Cabo Bite Report Capt. George Landrum Fly Hooker Sportfishing [email protected] www.flyhooker.com CABO SAN LUCAS FISH REPORT DECEMBER 13-19, 2004 WEATHER: It was partly cloudy for most of the week, or partly sunny for the optimists. At the tail end of the week the clouds moved in and it became very gloomy, but warm since the clouds trapped the heat. No rain arrived with the cloud cover. Our average night time temperature was 67 degrees and our day time highs were in the high 80’s. WATER: There was a band of warm water in the 74 degree range along the Pacific coast for most of the week, and it extended off shore only a few miles. Once out there, it dropped and was averaging 71 degrees. There was a cold spot outside the Golden Gate Bank that had temperatures in the high 60’s for several days. On the Cortez side of the Cape we were looking at temperatures in the 74 range almost everywhere. At the end of the week the surface temperatures were higher as the cloud cover trapped the heat. BAIT: Almost all Mackerel this week with a few Sardinas as well. Big baits were $2 each while the Sardinas were $20-25 a scoop. FISHING: BILLFISH: The week started out with a bang on the Striped Marlin as they seemed to be almost everywhere. The frustrating thing for a lot of boats was that while they could be seen all over the place, it was not easy finding fish that were hungry. A lot of Captains said there was too much bait out there and it took a while to find a fish that was not already stuffed! It was not uncommon to see 30 fish a trip, sometimes a lot more than that, and if you were lucky you found a few that would bite. The luckier boats caught and released up to 5 fish per day while the average was more like on, maybe two fish hooked out of 25-30 fish that bait was tossed to. These fish are averaging a bit on the small side with most in the 90-120 pound class, but there are a few nice ones in the 140-160 pound range being hooked as well. Live Pacific Green-backed Mackerel has been the bait of choice, tossed in front of moving fish. YELLOWFIN TUNA: There were more Yellowfin found this week than there were last week, but the big ones have not shown up yet. Almost all the Yellowfin caught this week were football fish or smaller school fish, the largest fish I saw was around 40 pounds. There were reports of a few large fish found out past the San Jaime Banks, but I never did find out who caught them. The Fish closer to home were found in Porpoise pods and bit fairly well on small feathers. The best action this week seemed to be on the Pacific side about 15 miles out, but there was some good action had as well on the Sea of Cortez up around the Gorda Banks. At the Gorda, Sardinas were the ticket for a good catch and for some reason the fish were just a bit larger up there. DORADO: Find something floating in the water that has been there for a while and you were almost guaranteed to find a Dorado or two around it, but unless you worked very close to shore, that was the only way you could find one. The open ocean, debris associated Dorado seemed to average about 25 pounds and the inshore fish averaged about 12 pounds, but there were twice as many of them inshore! Small feathers trolled at slightly higher than normal speeds accounted for a lot of the inshore fish while live bait did best off shore. There were also a few stray Dorado up to 50 pounds caught by anglers soaking live bait deep for Striped Marlin. WAHOO: The new moon kicked up the bite on Wahoo this week, but there were no really large fish found. The best action came from near shore on the Sea of Cortez side and was concentrated on the Red Hill area and Gray Rock. Almost all the action took place in less than 50 fathoms of water and some boats were able to get three fish a day, with the average size around 35 pounds. Live bait was the best, but only if they were Mackerel Scad, locally called “Chilwillies (sp?)” INSHORE: Inshore fishing remained slow this week but there are some Sierra beginning to show up. A few scattered Roosterfish and Jack Crevalle round up the major species caught next to the beach and most of the Pangas have been heading out a bit farther looking for Dorado and Striped Marlin. NOTES: This week was pretty good all around for fishing, but not everyone lucked out. For those of you who are longtime fishermen, you know that you don’t catch fish all the time, but you always hope that the bad luck will be on some one else! When it does happen to you, hey, it’s the way it goes some times. I can understand someone who has no experience fishing getting a bit upset over not getting a fish, but to have a supposed “experienced” angler ask for money back or future considerations because they did not get a fish really upsets me. Hey, you hooked into a Marlin; the fish jumped and threw the hook. Sorry about that, but it happens. No sour grapes and better luck next time. Sigh. Anyway, this weeks report was written to the jazz-fusion music of the Danny Godinez Band on the “Live in Anchorage II” CD. Self produced; the album is great music that kept me going this morning, tapping my feet as my fingers danced on the keyboard. You can check them out at www.dannyband.com. Until next week, Tight Lines.