardinas are holding up well, these baitfish were found schooling along the rocky beach stretches from Puerto Los Cabos, Palmilla to Santa Maria.

Local panga fleets concentrated on three main areas, to the south near Cabo San Lucas is where they found the most consistent dorado action, trolling lures anglers encountered schools of these mostly 5 to 15 lb. dorado and most boats were limiting and releasing many other fish as well.

Other spot was the Gordo Banks, this is where the larger sized yellowfin were hanging out, these fish ranging mostly from 60 to 150 pounds, with chances of cow sized tuna as well. Finicky, showing on the surface, feeding on chum, but not all that eager to bit the baits with hooks, lighter leaders proved more successful at times, also reports of a limited number of private afternoon charter doing well. Just seeing these large sized tuna feeding and breezing on the surface was quite impressive, being extra patient at this spot was the key. These tuna were hooked on sardinas, skipjack, chihuil and chunk bait. Anglers were fortunate to land one or two of these fish. Other area where tuna were found was in between the La Fortuna and Iman Banks, most of these fish were in the 20 to 40 pound class, same deal with them being very finicky, coming up readily and feeding on the chummed sardinas, but not easy to entice into biting the hooked bait. Anglers catching one, two or three of these yellowfin were doing well. A mix of bottom species and a few dorado were found on these same fishing grounds, but they were limited in numbers.

Biilfish action was very spread out, a few more sailfish being encountered, they are one species that do prefer the warmer currents. Striped, blue and black marlin were also in the area, but no specific spot was producing any quantities of these billfish at this time.

We are nearing the time when wahoo typical become more active, but with the warmer than usual water temps these fish are sluggish and not yet providing more than a few scattered strikes here and there. A few wahoo were hooked into near the Gordo Banks while fishing for tuna and other wahoo were hooked while trolling rapalas or skirted lures, of these wahoo that were landed, most weighed in the 30 to 40 pound class. We do expect the wahoo fishing to become more consistent in the coming weeks as the water temperatures continue on a cooling trend.

The combined panga fleets launching out of La Playita/Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out approximately 144 charters, with anglers accounting for a fish count of: 1 blue marlin, 3 striped marlin, 15 sailfish, 565 dorado, 134 yellowfin tuna, 16 bonito, 14 cabrilla, 11 dogtooth snapper, 46 yellow snapper, 12 barred pargo, 7 wahoo, 7 yellowtail and 12 amberjack.

Good Fishing, Eric

October 15, 2011

The two recent tropical storms, Irwin and Jova, both stayed far enough to the south that no significant effects were felt. Outer cloud bands from these systems barely reached the Los Cabos area, no rain fall, high humidity, stirred up ocean conditions and some south wind created more challenging conditions for offshore anglers. Usually by the second week of October storms from the south relinquish, fall patterns dominate and weather is ideal. Water temperatures are now averaging 85 to 88 degrees, surely these warmer than usual currents will be declining in the coming weeks, as days are progressively shorter and cooler.

Sizable crowds of anglers are arriving, just as they always do during the popular fall months. This coming week the grand daddy of all marlin tournaments will be held, the Bisbee’s Black and Blue, there are a couple of tune up tournaments being held in the days prior to the black and blue. There have been several large marlin recorded in the past ten days alone, with black and blue marlin in the 300 to 460 pound range being accounted for out of La Playita, Puerto Los Cabos.

Fishing overall was slower than what is expected and normal for this time of year, even though conditions seem to be favorable, finding consistent action has been a challenge. Dorado action was reportedly very good for fish in the 15 pound range on the Pacific side of Cabo San Lucas and close to shore, while in the direction of San Jose del Cabo and further north, dorado have been few and far between, with more marlin hook ups reported than dorado. On the local fishing grounds there are now possibilities at sailfish, striped, blue and black marlin, though not particularly numerous, they are present and there are not many places that can offer this same chance at an offshore grand slam.

Yellowfin were found throughout the region, at times traveling with porpoise offshore and they were also schooling on the Iman and Gordo Banks. The schools encountered near Iman and La Fortuna were yellowfin in the size range from 20 to 50 pounds, very skittish and line shy, coming up and feeding on chummed sardinas, but only striking occasionally on the lightest of leaders and small hooks, this resulted in higher percentages of break offs. Supplies of sardinas remained steady, but were found near Palmilla and this meant some delay for boats departing from La Playita, we are expected new sources to the north to open up soon.

The larger grade of tuna that has been schooling on the Gordo Banks are still congregated on this high spot, but these fish are elusive, though most everyday a handful of tuna are being hooked into. Sizes on this spot have started at about 80 pounds and several yellowfin tuna over one hundred pounds were weighed in recently at La Playita, one tuna came in at 180 lb. and the largest weighed in for the week was a 270 lb cow taken on Thursday, after a 5 hour battle this fish was brought to gaff on a private boat out of Puerto Los Cabos.

So with the WON Tuna Jackpot just a few weeks away, we are anticipating an action packed event, competition will be heavy, most likely needing a fish of over 200 pounds to have any chance at winning.

Bottom action was not consistent, but on days when currents slacked and anglers were able to work the structure, there was mixed success found for amberjack, dogtooth snapper, pargo and cabrilla. Did not hear of any of the large home guard yellowtail being landed off of the Outer Gordo Bank.

The combined panga fleets launching out of La Playita/Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out approximately 136 charters, with anglers accounting for a fish count of: 1 blue marlin, 4 striped marlin, 2 black marlin, 9 sailfish, 66 dorado, 70 yellowfin tuna, 14 bonito, 15 cabrilla, 3 grouper, 8 dogtooth snapper, 16 yellow snapper, 10 barred pargo, 4 pompano, 16 roosterfish, 240 black skipjack, 5 yellowtail and 9 amberjack.

Good Fishing, Eric

October 8, 2011

The Fall season is now in full swing for Southern Baja, crowds of anglers are now arriving to enjoy this favorable time. Weather has been tropical, warm and very humid, scattered cloud cover, light to moderate winds, with cooler temperatures in the early morning. Presently there are two storm systems gaining strength off of Mexico, Hurricane Irwin and Tropical Storm Jova, both appear to be a bit undecided on what path they will follow, but they do appear to be turning around from there westerly path and back towards the mainland, these systems will be to be monitored closely, either way the seas are likely to be up some over the weekend and most certainly the humidity. This is now the tail end of tropical storm season, there has been a recent trend of late season storms, with ocean water temperatures still ranging from 86 to 90 degrees, weather patterns can be more unpredictable.

Supplies of sardina baitfish have been limited to schools found off the beach stretches from Palmilla to Santa Maria. This past week there were longer delays for anglers looking for this bait source, these fish also migrate and at this time are not very abundant, surely new sources towards the north will be scouted out soon. Some pangeros are jigging up Pacific moonfish with sabiki rigs in the marina channel are using these as another bait option for bottom species. Skipjack, bonito, bolito, cocinero, chihuil and other larger sized baitfish are being found on the fishing grounds.

Despite more favorable ocean conditions, anglers found the all around action to be slower and not up to local standards. Numbers ot fish caught per charter were limited at times to one, two or three fish, though there were also some very impressive catches made in recent days, this should raise anticipation as we near tournament time. Yellowfin tuna of over 200 lbs. were landed from the Gordo Banks, as well as blue and black marlin weighing in at more than 400 lbs. Consensus among locals is that as water temps drop towards 80 degrees we will see improved fish counts.

Dorado were spread throughout the region, found in small to larger sized schools, though most all of these fish have been smaller sized, only a small percentage of them over 15 pounds. A few wahoo were encountered in the warmer currents, we expect towards the end of the month these elusive speedsters will become more active, there were reports of wahoo up to 50 pound landed, off of the Pacific and north of Punta Gorda.

Off of the Gordo Banks there was no consistent bite this past week for the larger grade of yellowfin tuna, though a handful were landed this week, there were other extended hook ups lost. On Thursday there was a 235 pound yellowfin tuna weighed in that was landed from a La Playita panga. These tuna are now here in the area and surely with the warmer than normal conditions, they will be taking up residence for the season. Schooling yellowfin tuna were on the grounds of La Fortuna and Iman Bank, these tuna could be seen breezing and putting on a surface show, but also proved to be extremely line shy and not much interested in anglers presented offerings. Though there were some hook ups, with sardinas being the most productive bait for these fish that were weighed an average of 20 to 40 pounds. There was also a continued problem with too many aggressive black skipjack on these same areas. At times the tuna decided to come up later in the day when the tide was more favorable and less boat pressure.

The same areas of Iman and the Gordo Banks produced a variety of species, tuna, billfish and dorado on the surface, with a mix of bottom dwellers, dogtooth snapper, amberjack, yellowtail and grouper, most of these fish were striking on larger baitfish or cut baits, with some specimens weighed up to fifty pounds. There was a surprisingly good bite for yellowtail of 30 to 40 pounds on the Outer Gordo, but only a few anglers capitalized on these fish, which normally prefer cooler currents. This type of bottom fishing takes more experience than many anglers realize, even for the most skillful local skippers, it proves a real challenge to be able to hook these powerful fish and turn them away from the rock piles before they are able to cut off even your heavier eighty pound tackle.

The combined panga fleets launching out of La Playita/Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out approximately 156 charters, with anglers accounting for a fish count of: 2 black marlin, 9 striped marlin,2 blue marlin, 6 sailfish, 4 wahoo, 315 dorado, 202 yellowfin tuna, 18 bonito, 18 yellowtail, 24 cabrilla, 9 grouper, 13 dogtooth snapper, 14 roosterfish, 8 sierra and 25 amberjack..

Good Fishing, Eric