May 19, 2012
Anglers –

The weather is often unpredictable during the late spring season. Normal patterns for the Los Cabos area, is that we see the ocean water temperature hold on a steady warming trend through the month of April and through the first half of the month of May, then as winds and currents shift, there is cold water that sweeps in from the Pacific, within a day water temperatures can drop by fifteen degrees. This current typically does not reach any further than Los Frailes. With the IGFA Tournament being held this week we did notice an increase of visitors. During the first two days of the tournament anglers witnessed near record paced striped marlin action, teams faced much tougher conditions on the third and fourth day, though many marlin were still tagged. Weather patterns changed on Wednesday, relentless winds from the west, shifting to the south and persisting through the week. Overnight the ocean water temperatures dropped from being in the upper 70’s to a chilly 60 degrees off of Cabo San Lucas, off San Jose del Cabo the water is now in the 65 degree range. Marine fog also moved in the direction of the Sea of Cortez, had previously been hanging over the Pacific. Some thirty miles offshore, near the Cabrillo Seamount the water temp is now about 72 degrees. Anglers will need patience for patterns to stabilize and wait for the ocean to warm back up. Could be a matter of days or weeks, hard to predict, but things can change rapidly during transition periods, we must remain optimistic.

Before the mid week weather change it was feeling more like summer, air temperatures into the 90’s, clean blue current in the 75 to 80 degree range found within miles of shore. We were starting to see a few wahoo showing, even some action for yellowfin tuna was encountered, along with some great variety off of the bottom spots and continued wide open marlin action on the offshore fishing grounds. On Thursday the wind gusted from the south and this made for a tough day with limited options. Most charters ended up trolling close to shore, where most found wide open roosterfish action, some larger sized roosters were accounted for, including one 60 pound specimen landed and released by John Hefty of Cabo San Lucas while fishing with skipper Chame Pino. Trolling with caballito was the most consistent deal for the inshore action. Sardinas had been available again, but with increasing southern swells this is a day to day situation, as to if the live sardinas will be available.

Early in the week there was great striped marlin action encountered off of the San Jose del Cabo grounds, fish were striking on practically anything, lures, ballyhoo, caballito, bolito and skipjack, multiple catches were common. Only an occasional dorado was found, a few wahoo strikes were being reported, as these elusive speedsters were becoming more active in the warmer waters. Several groups of a half dozen or more wahoo were seen slowing swimming on the surface, in shallow waters off of Cardon, these fish would not strike on anything presented to them, but one resourceful pangero rigged up a small treble hook from a yo-yo jig and successfully snagged two wahoo, we won’t mention any names, this technique of hooking a fish might not be legal, but it sure made for an exciting story.

Early in the week anglers reported tuna strikes while trolling with live bolito outside of San Luis, these yellowfin were found traveling with larger sized porpoise and were in the 70 to 100 pound class, limited numbers were landed, but other fish were lost and many strikes were missed, it was encouraging news, but now we will play the waiting game for conditions to become favorable again.

The Gordo Banks were really showing a lot of early in the week, tons of baitfish on the surface, red crabs and whale sharks cruising about, not many gamefish caught, besides striped marlin later in the day, but sure was a promising sign.

Construction on the new hotel in La Playita continues at a rapid pace, apparently no problem with funding here. We have heard it is going to be a Four Seasons Resort, do not see their sign up yet. Apparently some eighty rooms, three to four stories, all are overlooking the Puerto Los Cabos Marina.

Local Marina officials have become stricter with the commercial pangeros bait sellers, now enforcing that no netting or selling be done inside the boundary set near the channel entrance. These local are not easy to persuade into conforming to new rules, kind of like the Wild West was..

The combined panga fleets launching out of La Playita/Puerto Los Cabos sent out approximately 77 charters for the week with anglers reporting a fish count of: 28 striped marlin, 7 yellowfin tuna, 15 dorado, 2 wahoo, 28 cabrilla, 85 various pargo species, 14 jack crevalle, 2 yellowtail, 19 amberjack, 135 roosterfish, 12 pompano, 8 bonito and 14 sierra.

Good Fishing, Eric

May 12, 2012
Anglers –

Springtime weather in Southern Baja is starting to feel more like summer, as high temperatures were reaching 90 degrees, though early in the morning there was still a slight chill inthe air, in reality the climate now is ideal, with variable breezes later in the day helping to keep conditions comfortable. Ocean currents are now coolest on the Pacific side of Cabo San Lucas, where it is averaging 68 to 69 degrees, in the direction of the Gordo Banks anglers are finding warmer water of 74 to 76 degrees. Early in the week there was a day when we felt serious thunder with lightning strikes throughout the area, only scattered reports of actually rainfall, but where it did rain, the drops were large, very tropical and unusual for this time of year. The majority of the sportfishing fleets were fishing on the grounds off of Chileno to the 1150 spot, the Gordo Banks and north towards Iman, Desteladera and San Luis Banks.

Live bait options remained plentiful for caballito and after becoming scarce for a couple of weeks, nice sized sardinas were once again available, pangeros found schools of these baitfish inshore near San Luis, with calmer surf conditions, this gave the netters opportunities to reach the baitfish. There was also the option of purchasing bags of fresh dead sardinas from the dock area and they were being used mainly for chumming over shallow rocky areas for catching a mix of bottom species. Larger concentrations of bolito are now schooling on the fishing grounds, being caught early in the day for use as trolling baits on the same grounds.

The red hot striped marlin action encountered last week off of San Jose del Cabo tapered off for several days during the recent moon period. In the past day or so the action seems to be rebounding, many stripers were seen tailing on the surface, a percentage of these were striking lures or bait, while many showed no interest. The area from the Gordo Banks to the 1150 spot seemed to have the larger concentration of billfish. There were fewer dorado encounters this past week, only a scattering of mostly single fish found. There were reports of schooling dorado found near shark buoys north of Gordo, but these do-dos apparently had lock jaw and would not hit on anything.

Yellowfin tuna were not found with any consistency, some days anglers did find larger sized yellowfin of 100 pounds plus, breezing in the same area with porpoise, these fish would come up and feed on chummed sardinas, but just would not strike any baits with hooks with them, strange to see tuna act in this manner, but it is not all that uncommon, with the abundance of natural food source on the banks these fish can become obsessed with feeding on a particular resource on their own schedule. There were a handful of medium sized tuna hooked into while trolling Rapalas near the Iman to San Luis area, but still hit or miss.

More reports now heard of seeing free swimming wahoo and occasional hook ups, despite limited numbers, still very encouraging to see these pelagic becoming more active, it seems that they always prefer water temperature in the mid to upper 70s. The wahoo being hooked now have ranged from 10 to 70 pounds, the larger specimens were landed on the marlin grounds on trolled bolito, though more numbers of the ‘hoo were encountered closer to shore, north of Punta Gorda, striking sardinas, yo-yo’s and Rapalas.

With offshore fishing action still producing limited options, many panga charter charters are fishing closer to shore over the rocky structure for a quality mix of great eating species, most of these fish are striking on caballito or sardinas, with some mixed success had on yo-yo jigs as well. Amberjack up to 60 pounds were accounted for, with a few yellowtail of 10 to 30 pounds in the mix, yellow snapper, barred pargo, huachinango, leopard grouper and pompano rounded out the action. In the past couple of days anglers enjoyed the seasons first consistent action for quality and quantity of pompano, these jacks were averaging ten pounds, striking on live bait close to shore two miles north of Puerto Los Cabos, off of La Salinas. These are some of the finest eating fish found in local waters and that includes a smorgasbord list of others.

Trolling the beach stretches has produced sierra, jack crevalle and roosterfish. There were reports of dogtooth snapper starting to show up as well, time to break out the stout tackle for these brutes.

The combined panga fleets launching out of La Playita/Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out approximately 62 charters this past week, with anglers accounting for a fish count of: 21 striped marlin, 7 wahoo, 14 dorado, 8 yellowfin tuna, 34 barred pargo, 65 yellow snapper, 18 sierra, 27 amberjack, 8 yellowtail, 27 cabrilla, 28 roosterfish, 98 pompano, 8 mako shark and 16 hammerhead sharks.

Good Fishing, Eric

Anglers –

Light crowds of visitors now traveling to Southern Baja. Conditions are practically perfect, high temperatures in the mid 80s, warming air and ocean temperatures is creating more marina cloud cover, afternoon breezes make the spring climate very pleasant. Water temperatures were on a warming trend throughout this past week and at this time there is 76 degrees pushing in from outside of the Gordo Banks area. From Cab San Lucas to Los Frailes the inshore water is ranging from 72 to 74 degrees. Conditions and fishing action can change rapidly at this time of year.

Increasing ocean swells from the south made it difficult for pangeros to net any sardinas, so in recent days live sardinas were not available and anglers were using the larger caballito, which remained plentiful from the marina area. Though these baits are purchased per piece, not to be used freely for chumming with, such as with the sardinas. More bolito are now schooling on the fishing grounds and these are being caught early in the day for use as bait. Also at times pelagic red crabs have been surfacing, being netted and used for bait over the bottom structure.

Striped marlin action has dominated the offshore action for the past few months, but this past week we saw wide open action, as the numbers of marlin on the local grounds significantly increased, anglers were regularly accounting for multiple catches on striped marlin ranging to to 150 pounds. In recent days there has been a hot spot found between the Outer Gordo Bank and the 1150 high spot, ten to twelve miles offshore, but the stripers are being found throughout the region, at times within a couple miles of shore. The marlin are striking on a variety of trolled baits and artificial lures. Local panga fleets were reported incredible success while slow trolling with dead bolito, while caballito and skipack also worked, the billfish seemed to prefer the bolito, striking on the fresh dead bait without hesitation. Many double and even triple hook ups were reported, these marlin were encountered in concentrations. As skipjack and bolito schools increasingly congregate on the fishing grounds, this is now attracting larger concentrations of gamefish. Continued reports of mako and thresher sharks found on the same offshore fishing grounds and more dorado also appeared in the fish counts, no real numbers yet, just single fish being encountered, hooked on trolled lures or bait, the majority of the dorado have been of larger size, with a handful of impressive sized bulls up close to fifty pounds accounted for from the same marlin grounds. A few wahoo stories being talked about and we look for these elusive fish to become more active with the warming currents and their favored bolito food source appearing.

With the lack of sardinas and higher surf conditions, there was not much to report for inshore action, anglers had other options of fishing rocky structure areas, from 50 ft. to 200 ft. Anglers found mixed results on a wide variety of species, most common were yellow snapper, barred pargo, huachinango (red snapper), amberjack, cabrilla (leopard grouper) and triggerfish. On some days good early morning action was reported on yo-yo jigs and live caballito, many heavier fish were cutting lines off in the rocks. Red crabs were sporadically found on the surface and being used successfully for red snapper bait, even an occasional amberjack hit on these small crabs. Sea lions were also hanging around their favorite snapper grounds and were a negative factor to deal with. Bottom species become finicky when the grounds are plugged with red crabs and all of the fish acquire a preferred taste for these crabs and not much or anything else. With persistence and patience there were quality catches accoutered for, all excellent eating specimens and we certainly enjoyed the improved action.

The combined local panga fleets launching from La Playita, Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out approximately  52 charters for the week, with anglers reported a fish count of: 86 striped marlin, 6 mako shark, 2 thresher shark, 23 dorado, 22 barred pargo, 86 yellow snapper, 4 yellowtail, 34 amberjack, 28 cabrilla, 14 pompano, 48 triggerfish, 42 sierra, 1 yellowfin tuna and 12 roosterfish.

Good fishing, Eric