Cabo San Lucas Fishing Report for Nov 30-Dec 6, 2003 Capt. George Landrum "Fly Hooker" Sportfishing [email protected] www.flyhooker.com CABO FISH REPORT FOR NOVEMBER 30 TO DECEMBER 6, 2003 WEATHER: We had a good week weather wise with our highs in the high 80’s and lows in the mid 60’s. It was partly cloudy at the beginning of the week but cleared up at the end. Light winds in the afternoon but almost no breeze in the mornings made for very comfortable conditions. WATER: We had one day this week, I believe it was Tuesday, when the surface conditions on the Pacific side were rough, but that was due to conflicting currents, not due to wind. By rough, I mean that there were big swells, some of them 8 foot, with a lot of little stuff between and small standing whitecaps. This condition extended for almost 15 miles. The rest of the week there were small swells of the normal 2-4 foot variety, calm in the mornings with a little chop in the afternoons. The Sea of Cortez was calm up until past the Vinorama area, then it got rough due to wind. The Sea of Cortez was showing an almost even 79-80 degrees across the board at the end of the week while the Pacific side was just a degree cooler. There was a good temperature break 30 miles to the west where we went from 78 to 76 degree water. BAIT: Mackerel at the normal $2 each and Sardinas at $20 a bucket were available all week long. FISHING: BILLFISH: This is the third week in a row where the concentration of Marlin has been on the lighthouse and most of them have been caught while dropping down live bait. These are Striped Marlin and the average weight has been around 110 pounds. A few have been caught on the troll while working close to the coast up the Pacific side. Dark colored lures have been the ticket there. YELLOWFIN TUNA: Long runs and keeping your fingers crossed were the key to getting Tuna this week. The closest I heard of them coming in was 14 miles to the west but the concentration of Tuna was found on the temperature break 30 miles west. Of course, they were associated with the Porpoise. Live bait, small feathers, cedar plugs and little hootchies were working on them. Most of the Tuna were in the football category, up to 20 pounds, with a few larger fish mixed in. I know there were fish found in other places, but that is where most of the effort was centered. DORADO: Either you found wood floating or you found Frigate birds working, that was almost the only way anyone caught Dorado this week. Most of the fish found were less than 25 pounds in size and some boats did very well if they were the first to a piece of wood. Live bait was the key and if you were lucky, there could be a big school under the wood and you limited out. Most of the boats never saw a Dorado this week though. WAHOO: Coming up on the full moon there were Wahoo caught at the end of the week and they were found on the banks or on the ledge at the lighthouse. Quite a few boats got bit while soaking bait for Marlin but of course, those teeth made short work of the mono leaders! Most of the fish were in the 45 pound class with a few going to 80 pounds. INSHORE: Small Sierra, Jack Crevalle and Pargo were the fish caught inshore this week, and the action was not very hot. Most boats came in with a couple of Pargo caught on live bait and a few Sierra, but a few boats actually got into good schools of the little razormouths and were able to get a dozen or more fish in the 5 pound class. NOTES: The whales are starting to show up. Mary and I were invited out on a sunset cruise and we spent almost an hour watching three Humpbacks right off the point. As the water cools down we should start to see the Gray whales showing up as well. The fishing was a bit off this week, it seemed you either got Marlin close to home while soaking bait, or made a long journey offshore for a chance at small Tuna. I know this is not the kind of information you like to hear, but that’s the way it is. Things should pick up soon. Until next week, Tight lines! Fly Hooker Daily fishing Reports for Nov 30-Dec 6, 2003 Capt. George Landrum "Fly Hooker" Sportfishing [email protected] www.flyhooker.com WEEKLY FISH COUNT 1 Striped Marlin 120 pounds tagged and released 1 Striped Marlin 160 pounds tagged and released 1 Striped Marlin 110 pounds kept 9 Dorado to 30 pounds kept 14 Yellowfin to 22 pounds kept Lots of Bonita released “FLY HOOKER” FISH REPORT FOR NOVEMBER 30, 2003 Today was the last day of fishing for our friend Bob Deeter and I got a chance to spend it with him. During his days here Bob had caught BIG Wahoo, BIG Yellowfin, too many “Stinkin’ Marlin” but had not gotten any Dorado yet. With our fingers crossed, and expecting only Yellowfin, Manuel and I went south. We cruised for a half hour then put lines in the water. About 45 minutes later Manuel got a call on the radio that a friend had found Porpoise and there were birds working as well so we pulled in the lines and ran to the spot. We were the fourth boat there but no one had hooked up yet. A few minutes after we arrived one of the boats hooked up to a Striped Marlin, a pretty small one, but that was all the action. We left after working the Porpoise for about 45 minutes, looking for something that would produce fish for us. An hour later Manuel saw a boat doing slow circles, way off in the distance. I was driving so I picked up the speed and we headed that way. A few miles later I saw something off to the right, it looked like a jug in the water, so we detoured to check it out. It turned out to be a tree root with a couple of birds sitting on it. Eureka! There were Dorado around the wood and in the next hour we fought and landed 8 Dorado, all on live bait. The first fish were the largest and we caught four that were between 20 and 30 pounds, the others were in the 10-20 pound class. With all the bait gone, Bob and I decided to try jigging and Manuel pulled the boat right up to the log. Manuel yelled “Dorado” and pointed right to the log. Both Bob and I kept looking into the water but could not see anything swimming around. Finally I realized that the Dorado he was talking about was what I had mistook for a root off of the log. Bob and I thought that the fish was either one that had come off when we first arrived or one another boat had caught and it had come entangled on the wood and broken off. I mean, this fish was nose up to the log, hanging vertically. Manuel backed the boat up to the fish and I gaffed it, fully expecting a rotten fish to come up. To our surprise the fish was in rigor, had bright red gill, beautiful color and bled when cut! The only thing I can think of is that either it was the first fish we lost and it banged against the log or it had been chasing bait and killed itself running into the log. Anyway, we caught eight Dorado and ended up with nine! There was more than enough fish fillets for Bob and we decided to go in early to give Manuel a chance to get to his baseball game. Thanks Bob, once again I had a great time with you! See you again next year! “FLY HOOKER” FISH REPORT FOR DECEMBER 1, 2003 Howard Grodenski called us from Virginia on Saturday and wanted to know if the boat was available for today and tomorrow. It just happened to be open and he flew in yesterday. This morning Juan and Manuel took him to the same spot where Manuel and I had found the log yesterday and started to search. They came across another piece of wood that held a lot of bait and had birds sitting on it, but no Dorado. They also came across two separate pods of Porpoise but had no Tuna strikes. Tossed bait to three of the four Marlin they saw and had no takers. One of those kind of days. The water was beautiful though, and I got some projects taken care of so I am going along tomorrow. I sure hope we find fish! “FLY HOOKER” FISH REPORT FOR DECEMBER 2, 2003 Howard invited me so I was on the boat today. We had decided yesterday afternoon that today we would either go up the Sea of Cortez to the Gorda Banks area or up the Pacific coast, depending on the weather and on what other boats had been doing. Three days in a row to the south had produced only one good day of fishing and that was a lot of luck. Manuel said that the fishing up towards San Jose had been slow so this morning we decided to try the Pacific side. Lines in the water at 7 AM after a 15 minute cruise and the boat kept pointing it’s bow south. After a while I started to get worried that Juan and Manuel had changed the game plan on us. Nope, Manuel had spotted three boats about 12 miles out that looked as if they were staying in one spot, maybe working Tuna or a piece of Debris with Dorado. Eventually we got close to the area and could see that they just happened to be in the same spot, there was no concentrated activity. The bow turned towards the coast in the area of Margarite and when we got about 6 miles off the beach we spotted several Frigate Birds working. Excitement was in the air and fish on our minds as we got closer and prepared ourselves for some action. Shoot, it was a big school of baby Dorado chasing little bitty baitfish. One of the Frigates got hold of a little Dorado and took off with it. Gives you an idea of their size, huh? We kept going and about 5 miles off the beach we finally had a hit. The strike was on the rigged Ballyhoo on the stinger rod. It was a hard strike and took a bit of line but did not stick. Juan ran down and pinned on a Mackerel, which he then dropped back. I cleared the short line then ran to the bridge and started to bring in the stinger line, hoping the fish was still back there and would follow the lure in and see the bait. That’s exactly what happened, but the Marlin took the bait off the hook. Juan quickly reeled in and rebaited and I brought the stinger lure in. The Marlin had just had it’s appetite teased and came right back on the second bait. Hooked up! Howard got into the chair and reeled like crazy. The line came in so easily that he thought it must be a little Dorado or some other small fish, but after the fish approached the boat it changed direction and took off! Back and forth, back and forth it went for 30 minutes. Finally Howard was able to get the fish close enough to the boat for Juan to touch leader and make it a legal catch. I had the camera ready and for the next 15 minutes was able to get some great shots of the fish in the air, and of Howard sweating as he worked the fish. After 45 minutes Juan was able to get the leader and grab the bill. I placed the tag in the fish and we released it. Way to go Howard, a nice fight and release on a #120 Striped Marlin. Just a few minutes later we saw another fish on the surface and tossed it a bait, but the fish went down. That was all the action we had. As we approached the lighthouse there were almost 30 boats working the ledge, both trolling, slow trolling live bait and dropping live bait deep. We slow trolled live mackerel across the area, two up on top and one deep, as well as having a rigged ballyhoo out but we had no interest from the fish. Back in the Marina flying a blue Marlin flag and a red release flag, we were one of very few boats flying any flags today. I don’t know what happened to all the fish we had around last week, but every day is different and maybe tomorrow the bite will turn back on. Until then, Tight lines! “FLY HOOKER” FISH REPORT FOR DECEMBER 3, 2003 Michael Parker and his friend Eric are here from Seattle with their families and have arranged today for a fishing expedition. Michael is a fishing junkie so he made all the arrangements! The girls get tomorrow at the spa while the guys watch the kids, a good trade off. Juan and Manuel went about 17 miles out to find the fish today but they did well. Eric got the first Marlin of the day, one that struck a lure. The Striped Marlin was estimated at 160 pounds according to Juan, and after a very long 30 minute fight it was tagged and released. The fish did not do a lot of jumping and that increased the amount of time it took to bring in. They also got into some Yellowfin Tuna, in among Porpoise, and ended up catching seven of them, most of the fish about 7-10 pounds, footballs. There were enough fillets that they ended up with about 23 pounds of meat, which they had smoked to take home. That was all the action out in the deep water but Michael still wanted to get a Marlin. With several hours left, Juan and Manuel decided to join the crowd at the lighthouse and drop down live bait and wait for a bite. It was just about 10 minutes before time to quit when the Marlin finally took a bait. Once again the fish did not jump, and it only took about 30 minutes for Michael to get the fish in. This one was bleeding from the gills so Juan and Manuel took it. All right, the boat was flying two Marlin flags, one release flag and four Tuna flags (that’s all the tuna flags we have) when they came in the Marina, and that was a lot better than most of the boats did today! Good going guys, we were glad you had a good time! “FLY HOOKER” FISHING REPORT FOR DECEMBER 5, 2003 I got to go fishing again with our friend Jeff deBrown of “Baja On The Fly” as he brought three anglers down from the East Cape. Jeff had taken Ken, Lazlo and Ken’s son Cody out fishing for two days up there, but their luck had been bad, blanked for both days. The wind was blowing just a little as we left the Marina this morning, but I thought that it would die off by 9 am. We had loaded up on Sardinas, a necessity when fly fishing as you generally need a lot of chum to draw fish to the boat. I told Manuel (Juan was sick today) to keep going until we found Porpoise or something floating. It’s tough enough having the handicap of being a fly fisherman, you have to be where the fish are in order to catch them. No sense in blind casting, that’s a waste of time. Accordingly, Manuel headed out to the west and we kept cruising for two hours before finally finding Porpoise. The pod was enormous and there were Frigate birds working it as well. They were moving along at a fairly good clip so we started off by trolling flies. The first pass resulted in a triple strike! Lazlo, Ken and Jeff fought the Yellowfin to the boat and they were perfect size, around 10 pounds each. As they were fighting the fish I was tossing out Sardinas, hoping to keep the fish by the boat and get the guys a chance to cast to them. Well, a 10 pound Yellowfin on 11 weight rods are not a quick catch, and even though I could get the fish to boil for a little while, the main school moved away by the time the guys got their fish to the boat. This happened every time we hooked up, but since we did not get triple strikes every time, the guys did get a chance to cast once in a while. It ended up that every fish we hooked up came on the troll, and there were Bonita mixed in there as well. I got a chance to fight one of the fish but crossed lines with one Ken had hooked up and got cut off. Oh well, that’s the way it goes sometimes! I think that Jeff ended up loosing a couple of shooting heads, once when one line caught in the prop (Jeff was on the rod), and then that one I got cut off on. Cody got to fight three fish and started to feel bad (a little seasick). Ken gave him some Dramamine and he knocked out on the engine cover for the rest of the trip. Ken got the largest fish of the trip when he hooked up to a 22 pound Yellowfin! It took him a long time to bring the fish to the boat, a lot of runs in a fish that size on fly gear! Eventually the bite died off and we used up just about all the chum. That is when Jeff had a big boil behind the fly he was trolling. We both saw it at the same time, and then it swirled again! A short run of about ten yards then a Dorado that was at least 30 pounds jumped in the air! All right, everyone saw the fish and we were excited! The Dorado started to make a long run, constantly jumping and putting up huge splashes. Another boat was in the area and not until it got close to us did we realize the Captain had never looked our way or noticed that we were hooked up! We yelled and whistled and finally his deck hand heard us and saw us wave them away, but it was to late. By the time the Captain turned his head, saw us waving and turned his wheel, he had run over the line and cut it off about 25 feet from the backing. Ouch, a nice fish and $60 worth of fly line gone! Jeff had handed off the fish to Lazlo but there was nothing any of us could have done. Well, that was the end of the day for us and we were facing a 30 mile run back to the Marina. It was a really good day on the water and it was nice to have a successful fly fishing trip! Thanks Jeff, next time I am going to have to charge more if we are going to be cruising for 5 1/2 hours, it really burns up the fuel! It was loads of fun and lets do it again! Thanks again, and I am really glad that both Ken and Lazlo and Cody had a great time. Yes Ken, I agree that if you tied a Steelhead and a Tuna tail-to-tail that the Tuna would win! “FLY HOOKER” FISH REPORT FOR 6 DECEMBER, 2003 Jay, John, Ron and Wes were our anglers today. This trip was arranged once they had come down and they had inquired about it first, but were undecided on fishing or golfing for the day. Fishing won out but they may have caught more on the golf course! Juan and Manuel started the day off the lighthouse on the Pacific side and it was shortly thereafter that a Marlin was sighted on the surface. A live bait was tossed but there was no interest shown by the fish. They continued trolling out to where we had found the porpoise yesterday, almost 30 miles out, and they did find the Porpoise. So did a few other boats. But no one had any action from fish there, and no fish were seen busting the surface. On the way back they found two Frigate birds working and checked it out. There were a few Dorado seen feeding under the birds, but once again, there was no interest in either the lures or in live bait. Some days you get fish, other days you get stinky, and today was one of the stinky ones. Sorry about that guys, we hope you were not too disappointed, and we hope you have better luck next time!