March 5, 2006 Anglers – Ideal wintertime weather conditions continue to greet vacationers traveling to the Los Cabos area. Skies have been clear and daytime highs were in the low 80s, winds did blow consistently from the north, but were not too much of a difficulty, as they did not top more than 10 to 13 miles per hour. For the most part anglers enjoyed favorable ocean conditions, with water temperature ranging from a cool 66 degrees on the Pacific side of the peninsula to an average of 71 to 73 degrees on the Sea of Cortez side and north to Los Frailes. Bait supplies varied from day to day as to what was available, with the preferred offshore baits including caballito and mackerel, then for the smaller gamefish closer to shore it was the sardinas that proved to be more productive. Water clarity fluctuated daily, with cloudy green water found on the Pacific, to clean blue water being reported north towards Los Frailes. With the water temperatures now on the rise prospects are optimistic for the coming weeks. On the offshore fishing grounds there were large concentrations of bolito now appearing, these fish are always a great sign for attracting a variety of larger pelagic species. Whales remained numerous throughout the area and should be hanging around in local waters into April. Sportfishing fleets were concentrating their efforts from Chileno, the 95 spot, offshore of San Jose del Cabo and outside of the Gordo Banks. Striped marlin were found spread out anywhere from 5 to 25 miles from shore, by the end of the week most of the stripers were moving further out, in the 20 mile range. Fish were striking on trolled lures and bait, though anglers dropping back or casting with live baits reported a greater percentage of hook ups. Most charters that targeting billfish were accounting for more than a few opportunities per day and some landed several fish per trip. Increasing numbers of dorado were appearing in the fish counts, most of them found further from shore in the same areas as were the marlin. For anglers lucky enough to find any floating debris they reported fast action on dorado up to 25 pounds. Yellowfin tuna action was slow throughout the region, with only a few reports of tuna up to 30 pounds found traveling with porpoise further offshore, but at this time this was not a consistent bite. The inshore bite continued to be the best bet for the panga fleets launching out of San Jose del Cabo, fleets found great action from Red Hill and north to San Luis. Anglers found wide-open fishing for Mexican Bonito, particularly on San Luis Bank, though on some days the north wind made this area a bit choppy. These scrappy fighters weighed from 3 to 8 pounds and were striking on iron jigs throughout the entire water column. Perhaps the most consistent inshore bite was found at San Luis, an area locally known as "blue rock”. A wide variety of smaller gamefish congregate on this spot every year during the months from February to April. At this time the sierra are dominating the activity, ranging in sizes from 2 to 6pounds, proving to be great fighters on light tackle and also tricky to hook up. The best technique recently has been to chum while drifting fishing with dead sardinas, anglers could see the schools of fish darting in and out from underneath the boat. A variety of pargo, cabrilla, triggerfish, amberjack and pompano were rounding out the catches. Off the deeper rock piles, 120 to 180 feet, anglers working yo-yo jigs had varying reports of hooking into hard fighting amberjack and cabrilla up to 20 pounds. The first part of the week produced some very good action for huachinango and other pargo species, this was while supplies of red crabs remained, the Inner Gordo Banks was one of the better places for the snapper, though dealing with a pair of pesky sea lions that have taken up residence there was a nuisance. The La Playita panga fleets sent out approximately 74 panga charters for the week, with anglers accounting for a combined catch of; 710 sierra, 560 Mexican Bonito, 18 dorado, 7 striped marlin, 310 pargo, 22 cabrilla, 42 pompano, 29 triggerfish and 26 amberjack. Good Fishing, Eric