April 30, 2005 Anglers – Los Cabos vacationers are now being welcomed by ideal springtime weather conditions, plenty of warm sunshine and high temperatures ranged from 80 to 85 degrees. There was still prevalent northerly winds that were picking up by mid day, but overall the ocean conditions were improving, clean blue water was found within several miles of shore and the water continued to be on a warming trend, average temperatures throughout the region ranged from 69 to 74 degrees. Sportfishing fleets found the majority of the more consistent action relatively close to shore, anywhere from 2 to 8 miles out, with the action spread out from Cabo San Lucas to Desteladera. Supplies of both mackerel and sardinas were readily available for purchase in the early morning. Most common offshore species was striped marlin, but more dorado were also found this past week, along with a handful of wahoo and yellowfin tuna. Off the bottom there were some quality cabrilla, pargo and yellowtail accounted for and along the shoreline anglers found a variety of pompano, pargo, jack crevalle and sierra providing plenty of action. Striped marlin were found spread out and were sighted tailing on the surface, free jumping and feeding in the blue offshore waters, the best methods proved to be either trolling bait of drift fishing with baits down deep, but a percentage of stripers were also striking on trolled lures. Boats targeting marlin averaged about one fish per day, but some charters were catching as many as three, these figures are down from last week when the bite had been so red-hot. Most of the marlin now being caught are ranging in the 100 to 130 pound class. There has been large concentrations of squid on the local fishing grounds and this has attributed to less consistent action, apparently the fish are gorging themselves on the squid and at times show little interest in any other offerings. Dorado are now becoming more prevalent in the daily fish counts, still only one or two here and there, but much improved compared to how it had been for several weeks prior when virtually none were even being seen. A few wahoo were also spotted and hooked into this past week, with the warmer water now moving into the Gordo Banks region this is stating to bring in the species that prefer the more tropical waters. The Gordo Banks has had large yellowfin tuna feeding there all week, these fish are ranging from 20 pounds on up to possibly 300 pounds, huge tuna were seen clearing themselves all the way out of the water, quite a show, but they had practically no interest in any of the anglers offerings, as they were gorging on the abundant red crabs and squid. Several tuna were hooked into with sardinas, but they were the exception, one specimen of 104 pounds was landed from a panga out of La Playita and several other to 40 pounds were taken, but the size of some of the yellowfin tuna seen breezing through the area had both anglers and skippers in awe, when they do decide to go on the bite with sardinas or chunk bait that will be a spectacular show. An additional bonus on the banks has been the whale sharks, which are now being spotted daily. Shallow water bottom fishing produced quality-sized cabrilla and pargo to 20 pounds, with a few yellowtail mixed in, bait fishing proved to be better than jigs, fish were not too numerous but the quality was there. Surf anglers reported improved action for jack crevalle, a few pargo and halibut off of the San Jose Estuary and La Playita area. There was at least one 20-pound snook reportedly taken by a local angler in the afternoon. The combined La Playita sent out 84 pangas this past week and anglers accounted for: 145 sierra, 45 jack crevalle, 12 roosterfish, 92 pompano, 220 pargo, 85 cabrilla, 6 yellowtail, 16 yellowfin tuna, 40 dorado, 22 striped marlin, and 4 hammerhead sharks. Good Fishing, Eric