August 23, 2010
Moderate crowds continue to travel to the Los Cabos area to enjoy a late summer vacation before school sessions start back up for the fall semester. The lack of consistent local fishing out of Southern California has also sent more numbers of serious anglers further south in order to find their fix. This past week there was more cloud cover and very unpredictable conditions, some scattered thunder showers as well. Presently there is a tropical depression that has developed near Manzanillo, this system is forecast to gain little strength before encountering unfavorable conditions over cooler water. The region does need more rainfall, but hopes are that it does not all arrive at once with hurricane force winds. The all around climate has actually been very peasant considered that we are in the second half of August.
Ocean swells were minimal, seas were calmer in the direction of the Sea of Cortez, occasional squalls did create choppy conditions, blue water was found within one mile from shore and water temperatures averaged 77 to 83 degrees. Supplies of live sardinas were scarce this past week, but fresh dead sardinas were still readily available and were working very well for the yellowfin tuna bite.
Anglers found very good action for yellowfin tuna from the Gordo Banks, La Fortuna, Iman and San Luis. The majority of the tuna were being hooked while drift fishing with dead sardinas. Average sized yellowfin were ranging 20 to 40 pounds, but there were grades of fish in the 50 to 100 pound as well, most charters accounted for 5 to10 tuna in their daily catch. On Wednesday morning there was the season's second super cow yellowfin tuna landed off of the Gordo Banks from a 22 ft. panga. Local La Playita skipper Jose Gonzalez and angler Josh Evans, from Oakland, Ca. were trolling a live Pacific Moonfish rigged on 200 pound leader attached to 80 pound main line when the cow hit, the ensuing battle lasted three hours to bring the monster to gaff and the fish officially weighed in at a whopping 342 lb.
Dorado numbers continue to be less that would be expected for summer time, but most charters are catching one or more in their combined catch, mainly juvenile sized fish of 15 pounds or less. Trolling medium sized lures was probably the best method for finding the scattered smaller sized schools of do dos. A handful of wahoo were also caught this same way, weighing up to 45 pounds.
Other action included a few striped marlin, sailfish and one black marlin of 300 plus pounds was caught earlier this week from a panga on the Gordo Banks. A few dogtooth snapper up to 50 pounds were accounted for off of the bottom structure, as well as some amberjack, cabrilla and huachinango that were accounted for off the same rock piles. Of course there were the ever present Mexican bonito lurking in the middle of the water column.
The combined panga fleets launching from La Playita/Puerto Los Cabos sent out approximately 63 charters for the week, with anglers reporting a fish count of:
1 black marlin, 3 striped marlin, 2 sailfish, 3 wahoo, 68 dorado, 274 yellowfin tuna, 7 dogtooth snapper, 12 cabrilla, 18 huachinango, 13 amberjack, 6 roosterfish and 34 bonito.
Good Fishing, Eric
