November 8, 2020

This time frame would normally be one of the busiest periods for the Los Cabos area, though with all that has happened this year with the world wide Covid 19 epidemic we are seeing much lighter crowds. Though this past week the area was bustling with the season’s final big tournament, the WON Tuna Jackpot, which ended up attracting 149 teams and had accumulated total payouts of over one million dollars. Largest yellowfin tuna was 210 lb., local La Playita team fishing aboard the sportfisher “Burro” made the big money on the first day with their 175 lb. tuna, congratulations to them.

Weather patterns remain warmer than usual, but slowly we are feeling fall conditions settle in. Ocean water temperature now averaging about 82 degrees. The overall fishing action has not been up to normal standards now for about the past month, we do anticipate that we will have a good late season as conditions shape up. Most common catches have been dorado, though most are under 10 pounds, hard to find any over 20 lb. Sardinas, ballyhoo and some caballito have been main bait source, as well as some slabs of squid.

Local fleets have been finding better chances for the yellowfin tuna on the grounds from the Iman Bank to Vinorama, often seeing fish come up and then just as quickly vanishing, finding it tough to entice any strikes. We have seen a handful of quality grade 40 to 70 lb. yellowfin accounted for, also there have been some schools of football sized tuna showing as well, more of these found from Palmilla to Santa Maria.

Dorado were found in all directions, though more numerous on the Pacific, but again most are smaller in size, striking on lures and rigged baits, such as ballyhoo. Wahoo were spread out as well, really no particular hot spot and hard to find one over 30 lb., as in the recent tournament there were only three over 30 lb. weighed in.

Not much going on with billfish now, we saw more sailfish on local grounds than anything else. A mix of bottom species, with the highlight being a few dogtooth snapper to 40 lb. Again more triggerfish than anything else.

Good fishing, Eric

GORDO BANKS PANGAS

November 1, 2020

The month of October seemed to be warmer than usual, but just this week we started to feel more of a climate change. The week started with increasingly strong north winds, actually where the local Port was closed down for Tuesday as a precaution, seemed a bit over cautious, as conditions were not considered dangerous and there were inshore areas which could have easily been fished, by the weekend winds settled, water conditions which had become stirred up towards the north quickly rebounded, as clarity was again clean and blue near shore. Ocean temperatures cooled slightly, presently in the 82 to 84 degree range. Sardinas continued to be the main bait source, found schooling near shore, from San Jose del Cabo marina area to Chileno. Slabs of squid and ballyhoo were other options. Crowds of tourists were noticeably much lighter than we would typically see during this time frame, looks like this will be the same scenario for the rest of 2020.

Most local charters have been working the grounds from Santa Maria. Palmilla, Gordo Banks and north to Vinorama. Like last week, the overall bite was more scattered and really there was no particular consistent spot. Anglers found limited numbers of yellowfin tuna, the largest we saw were in the 50 to 70 lb. class and then there was the smaller 10 to 20 lb. grade mixed in. The locals had a few days earlier in the week where during the late afternoon they had a good tuna bite off of Palmilla, for a nice grade of 40 to 50 lb. fish, this action faded out later in the week. Did not hear of any more big tuna taken off of the Gordo Banks, this coming week is the final big tournament of the season, the WON Tuna Jackpot, believe there will be around 130 teams, with teams heading in all directions, surely we will see some nice sized yellowfin hauled in.

One of the more common gamefish we saw this week were dorado, though the majority were smaller sized fish, not many over ten pounds, anglers should remember to practice catch and release for these smaller sized dorado, especially since this is the one species where you can tell from a distance which fish are males or females, does not make sense to kill small size females which are filled with eggs, as these fish are one of the faster growing species, please give them a chance to mature.

Only a handful of wahoo were landed this week, we expect with the conditions shaping up that these fish should become much more active in the coming weeks. Off the bottom, the highlight were a few dogtooth snapper up to 40 lb., more triggerfish or small pargo compared to anything else, an occasional cabrilla, bonito, island jack or rainbow runner.

Along the shore we saw jack crevalle, roosterfish, sierra and more triggerfish. We expect to have more sierras move in as water temperature cools off as winter sets in.

Good fishing, Eric

October 25, 2020

With the resurgence of corona virus cases in areas throughout the U.S. and with the upcoming election we are seeing fluctuating numbers of visitors, less than half the amount than we would expect for this time frame. Though locally the tourist industry is following strict health protocols and the situation seems under control, people are just nervous about dealing with airport travel and worried about the whole deal. The richest marlin tournament in the world was held this week, with some 129 teams battling for a record sum of 4.6 million dollars. The event ran for three days and there ended up not being any qualifying fish over 300 lb. landed, so there were no huge pay outs this year, though there were several stories of huge fish being lost, which if landed would have been worth millions. We will hope for better results next year.

With ocean temperatures in the upper 80s conditions seemed unusually wam, though presently we are feeling a cooling trend and the coming week is forecast to bring more north wind and cooler temperatures, so we should also see water cool off and are hoping the all-around action improves. Anglers were using sardinas, slabs of squid mainly for bait, with some larger baitfish found on the fishing grounds as well. Schooling sardinas were now more abundant along beach stretches near Chileno.

The highlight this week was a 311 lb. yellowfin tuna that was weighed in on Saturday, taken by a group of anglers on the local sportfisher “Bacco” out of Puerto Los Cabos after a 3 1/2 hour battle on the Gordo Banks. The overall tuna bite was very slow this week, another 110 lb. tuna was brought in from a super panga mid-week and a scattering of a few other yellowfin in the 30 to 70 lb. class, but limited numbers. Most of these fish were taken near the San Luis Bank. One factor on the slower action seems to be the added pressure of all of the Ease Cape charters also traveling long distances to congregate and fish on our local grounds.

Wahoo were becoming more active, still spotty, but a couple of charters ended up with between 3 and 5 wahoo per morning. Most of this action near Iman Bank and further north while trolling Rapalas, sizes ranged to over 40 lb. We expect this wahoo bite to improve in coming weeks as water cools some. Dorado action was sporadic as well, some days we were seeing decent numbers of fish up to 15 lb., while other days we would only see a fish or two.

Not much reported off the bottom, a handful of various pargo species, bonito and even some out of season roosterfish caught near shallow rock outcroppings, a couple of these over 40 lb.

A few sierra were starting to show up as well, as their season will just be getting underway.

Good fishing, Eric