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

Anglers –
September 5, 2015

The Eastern Pacific has remained calm near the Southern Baja Peninsula, while the recent hurricanes have been forming further to the west and heading in the direction of the Hawaiian Islands. Presently there is Tropical Storm Kevin, it is far off the Baja Coast and appears that this system will stay offshore, before downgrading rapidly to a Depression. With the one year anniversary of the devastating Hurricane Odile nearing, we all anxiously following all weather forecast with close interest.

We are now in the final month of summer, conditions are now very tropical and humid, there has been little rainfall felt along the coastal stretches, though mountainous regions have received more scattered afternoon thundershowers and the desert landscape has turned a brilliant lush green.

Crowds of visitors remain light, families are preparing for new school semesters and Southern Californian anglers are taking advantage of epic pelagic gamefish action in their local waters due to the affects of the el Niño current. Ocean conditions have been great, mostly calm, with breezes picking up later in the day. Light to moderate swells, fluctuating currents and clean blue water now found very close to shore. Water temperature has ranged from 86 degrees on the Pacific to 89 degrees in the direction of the Sea of Cortez.

Schooling sardinas have been remaining in the same place to the north of the marina jetty, caballito have also been another bait option. Offshore fishing grounds are attracting bolito, skipjack, small yellowfin tuna and flying fish.

Red Hill and Palmilla Point was the spot early in the week where charter fleets found good action on the smaller grade of yellowfin tuna, up to 15/20 lb. This bite fading out later in the week. Other tuna action was found on the Gordo Banks and Iman Banks, on these grounds the action varied from day to day for the larger sized yellowfin tuna.

Dorado and wahoo were now in the daily reports, most of the dorado encountered were small to medium sized. The wahoo were the highlight in recent days, often very elusive, these prized gamefish went on a great bite on the known grounds from Cardon, La Fortuna to Iman Banks, most wahoo weighed in the 20 to 40 lb. class. Some charters have had five or more fish in the box, with many other strikes lost. Trolling with Rapalas and skirted lead heads in order to find the fish, then anglers were having many strikes while slow trolling rigged baits, such as caballito, chihuil, ballyhoo or bolito.

These same grounds were producing a mix of bottom species, no significant numbers, though a handful of quality fish were being accounted for, dogtooth to 50 lb., amberjack, yellow snapper, rainbow runners, cabrilla, etc…

The combined panga fleets launching out of La Playita, Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out approximately 45 charters for the week, with anglers reporting a fish count of: 4 striped marlin, 7 sailfish, 12 bonito, 16 rainbow runners, 38 dorado, 49 wahoo, 320 yellowfin tuna, 4 dogtooth snapper, 5 amberjack, 11 cabrilla, 16 yellow snapper and 14 barred pargo.

Good fishing, Eric