Winds, Holiday Crowds, Wahoo, Tuna, Dorado, Marlin ~ November 24, 2018

Anglers –
November 24, 2018

Lots of tourists now visiting the Los Cabos region for this Thanksgiving Holiday week. We felt more wind this week, blowing out of the north, as well as from the south, this contributed to rougher ocean conditions for anglers, at times limiting options and opportunities. Water temperatures were in the 78 to 81 degree range. Crowds of anglers were slightly less than previous weeks, due to tougher conditions and it being the time we see a decline in anglers, as there usually is between holiday periods.

Overall the fishing was more scattered, off on the Pacific banks there was incredible wide open action for striped marlin, not seen like this for many years. All the way from Mag Bay, to Finger and Golden Gate Banks, more than 20 marlin per charter was reported. Fleets from Puerto Los Cabos Marina were mainly fishing the grounds from the Gordo Banks, to Iman and San Luis, as far north as Vinorama. These areas were producing yellowfin tuna, dorado and wahoo.

The tuna action was less productive this most recent period, north winds made drift fishing even more challenging, being swept off the spot so fast and then having to reset. Full moon period also never seems to help the yellowfin tuna action, though tuna were still being caught every day, but more like a one, two or three per boat average. Sizes ranging from small footballs, to 40 to 80 lb. and there were also two yellowfin tuna over 200 pounds landed this week, one a 208 lb. and the other 247 lb.

Wahoo were striking on the grounds from Iman to Vinorama, the best odds for enticing strikes was on slow trolled baits, such as caballito and chihuil, some ‘hoo were also taken on higher speed trolling lures, sizes ranged from 10 to 40 lb. No huge numbers, but some more fortunate anglers landed as many as four or five wahoo, other anglers lost that many strikes without landing one, that is how wahoo fishing can go. We look for this bite to improve in coming weeks, as crowds and heavy boat pressure lighten, should be a great December.

Early in the week we saw more dorado action, particular later in the morning just south of Punta Gorda, this is where bait schools were attracting hungry schools of dorado, boats arriving on this scene were quickly able to limit out on nice quality fish as large as 20 lb.

Surprisingly roosterfish were still roaming the shoreline, most of these were smaller juvenile fish, fun sport on light tackle and please remember to always catch and carefully release these game fish. We heard of at least one snook being landed off of the beach in front of Marriott Resort.

Very little bottom action done this week, winds and currents made this tough, there were plenty of triggerfish on the Iman Banks, made it tough to battle through these in order to have a chance at the finicky tuna.

The combined panga fleets launching out of La Playita, Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out approximately 162 charters for the week. Anglers reported a fish count of: 3 striped marlin, 4 sailfish, 115 dorado, 84 wahoo, 125 yellowfin tuna, 18 bonito, 22 white skipjack, 15 red snapper, 8 yellow snapper, 11 cabrilla, 6 sierra, 16 roosterfish and 140 triggerfish.

Good fishing, Eric

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