Cabo fishing report for Sept 28- Oct 4, 2003 Capt. George Landrum "Fly Hooker" Sportfishing [email protected] www.flyhooker.com CABO FISH REPORT FOR SEPTEMBER 28 TO OCTOBER 4, 2003 WEATHER: We had wonderful weather in Cabo this week! Sunny skies with just an occasional cloud, daytime highs in the low to mid 90’s, nights were cooler with the lows in the mid 70’s. A light breeze most of the time to keep thing from becoming too muggy. Unfortunately, when the breeze did die, it was humid enough that you just sweated! Well, that should only last a few more weeks. WATER: Blue water everywhere you went, both the Pacific and Sea of Cortez. Also warm water in the 85-87 degree range. Not until you got over 30 miles out on the Pacific side were you able to get into water as cool as 85 degrees. With so little wind this week the water had only small ripples on it, still some swell, but no wind chop at all. BAIT: Mixed bait was around this week with Mackerel and Caballito both showing up in the Bait Pangas, fish wells. The normal price of $2 seemed to prevail although I do know of one guy asking $3 per bait. Seems to happen almost every year as tournament time starts to roll around. FISHING: BILLFISH: Marlin were scarce this week and those that were found were not specially hungry. Most Striped Marlin turned down offerings, and those that were caught had been stuffing themselves on squid. The Blue Marlin were not on the feed either although again, some were caught. Of course, with the number of boats going out every day you would expect there to be Marlin flags flying at the end of the day, and there were, but not in the numbers we were seeing last week. Best lure colors seemed to be the old standby black/green and of course the Petrolero. YELLOWFIN TUNA: On again, off again, that was the Tuna story. One day they were here and biting good, the next day they were there and the bite was off. One thing for sure, they were not found close to home this week. Most of the boats were finding them at least 20 miles offshore and more on the Pacific side. The Tuna were associated with the Porpoise and most of the fish were school ones, in the 20-40 pound class. I did hear of a few larger fish caught this week but did not learn where they were found. Dark feathers and cedar plugs worked, as did dropping back live baits and slow trolling them in the area. DORADO: Find the right floating fish condo and you caught Dorado, fish the wrong ones and they were just not there! There was so much debris in the water that it took a while to find the pieces the fish were concentrated under. If you were lucky and were the first boat there, the catch could be great on fish from 15 to 40 pounds. A few nice fish in the 60-70 pound class were caught as well, and most of these came on the troll in the same areas. There was a big debris line out 18 miles on the Pacific side that had a few fish condos in it, but most of them were empty. Closer to shore, a lot of the Pangas were having luck on smaller fish by pulling live bait about a half mile to mile offshore. WAHOO: There were few Wahoo caught this week, at least compared to the previous week. Again the fish seemed to be found under floating debris and the first boat there had the best chance. The fish were running 30-50 pounds. INSHORE: Jack Crevalle, Roosterfish and a few Sierra were reported by Captains and anglers fishing the shore breaks this week. Live bait was the key as lures were mostly ignored. The best action seemed to come from the Pacific side around the lighthouse. NOTES: The fuel pumps on the new dock are hooked up and pumping great, no more long lines waiting to get fuel. All right, every once in a while I have to say this again. If you rent a boat from someone on the beach or walking around the Marina, don’t give them a big deposit, make sure you have the full information needed for the next day and get a written, signed receipt with phone numbers and a business address so you can find them again. Every day I see anglers walking around looking lost. When I offer to help them I find out that they have been taken by a coyote for $100, been told to be at a certain place in the morning and they will be taken to their boat. Well, they were taken all right. Get the name of the boat, the slip it is in, the name of the Captain, the time you are supposed to meet, a written receipt with phone numbers stating exactly what is included in the price and what the balance is. Don’t let this happen to you! This weeks report was written to the guitar sounds of Joe Satriani on his CD “Surfing With The Aliens”. Once again, thanks Charlie! Until next week, Tight Lines! "Fly Hooker" Daily Catch Reports for Sept 28-Oct 4, 2003 Capt. George Landrum "Fly Hooker" Sportfishing [email protected] WEEKLY FISH COUNT STRIPED MARLIN: 1 RELEASED (#180) YELLOWFIN TUNA: 15 KEPT (20-80#) “FLY HOOKER” FISH REPORT FOR SEPTEMBER 28, 2003 This was the last day for Roger and Doug Arnold and while the fishing was not great, it did provide the largest fish of the trip! After a very late start (they could not leave until 8am due to difficulties with the new fuel dock), they managed to get bait and get out of the Marina. I am not sure of any of the details but they were back at the Marina at around 4:30 flying a Marlin and a release flag. Mary said that the Striped Marlin was estimated at #180, a real beast for here! Way to go guys, and thanks for the fun we had with you! “FLY HOOKER” FISH REPORT FOR SEPTEMBER 30, 2001 Today the “Fly Hooker” has Carter Fourrier, his brother Brad and Brad’s wife Charlene and their friend Paul. All visiting Cabo from the New Orleans area, Carter’s father has a 31 Bertram up there as well so they are all experienced fishermen. The idea for the day was to get some fishing action, preferably at least something for dinner and a shot at a Marlin. Juan and Manual took the boat to the southwest about 12 miles and there they got into the Tuna. There were only four boats working what Carter called “thousands” of Porpoise, and the fish were not shy about eating. After hooking and landing a couple of small ones on lures, out went the live bait and the bigger boys started to bite. Charlene fought and landed the biggest fish and Carter said it would have weighed 80 pounds, the rest of them were in the 40 pound range. After getting 13 fish the had enough fun and Juan suggested that they start the search for Marlin. Leaving the school still biting, they came in closer to the coast looking for either Striped or Blue Marlin. As the beer level in the cooler slowly lowered and no Marlin bit, they talked about the Tuna fishing. When the boat arrived back at the Marina, they were still talking about it. Now they are talking about possibly going for one more day later in the week. If they decide to do it, I’ll let you know how they did. Thanks guys, we sure are glad you had a good time, and hope to see you again! “FLY HOOKER” FISH REPORT FOR OCTOBER 1, 2003 The Kosloski group from the cruise ship “Rotterdam” were our anglers for a short fishing trip today. The original schedule was for us to pick them up at 10am at the cruise ship dock and to return them just before 5pm so they could catch the last shuttle back to the ship. It seemed the ship had a slight problem that delayed it’s arrival until 11am, then they were only able to get three shuttles into service, and of course the tours that were scheduled through the ship were the clients that were unloaded first. basically, what this comes down to is that the Koslowski group of 6 persons were not able to get on board the “Fly Hooker” and out of the harbor until almost noon. No live bait was available so Juan and Manuel decided to work the area off the lighthouse on the Pacific side (Juan had gotten a phone call from his brother that he had caught a few nice Tuna in the area five miles off shore). It was slow for the “Fly Hooker” though, and until a Blue Marlin of just over 200 pounds struck, it looked as if the trip was going to blank out (get skunked, in other words). Unfortunately the fish came unbuttoned after about 5 minutes, and while Juan and Manuel say it was a Blue Marlin, because the fish never jumped, I think there is a possibility of it being a Black Marlin (not just the fight, but the location as well). After that it was quiet for a while and the group decided to return to town and get a quick walk through before returning to the ship, therefore they were back at the slip at 4 pm. Well, a little action, but no fish, guess that next time they get lines in the water they will have a lot better luck! Thanks guys, we wish that things had been a little bit better for you on your visit to Cabo, but also wish you a safe and smooth return trip! “FLY HOOKER” FISH REPORT FOR OCTOBER 4, 2003 David Hirsch and his two buddies decided to get out today and do some fishing. David has been coming down here for quite a while, last year they were able to catch a small Striped Marlin and some other very small fish, on todays trip they wanted to get some fish to eat. Hopefully there would be Dorado and Tuna. Juan and Manuel tried to get the Dorado for them by working a lot of debris around 18 miles to the south west, but even though there were some very large logs, and in one case an entire tree, there were no fish on any of the stuff they tried. Several miles further out they spotted two boats working and headed that way, thankfully they got into the Tuna and were able to hang on to two fish in the 25-30 pound class, good for eating, of course. That was the action for the day, but they were able to catch fish, I saw quite a few boats that came up skunked. Thanks guys, we are glad you had a good time.