April 24, 2008
Anglers -
With each passing day it is feeling more like summer time, though the evenings are still cooling off into upper 60s, actually an ideal time of year now, before it gets too blistering hot and humid. Vacationers are enjoying plenty of sunshine, with daytime high temperatures reaching the upper 80s. Water temperature are on the rise, now ranging from in the upper 60s on the Pacific side of Cabo San Lucas to as high as 74 or 75 degrees off of the Gordo Banks area in the direction of the Sea of Cortez. Tourism continues to be at substandard levels due to the poor economy in the United States, perhaps up to 50 % less than normal for the spring season. Live sardinas are plentiful around the La Playita area, being netted daily by the commercial fleet, but mackerel have become scarcer, often there were not sufficient supplies for the entire sportfishing fleet. Despite the bait situation the overall fishing action improved this past week, with the main reason being that the water conditions became cleaner and warmer within several miles of shore, where seas were relatively calm
Cruiser charters and local panga fleets were concentrating most of their efforts in the area of the 95,1150 and Gordo Banks area. Off of Chelino and Cabeza Ballena, some two to five miles from shore, there was some great yellowfin tuna action Sunday through Wednesday, anglers found limits of tuna ranging 10 to 18 pounds while trolling with feathers, rapalas, cedar plugs and using live sardinas. In the same area there were increasing number of dorado appearing in the daily counts, still only and average of maybe one per boat, sometimes two, but at least these popular fish are showing signs of moving onto the local fishing grounds. Most all of the dorado being caught are nice sized fish, averaging 15 to 30 pounds.
Sierra were found in large schools and were running good sized, averaging 3 to 6 pounds, the hot spot for them was from Westin Regina to Chileno, slow trolling with live sardinas provided the best action. Another wide open bite developed this week for small firecracker sized yellowtail, up to five pounds, aggressively striking yo-yo jigs, they were in large schools in an area directly offshore of the San Jose del Cabo beach front hotel district, about one mile from the beach.
The rock piles north of Punta Gorda were holding various species of pargo, yellowtail snapper, pompano, triggerfish and cabrilla, though numbers were not significantly high, it was an option that produced some quality eating fillets for anglers to savor.
With the full moon phase peaking on April 20 the striped marlin action dropped off compared to the previous week, also the bait situation was no guarantee, making things more unpredictable. Nevertheless a decent bite on striped marlin did continue, the billfish were striking best on bait, but a fair percentage were hitting trolled lures, the Petrolero and Mean Joe Green color patterns produced consistently. Groups of marlin were often seen tailing on the surface, as well as many free jumpers, though this did not always guarantee success, they had to be worked for.
The Mexican Navy patrol is still aggressively stopping charter boats to check and see that all of the paper work, safety equipment, personal fishing licenses and fish limits are being abided to. A bunch of harassment is what it is, but this apparently is how they wish to show their authority. They need to get on the same page as the other governmental agencies that set the fish limits, the Navy has recently been declaring that limits are now ten fish per boat, that is news to everyone, all limits have always per licensed angler, not per vessel. What is up with this? Anyway, fleet operators are going to have to arrange a fun pow wow with the head Navy honcho and present them a printed version from the Internet explaining the 2008 Mexican Bag Limits, they state all limits are per license, not per boat. It cannot be that Los Cabos is special and has different limits than the rest of Mexico?
The combined panga fleets launching from La Playita / Puerto Los Cabos sent out approximately 48 charters for the week, with anglers accounting for a fish count of:17 striped marlin, 16 dorado, 135 yellowfin tuna, 88 combined pargo species, 15 roosterfish, 17 jack crevalle, 15 cabrilla, 202 sierra and 214 yellowtail.
Good Fishing, Eric
