FLY HOOKER SPORTFISHING
Captain George Landrum
gmlandrum@hotmail.com
www.flyhooker.com
Cabo Fish Report
May 21-27, 2007
WEATHER: What a change seven days can make! We started this week with our evening and early morning temperatures in the high 50's, specifically on Monday morning it was 58 degrees here at my house, and there was a lot of wind with it. For the next three days I had on long jeans and a light jacket every morning. This morning, Sunday, I got up and it was 78 degrees at 4:30 am here at the house! Yesterday it was registering 94 degrees downtown and there was just a light breeze out of the west. Now the skies are clear, the weather great and it feels like a non-humid summer!
WATER: Along with a change in the weather we saw a great change in the water as well. On the Pacific side early in the week there was water as cold as 58 degrees according to the sea-surface charts, the water was too choppy and green for us to go that direction and check it out. On the Cortez side of the Cape we had much warmer water, on occasion as warm as 81 degrees up around the Punta Gorda area. At the end of th4e week it appears as if the warm water is starting to wrap around the Cape and intrude into the Pacific as we are reading temperatures in the range of 76 degrees encroaching onto the southern edge of the San Jaime Banks. Just to the north of there the water quickly cools to 67 degrees and colder with a fairly well defined temperature break. On the Cortez side of the Cape the 80-81 degree water runs right up against the coast, extending out no more than five miles from the Punta Gorda area to Cabo, outside of this area it is just a bit cooler at around 74 degrees with no defined break. The warmer water is the blue water so most of the action we have seen has been within 5 miles of the beach.
BAIT: Bait became a bit scarce this week, and the IGFA Offshore Championship Tournament boats received the first pick for the most part. With the water warming up quickly Pacific Mackerel has become a commodity much in demand and supplies were scarce. Four days of tournament fishing put quite the dent in available supplies, and with three days of tournament fishing starting Monday you can expect things to remain on the lean side. Most of the fish were in the 1/3-pound range and the cost remained at $2 per bait. There were a lot of Caballito available early in the week but with the full moon coming up soon they have become hard to get as well. Sardines, nice sized ones, were available at $25 a scoop from the bait boats up in the Palmilla area.
FISHING:
BILLFISH: As a change of pace there were some Swordfish hooked up close to home this week. I had confirmed reports of two fish, one of them fought for 6 ½ hours and another for 2 ½ hours and both of them ended up getting away. More were sighted but refused to eat. I managed to catch and release my first Blue Marlin of the year at the inner Gorda Bank, a little guy of about 130 pounds. On the radio I hear reports of some Blues caught up in the East Cape area in the warmer water so more of them should be arriving soon. The just completed IGFA Offshore Championship Tournament had a total of 62 teams fishing for four days and resulted in the release of a total of 325 marlin for an average of 1.3 marlin per day, per boat. That is a bit slow by our standards but it just goes to show that the bite has been a bit off for the stripers. There were a lot of tailing fish early in the week due to the wind, but later on it was a matter of searching for feeders and being there at the right time. There were concentrations of fish up at the Vinorama area but they scattered mid-week and seemed to move in closer to Cabo. The bite happened for a lot of boats in the area of the 1150 spot and that was right at the edge of the warm blue water and the slightly cooler green water and at the end of the week it seemed as if the fish had moved in even closer with a lot of tailing fish seen off of Punta Ballena.
YELLOWFIN TUNA: At the end of the week there were some fish found offshore up around the Vinorama area mixed in with Porpoise. They were decent fish in the 35-pound class. Other than that there was not much found in the way of Tuna.
DORADO: Dorado are still an occasional catch with a few small fish being found in close to shore in the warmer water. With the influx of 80+-degree water we hope to see more of them soon.
WAHOO: There were a few scattered Wahoo in the 20-30 pound class reported this week from the Punta Gorda area. With the upcoming full moon on the 31st we will probably be catching a few more.
INSHORE: Inshore has still been good for Sierra to 8 pounds with a lot of boats getting double digit numbers of fish on the Pacific side of the Cape. The Roosterfish have begun to show as well with some Pangas reporting up to 10 releases in a days fishing, and the fish have been a decent 10-20 pounds. At the end of the week there was a reported bit on Dogtooth Snapper (Pargo) on the Pacific side up in the rocks at the points.
NOTES: The IGFA Offshore Championship Tournament is now over and starting Monday is the World Championship Billfish Release Tournament. http://www.wcbrt.com/ I am fishing in that one so will be pretty busy this coming week. I golfed this morning and finally broke the magic 100 mark with a score of 98; maybe I can buy a good driver now! Our local protest against the Shark Norma #029 was given a ½ page in the L.A.Times along with a photo of the boats in the marina protesting the law just recently passed and signed by the President. For more information on the shark longline fishing law, you can go to this website for updates.
http://www.billfish.org/new/NewsArticle.asp?ArticleID=60
Until next week, Tight lines!