GORDO BANKS PANGAS
August 24th, 2025
We had a great week full of action and crazy stories at the famous Gordo Banks (Inner and Outer).
Captain Nico landed a 619-pound Black Marlin on Friday on his 26ft super panga. This fish was hooked on a live yellowfin at the Outer Gordo at around 7:30 am. Sadly, after a 3-hour fight, the marlin died. The crew took around an hour to bring it up to the boat.
Captain Chame landed a 621-pound Black Marlin on Saturday on his 26ft super panga as well. This fish was hooked on a live bulito at the Outer Gordo at around 8:00 am. Reports from other captains claim that when Chame hooked his fish, 3 other marlin (2 blues and 1 other black) were hooked at around the same time. Chame and his friends fought this marlin for 5 hours, landing it at around 1:00 pm.
This was a great week for big marlin at our local marina. 4 Black Marlin over 550 were landed, many more were lost. Reports also claim 8-9 blue marlin in the range of 150-300 pounds. All Black Marlin were hooked while trolling big live baits (tuna, skipjack, bulito) at the Outer Gordo. A handful of blue marlin were also hooked on these live baits. The majority of blue marlin hookups came on lures surrounding the areas of both Gordos. We also saw a handful of big striped marlin in the same area (140- 190 pounds).
It is important to reiterate that we always encourage catch and release of all bill fish. Many times, these massive fish die during the fight or very long fights lead to extreme exhaustion, making a clean release challenging. These massive fish on such small boats with no fighting chairs can add a lot of time to these fights, making it more stressful for the fish. Nonetheless, we are happy to say that these 2 fish will feed many families (close to 100).
On Saturday, Captain Papayo landed a 276-pound yellowfin tuna at the Inner Gordo. This was the only big tuna reported all week. A couple of boats reported big boils on their baits, most likely big tuna as well.
If there is no interest in looking for a big marlin or tuna, there is also plenty of action at the inner Gordo on small yellowfin. Most of these tuna are very small, 3-5 pounds; you might see a few closer to 10 pounds. Many skipjack in the mix as well. We have also seen a handful of dorado in the same area on live sardines. Bait guys continue to net plenty of sardines every day.
Action towards Iman was slow throughout most of the week with some boats landing a few tuna and dorado. On Saturday, one of our pangas landed 10 decent size yellowfin on live sardines. They ran out of bait quickly as the action was hot and not many boats were out there to help chum the waters. A few of these tuna were close to the 30-pound mark. 3 wahoo came to the fillet table this week, most of them small, 12-18 pounds. The wahoo came on lures in the areas of 25 and Iman. 1 red snapper was caught on a jig while drifting sardines for tuna at Iman.
Good Fishing, Brian
