Cabo San Lucas Fishing Report for Nov 25- Dec 1, 2002 CAPT. GEORGE LANDRUM “FLY HOOKER” SPORTFISHING [email protected] www.flyhooker.com CABO SAN LUCAS FISH REPORT NOVEMBER 25-DECEMBER 1, 2002 WEATHER: Our week started out very nice with the nighttime lows in the high 60’s and the daytime highs in the mid to low 90’s. On Wednesday we began to get clouds moving in strong and checking the weather maps found the Pineapple Express had moved right over us. We have had cloudy skies and showers everyday since then but it is clearing up now. No really heavy gullywashing downpours, just enough to mess up the streets and wash trash into the Marina. The cloud cover has caused the temps to drop and we are now seeing low 60’s to mid-high 70’s. The desert is going to be beautiful in a week! (Tropical Legs) WATER: Both the Pacific and the Sea of Cortez were calm all week long but there was some pretty choppy conditions on Wednesday as the front moved over us. The inshore water dirtied up on Thursday due to the rain but out past a mile it gets blue again. Our water temps have lowered a bit as well with water outside the Cape reading in the 80-81 degree range. Our warm water is now on the Pacific side but the temp breaks are far, far away. (Amazon) BAIT: Most of the bait available this week were small 8-10” Mackerel and the price was the usual $2 per bait. A few Caballito were in the bait boat tanks as well. I have no knowledge of Sardina availability. (Magic In Your Eyes) FISHING: BILLFISH: What a strange week! I was not expecting much in the way of Marlin but I was surprised. There were still Blues and a few Blacks being caught this week, and a lot of Striped Marlin being sighted and caught. Toss in a mix of Sailfish and just about every billfish we have available here in Cabo was around this week. Naturally the Striped Marlin were the most common, and most boats were able to get at least a couple of them hooked up. Live bait was the ticket and most of the fish were spotted tailing. For lures, anything in Dorado colors seemed to work well on all the Billfish, likely because there are so many of them around right now. Most of the bite has been on the Pacific side, up in the Los Arcos area from 2 miles to 10 miles offshore, and including the Golden Gate Banks. (Calypso Getaway) YELLOWFIN TUNA: The Tuna bite dropped off a lot this week and almost all of the fish I have seen or heard about have been footballs to 20 pounds. There have been a few schoolies in the 25-35 pound range as well but no large fish. The fish have not been associated with Porpoise, most of the strikes have been in the blind while fishing for Dorado. 6” feathers and hard plastic lures in smaller sizes worked well with no specific color mentioned by anyone. Due to the effort put in this week Dorado, most of the Yellowfin found were caught within 5 miles of the Pacific coast. (Dr. Macumba) DORADO: Last week I said that it looked like the Dorado bite was going to keep getting better and it has. The average size is up to around 20 pounds and there has been plenty of them around. Most of the boats were working the Pacific side up to 10 miles offshore. A lot of the action was within 2 miles of the beach and the boats were pretty concentrated in there. The key was finding Frigate birds working and getting in a pass on them with the lures. If you hooked up, drop back some live baits and wait for the action. Most boats were able to meet the 2 Dorado per angler limit without a problem early in the morning, then went in search of other species. (Angelina) WAHOO: I saw a few Wahoo flags this week but when I talked to the anglers I found that most of them had been flown by boats that had found some nice sized Sierra inshore. I am sure there were some Wahoo caught but don’t know the where’s or what’s this week. (Long Ago And Far Away) INSHORE: Up until Wednesday there was some fair fishing for Sierra and a few small Roosterfish inshore, and there was good action on the smaller Tunas, the Skipjack and Bonita. Most of the Pangas were concentrating on the Dorado bite and after Wednesday’s weather change, the water inshore became too murky for anything but the Dorado search. (Heart String) NOTES: If anyone reading these reports has questions about fishing in Cabo or just Saltwater fishing in general, feel free to check the “Ask The Captain” section at www.flyhooker.com , my homepage. I have just gotten the bugs worked out and will be answering questions each morning. To all those anglers who have fished with us and have tagged and released a Marlin using the “Billfish Foundation” tags we provide, I am sorry to say that the Foundation has changed their policy concerning the issuance of free release certificates. Here is a quote from them: “Yes, it is a new policy. We generate through the Release Certificate Program 10,000 to 12,000 certificates a year, all for free. It just got too expensive not to do something. The new policy is $25 introductory membership offer where all certificates are then free, along with the rest of the premiums, or, $20 a certificate. There was really no way to give the heads-up to captains and fleets, there are just too many.” So, if you want the certificate you are going to have to pay for it, but hey, it’s not a lot of money and it goes to a very good program! This weeks report was written to the music of one of my favorite songwriter/guitarists, Earl Klugh on the 1991 “Blue Note” Capitol release, “The Best Of Earl Klugh”. Fly Hooker Daily Catch Report for Nov 25- Dec 2 “FLY HOOKER” FISH REPORT FOR 25 NOVEMBER 2002 Rick Harris is in town again on a short notice vacation and today he went fishing aboard the “Fly Hooker” with a friend of the family, Kyle. Juan and Manuel took the boat up the Pacific side and worked the area about three miles offshore of the Margarita/Los Arcos area and had a lot of fun with Dorado. Rick only wanted to keep a little bit for dinner so they started releasing fish. A total of 8 large Dorado gave them a lot of jumps and lots of fight and they were back at the Marina by 12:30! Thanks Rick, we look forward to seeing you again next year! “FLY HOOKER” FISH REPORT FOR 26 NOVEMBER 2002 Walt Ehnat and his grown sons Tom and Marty were our anglers today. This is their third day of fishing on this vacation and they had a blast! Well, everyone except Marty. He crawled out of the cabin when the boat got back in at noon and wanted to know when we were leaving! A little bit of the old “Tequila Flu”! Well Walt pretty much took it easy since it wasn’t too long ago that he had a triple bypass so it was up to Tom to do most of the fishing. Juan and Manuel were able to keep him busy by hooking up 9 Dorado, 2 Yellowfin and letting him fight an estimated 310 pound Blue Marlin for over an hour before tagging and releasing it! I sure hope the fishing stays this good. “FLY HOOKER” FISH REPORT FOR 28 NOVEMBER 2002 It clouded up last night and this morning, just after the boat left the Marina with John and Ray aboard for a half day of fishing, the skies opened up and it poured! This was the first time for John and Ray to do any kind of fishing and one of them had a very worried wife. About mid day we were able to calm her down with the report that the guys were catching fish, were not seasick and would be coming in on time. Manuel and Edgar went back to the Pacific side, up off of Los Arcos and caught 7 Dorado and 2 Yellowfin Tuna. “FLY HOOKER” FISH REPORT FOR 29 NOVEMBER, 2002 Brothers Zach and Brian Eastman are fishing today and tomorrow and they really want to catch a Marlin. We had our fingers crossed when they left this morning. Juan and Manuel went back to the Pacific side and were able to get 4 Dorado in the boat but no Marlin. They did have strikes from 4 Striped Marlin and saw lots of them on the surface and jumping but were not able to get a hook to stick in any of them. Hopefully tomorrow! “FLY HOOKER” FISH REPORT FOR 30 NOVEMBER 2002 The second day of fishing for Zach and Brian was not as eventful as yesterday. Juan and Manuel returned to the same area as yesterday but the fish had moved on. Today they didn’t even see a Marlin and they only caught one Dorado. “FLY HOOKER” FISH REPORT FOR DECEMBER 1, 2002 Zach Eastman decided to give it one more try and Brian decided that he wanted to do the Sand Dunes ATV excursion. Zach invited me to go along and I was happy to get the chance. Lines went in the water outside the lighthouse on the Pacific side and for the next three hours we had a boat ride as we worked our way up the coast toward the Golden Gate Banks. About three miles short of the Banks Juan spotted a turtle in the water and as we passed by him we had a very large Bull Dorado come and grab the long rigger lure. The fish didn’t stick and we worked the area for a little bit with no luck. We even dragged a live bait by the turtle, hoping that there were more Dorado under it. When we got to the banks there were 12 boats there and all of them were trolling, with no luck. At about the same time everyone stopped trolling and dropped down live bait. We gave it a shot for about a half hour but with no luck. We were told that the bite had been early using the deep dropped bait. Lots of bait balls, schools of Mackerel on the depth finder, but no interested Marlin. It was not until we were almost all the way back, just about 4 miles off of Los Arcos, that we finally had a Marlin strike. The fish grabbed the shotgun lure but did not hook up. I dropped back a live bait and we saw the Marlin come in and grab it. I ended up farming the fish! He ran with it for a few second, stopped to eat it then ran again. I set the hook on the second run and I guess I didn’t wait ling enough because I had good solid weight for a few seconds then could feel the hook pull loose. That was our only shot of the day and I blew it! Again, I’m sorry Zach! Our fingers are crossed that next time will be better. Until then, Tight Lines! Until Next Week, Tight Lines form George, Mary, Juan and Manuel, the “Fly Hooker” Crew! [email protected] www.flyhooker.com