October 21, 2012
Anglers –

Crowds of visiting anglers are increasing daily, all are arriving anticipating the exciting tournament season in Los Cabos. We were fooled over last weekend by a storm system which developed into Hurricane Paul. This late season front appeared to be harmlessly headed off to the west, but turned back towards land and caused havoc throughout the Baja Peninsula. Southern Baja received substantial rainfall on Monday and especially on Tuesday morning, along with wind gusts to 40 mph, Los Cabos was fortunate, as this was from the backside of Paul, other areas to north suffered much more damage. Ports were closed for Monday and Tuesday, with operations resuming on Wednesday morning. Once again road crews are working overtime to clean up the mess from flooding.

Swells peaked at about 4 meters on Tuesday morning, but with each passing day ocean conditions are settling and clarity is improving, water had become very murky from the desert run off. Blue water is being reported again and we expect action to improve as conditions rebound. Ocean water temperatures are now averaging 85 to 87 degrees. Baitfish have become more scattered after the recent storm passed through. Sardinas were now being found most commonly off of the beaches from Palmilla to Santa Maria.

Before the storm there had been a great bite for yellowfin tuna off of the Cabeza Ballena and Santa Maria area. The tuna were mostly in the 10 to 15 pound range, with lots of skipjack mixed in and a few dorado. These fish would hit on trolled rapala or hoochies, but the live sardinas were the best bet for really getting into the fast action. The fishing grounds north of Punta Gorda were starting to feel some affect from north winds, pushing baitfish down and stirring up the water, with the live sardinas being in the other direction, this is when the bite off of Santa Maria came to life last week, very fun action on light tackle for the football model yellowfin tuna, though the skipjack proved to be even too numerous to deal with at times.

On Wednesday, the first day fleets resumed charter operations, even though live sardinas were scarce, there were good numbers of yellowfin caught off of Santa Maria, the bite had picked right off from how it had been pre-storm. However the next day, Thursday, the skipjack completely dominated the action and most people never even saw a tuna, besides scores of the feisty skipjack there was an average of one dorado per boat was accounted for. We do expect to see the larger tuna to become active once again on the Gordo Banks.

With offshore conditions once again quickly improving, we are anticipating some great action to develop just in time for the crowds of anxious anglers to take advantage of. Next week is the Bisbee Black and Blue event, the granddaddy of all billfish tournaments in the world, will be interesting to follow all of the story lines that develop from this year’s jackpot.

This was a rain shortened week, then we were dealing with murky water conditions that slowed down the action, we are now just waiting for things to get back on track and hoping that we have no more rainfall for a while. Weather is great now, cooler mornings, with warm sunny days and no new storm on the horizon.

The combined panga fleets out of La Playita, Puerto Los Cabos Marina, sent out approximately 108 charters for the week, with anglers accounting for a fish count of:
2 sailfish, 3 striped marlin, 4 wahoo, 11 amberjack, 15 pargo, 8 sierra, 112 dorado, 1250 skipjack and 850 yellowfin tuna.

Good Fishing, Eric

October 13, 2012
Anglers –

We are seeing larger crowds of anglers arriving daily, as this is now the start of the peak fall season, time when weather patterns stabilize, fishing is great and there is much excitement with the many high stake tournaments just around the corner. Weather is more comfortable now, mornings actually have a slight chill to them, days are clear and warm and breezes are predominately from the north. Ocean water temperature is ranging from 85 to 88 degrees, warmest areas in the direction of San Jose del Cabo. There is a low pressure system forming to the south at this time, but it looks as though it will head west and stay clear of the Baja Peninsula. There has been a trend for the last few years that late season storms have developed later in October, with the water being so warm, anything could happen, we will hope that they stay clear of impacting our area.

Fleets are fishing in all directions, off of San Jose the best areas have been either around the Iman Bank or on the Gordo banks, though in recent days there has been a bite developing from Palmilla to Santa Maria. Most common species being found are dorado and yellowfin tuna, with a few sailfish, wahoo and miscellaneous bottomfish mixed in. There have been sardinas available, some days north near Vinorama and also now being found off of Palmilla Point, this has opened up more options of where charters can plan to concentrate their efforts. Lots of boat pressure in all directions now and we have seen up to a couple of dozen East Cape area cruisers making the long run south to fish on the Iman Bank, which must mean that there has not been much action going on in their local waters.

The yellowfin tuna bite has been up and down, lots of skipjack mixed in and also some pesky aggressive sea lions to deal with. Most of the yellowfin near Iman and towards Santa Maria have been in the 10 to 20 lb. range, the larger tuna are hanging around the Gordo Banks, everyday there have been a handful of fish accounted for that have been in the 100 to 200 plus pound range, at times biting early and other days preferred to come up and feed late in the day, no big numbers, but there is a chance at a very large yellowfin, these fish have been hitting on larger sized whole baits, as well as on drifted chunk bait. Many stories were told of big fish being lost.
Average catches per day on the smaller grade of tuna found closer to shore while using sardinas for bait varied from one or two fish on as many as 15 fish per boat. Action varied from each location every day, depending on bait supply, sea lion problem and the aggressive skipjack.

Dorado were more numerous on a daily basis, heard of some fast action on the Pacific side of Cabo San Lucas and there were quite a few dorado around the Iman area as well, most of the dorado were medium sized, 5 to 20 pounds, a few exceptions of larger bulls accounted for. Once found these fish would readily strike on lures and bait. Remember to respect the two fish limit per person for dorado, also try to release as many of the smaller fish as possible, particularly the females, easily identified by their rounded forehead, versus the squared off heads of the males. These fish start to spawn as juveniles and grow up to five pounds a month, important to conserve the future of this fishery.

Not much being found off the bottom recently, perhaps the water temperature is too warm and the fish are hiding in the structure or seeking out deeper cooler areas, hard to say what is going on, a few amberjack, snapper, cabrilla, triggerfish and even a couple of yellowtail and roosterfish hanging over the rock piles.

Wahoo are started to show, every day we are seeing a few of them brought in, some hitting on lures, such as Rapalas, others are striking on baits in the same area where the tuna and dorado are found, Many of the wahoo have been smaller than what we normally see, though some of them were up to 30 pounds.

Billfish action has been spread out, we know of one nice black marlin that was lost on the Gordo Banks, hear about more blue marlin showing off of Cabo San Lucas, off of San Jose’s grounds there have been a few sailfish and striped marlin encountered. Lots of skipjack on the grounds and with the football sized tuna around, we do expect to see some more black and blue marlin to appear.

The combined panga fleets out of La Playita, Puerto Los Cabos Marina, sent out approximately 202 charters for the week, with anglers accounting for a fish count of:
11 sailfish, 3 striped marlin, 17 wahoo, 2 yellowtail, 12 amberjack, 18 pargo, 6 sierra, 7 roosterfish, 440 dorado, 585 yellowfin tuna and 5 rainbow runners.

Good Fishing, Eric

October 6, 2012
Anglers –

The Southern Baja weather this past week is consistent with normal early fall patterns. We have seen cooler early morning temperatures, scattered tropical clouds with strong sunshine, warm and humid through the afternoon. Trade winds are blowing offshore in the morning, then switch out of the north midday and then from the south late, just enough breeze to help keep conditions comfortable. No new storms seen to the south at this time, still a chance at late season systems developing, as ocean water temperatures are averaging 85 degrees of more through most of the region.

Swells were light this week, gave a chance for the inshore clarity to start clearing after all of the recent rain runoff. Much larger crowds of anglers are now arriving, as the coming weeks is always one of the busiest times of year in the Los Cabos area. Advance charter reservations are definitely recommended this time of year. Commercial pangeros are working hard to find sufficient supplies of live bait, particularly sardinas, which are the preferred all around baitfish. Inshore off of Palmilla and to the north of Punta Gorda they are finding scattered schools of these baitfish, though it was not easy to keep up with the supply and demand. There are caballito in the marina and on the fishing grounds there are bolito, skipjack, chihuil and cocinero, more skipjack than anything else.

The cow bells are ringing on the Gordo Banks.There were more larger yellowfin tuna caught this week, the Gordo Banks produced quite a few yellowfin tuna over 100 pounds and maybe ten tuna over 200 pounds were landed by the combined Puerto Los Cabos fleet of pangas and larger sportfishers, largest we actually weighed in was 245 lb. Most of these tuna were found around the Inner Gordo Bank, they hit on whole baits, as well as chunk bait. A handful of fish were hooked throughout the morning hours and then local private charters were having a bit more success dung the afternoon sessions. On Tuesday evening there was a black marlin brought in by a trio of local La Playita anglers that was weighed in at 640 lb., largest black we have heard about so far this season. Last week there was a blue marlin landed out of Cabo San Lucas that went 720 pounds.

The Iman Bank was holding schooling yellowfin tuna, though there was no consistent bite for these fish, some days they would come up and feed on sardinas late morning, other days just did not come up at all. Lots of skipjack competing for the same food source, tuna do not like feeding at the same time as the skippies. These tuna in this area were in the 12 to 20 pound class, with a few up to 40 pounds, on the good days charters were accounting for a handful of tuna, as well as dorado in their mix.

Dorado are being found spread out, there were greater numbers congregated around floating debris. Most of the dorado were under 20 pounds, though we did see a few trophy sized bulls up to 45 pounds. No run on wahoo yet, with all of the bait ball activity we expect to see more of these wahoo in the counts soon. A few wahoo to 40 pounds were landed north of Punta Gorda, striking on Rapala and bait, with many boats now trolling larger baits on the offshore grounds, this is good way to tell if the wahoo actually are around, because they really like to clip off these same baits, more often than not they do so without notice or even becoming hooked.

The bottom action consisted of miscellaneous pargo/snapper, cabrilla, amberjack, dogtooth, grouper and even roosterfish. As we have been seeing now for several fall seasons, out of their normal inshore habitat, the roosterfish at this time of year will hang around the offshore structure of Iman, La Fortuna and San Luis and all of these roosterfish have been larger fish, 30 to 60 pounds. Anglers told many stories of drift fishing while using live skipjack off the bottom, taking freight train strikes, resulting in cut off lines. Not many amberjack recently, but that could change at any time, though the fall season is the time when the majority of anglers would prefer to target the pelagic surface species.

We have not heard many reports on billfish, except the 640 pound black marlin out of La Playita on Tuesday afternoon. Just a few sailfish and smaller size striped marlin found while trolling the blue water, we expect to hear more reports of big marlin hook ups in the coming days, as this is the time the tournament teams really start to scout fish for the upcoming events.

The combined panga fleets launching out of La Playita/Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out approximately 110 charters for the week, with anglers accounting for a fish count of:
1 black marlin, 7 striped marlin, 9 sailfish, 8 wahoo, 11 amberjack, 5 dogtooth snapper,
18 cabrilla, 194 dorado, 83 yellowfin tuna, 22 various pargo species and 5 roosterfish.

Good Fishing, Eric