September 15, 2012
Anglers –
The late summer season is progressing through normal patterns, light crowds of anglers, at least as many surfers as fisherman in town, muggy tropical conditions, rapidly changing ocean conditions depending on storm activity in the Eastern Pacific. So much for the drought, as Wednesday night and throughout Thursday there were wide spread thundershowers passing through the region, creating more clean up for the already over worked road crews. On Thursday afternoon there were red flag conditions, at least for Puerto Los Cabos Marina, officially closed to boating on Friday, until further notice, which is expected to be over the weekend. This most recent storm front seemed to be created by a combination of local weather disturbances combining forces with Tropical Storm Kristy, which was on a course paralleling the peninsula some 200 miles to the west of CSL. Besides the not so needed additional moisture, there were swells of 8/10 feet creating dangerous ocean conditions and pounding the shoreline, swells are expected to reside by Sunday.
Before this latest set back from the passing of TS Kristy anglers found improved action on the fishing grounds from the Gordo Banks to San Luis, ocean temperatures were averaging 85 degrees or more in some areas. Lots of baitfish activity found on these same grounds, particularly from black skipjacks of all sizes. Also some chihiul now being found on the Gordo Banks, as well as steady supplies of caballito in the marina area, before the swell swept in there were schools of sardinas being found by commercial pangeros off of Punta Gorda, dangerous work for these bait netters, especially when tide is low and surf is rising.
The majority of panga charters are concentrating around the San Luis Bank, this is where more numbers of yellowfin tuna were found schooling, these tuna were striking on live sardinas and weighed in the 10 to 20 pound class, on Thursday, the day of scattered rain squalls, the boats had the highest counts of tuna, averaging 10 to 15 yellowfin per charter, actually there was nicer weather conditions that morning on the fishing grounds than back on land. Dorado were found throughout the region, in open water, on the high spots and congregating near floating debris, not as numerous as in previous weeks. Most of the dorado were under 10 pounds, but there was also other spots where larger dorado to 20 pounds or more were encountered.
This past week there were at least four larger sized yellowfin tuna in the 150 to 250 pound class taken from the vicinity of the Gordo Banks. These tuna all hit on larger sized baits such as skipjack, caballito or chihuil, encouraging news to finally hear of tuna action on the famed local fishing grounds. This action should only improve as weather settles down in the coming weeks. There were dogtooth snapper biting on these same banks as well, ranging from 20 to 50 pounds, striking on whole or chunk baits, as usual more of these fish were being lost than actually landed.
Early in the week the red snapper (huachinango) continued to bite on San Luis Bank at first light on yo-yo style jigs, with a handful of cabrilla, grouper and amberjack rounding out the bottom action. Normally the first part of fall season can be very productive for larger sized species off of the bottom structure, this action also will depend on ocean conditions remaining calmer.
One truly noteworthy catch this week was that of a 50 pound snook caught off of the panga dock area at 1 a.m. by a local La Playita angler that was really targeting the elusive triple tails that are known to become more active during the evening hours. This monster snook hit on a chunk of skipjack and was battled for a period of time before it became entangled in the dock pilings and the angler and his friends actually dove into the water and down into the structure, passing the rod underneath the docks to untangle the line and were successful, eventually bringing the fish to gaff.
The combined panga fleets launching out of La Playita/Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out approximately 43 charters for the week, with anglers accounting for a fish count of: 1 blue marlin, 11 striped marlin, 7 sailfish, 1 wahoo, 8 amberjack, 11 dogtooth snapper, 9 cabrilla, 77 dorado, 104 yellowfin tuna, 42 huachinango (red snapper), 6 hammerhead shark and 16 yellow snapper.
Good Fishing, Eric