REPORT #1106 "Below the Border" Saltwater Fly-Fishing reports since 1996
East Cape
Cerviche time
Warmer water and less wind again brought this week brought some early rooster and jack action up toward Punta Pescadero and beyond to El Cardonal. Some better quality fish to 20 lbs. were found crashing on sardina close to shore. The bait also attracted a mixture of sierra, pargo and pompano,
Inshore the sierra and white bonito were concentrated in front of La Ribera and down to Punta Colorada.
Offshore there were rumors of a few marlin out beyond thirty miles and a few small dorado spread throughout Palmas bay.
Up at Muertos, the grande yellowtail were still continuing their early season snap. Also some pargo and jacks were around to tear up tackle.
Tip: When you get that yellow or pargo bite, set the hook and reel those first few seconds. It is critical to keep the fish from darting back into the rocks.
Water temperature 66-73
Air temperature 63-88
Humidity 75 %
Wind: NNE 6 to 8 knots
Conditions: Sunny
Visibility 7 miles
Sunrise 7:23 a.m. MST
Sunset 7:30 p.m. MST
Magdalena Bay, Baja Mexico
Windy conditions prevailed most of the week, not allowing boats to go outside. The few that did venture outside the Boca found some breezing schools of small yellowtail just a few miles beyond the entrance.
Estero action was limited to a few halibut and the obligatory bay bass.
Water temperature 62 - 70
Air temperature 64 -88
Humidity 75%
Wind: WNW 10 to 13 knots
Conditions: Partly Sunny
Visibility 6 miles
Sunrise 7:30 a.m. MST
Sunset 7:38 p.m. MST
Zihuatanejo, Mainland Mexico
The cool water is still with us, but the Terrafin Satellite Surface Temperature images show a finger of 80º water has moved up from the South. The warm water starts from about 10 miles from the beach, and extends to about 30 miles out.
A few sailfish, dorado and blue marlin are being taken, with the yellowfin tuna really getting active.
The clear water is about 10 miles, and the most action, especially with the yellowfin tuna, being at the 16 mile mark. The yellowfin are averaging about 30 pounds each.
This morning (Thursday), Cali called in to me to give me his weekly report on the Aloha. By 8:00 a.m., he already had a 25 pound dorado on the boat. He had also fished the last two days with fly fishing client, Robert Hoy, raising 5 sailfish and 1 blue marlin.
Margarito, on the Gaby, told me he had gotten into schools of large jack crevalle 5 miles off the beach. They boated several of the 20 pound jacks before continuing on to find a couple of sailfish.
Almost every boat in the fleet is getting the added spectacle of hump back whales, as they have moved into the area. Plus, lots of sea turtles are also being sighted each day by each boat.
Ed Kunze
Water temperature 80 - 84
Air temperature 73-96
Humidity 60%
Wind: NNE 3mph
Conditions: Partly Cloudy
Visibility 10 miles
Sunrise 7:50 a.m. CST
Sunset 7:57 p.m. CST
Cabo San Lucas
WEATHER: While the week started off great, with the daytime highs to the low 90’s and nighttime lows in the mid 60’s, at the end of the week the clouds moved in and the wind picked up. As of the weekend we were having winds from the northwest to 18-20 mph with partly cloudy skies and the average temperatures had dropped by 8-10 degrees. No rain came with the front system, but it definitely cooled things off.
WATER: As a result of the winds later in the week, what had been smooth 2-4 foot swells with light breezes on the Pacific side turned into sheep farming by Friday. Everywhere you looked there were whitecaps and swells that had kicked up to 4-6 feet with a few larger ones. Boats that fished south of the Cape early in the week started reporting the wind and swell increase on Tuesday and by Thursday the effects were right off the Cape. On the Cortez side, things were a bit nicer, especially in the morning before the wind really got to cranking it up. Outside of 10 miles though the effects came into play and you had to deal with the choppy conditions. As a result of the wind and the strong California current there was a band of very cool water, down as low as 59 degrees right at the lighthouse. Almost made me expect Albacore Tuna! On the Pacific side the water remained cool, between 59 and 65 degrees outside the 1,000-fathom line. This cool water extended south a distance of 30 miles while on the eastern side of the Cape it only went north as far as a line east of Cabo out to the 1150 area. Farther north it warmed a bit to the 68-degree range and out to the south of the Seamount there was a warm spot that had been drifting around all week that had water as warm as 71 degrees.
BAIT: Mackerel was easily available at the usual $2 per bait and there were also Caballito at the same price.
FISHING:
BILLFISH: Striped Marlin this week were found either close to shore, within 10 miles on the Pacific side or far out, past 30 miles to the south. While there were fish spotted, there were not many of them that were hungry. Looking at the flags flying as boats returned for the day and talking to the guys who were out there this week, the fish were either going to eat right away or disappear before you could get a bait to them. My guess is that only 10% of the boats had a decent shot at a Striped Marlin this week and about half of them hooked up, with some of these fish lost. From that I guess you can tell that the percentages were pretty low. I did hear rumors of a large Marlin, either Blue or Black, being landed early in the week. This fish was reported to be in the #400 range but I never heard anything more on it. With water this cold it would be surprising to me to have one out there, but you never know. There were a few more Swordfish hooked this past week in the cool, green water to the southwest with the largest reported at #250. These fish were reported to have eaten live Mackerel.
YELLOWFIN TUNA: Once again it was mostly football Yellowfin this week. The majority of the fish were found south at 30+ miles early in the week before the wind picked up. Later in the week the fish may have been there still, but it was too rough for most of the boats to get there. As a result of the wind more boats fished on the Cortez side of the Cape and around the warm water sot south of the Seamount there were reports of fish averaging 25 pounds with a few to 50 pounds mixed in with the white bellied dolphin. There were massive pods of these dolphin reported off of the Pacific side in the area of the San Jaime Banks, but with the pods reported to be 3 or 4 miles wide and long, it was difficult to find any fish with them.
DORADO: I did see several Dorado flags early in the week but nothing over this weekend.
WAHOO: Wahoo are in the same category this week as Dorado, with the red flags seen flying but I believe they were all for Sierra!
INSHORE: There was a giant school of small Yellowtail found on the Pacific side up at Los Arcos early in the week. Thank goodness the wind kicked up, as there may be some of them that escaped to reproduce. A lot of the Pangas were going out and loading up on them, and these were small fish in the 5-pound range. I hated to see this as for many of the guys there was no reasoning with them, it was a “load up while you can, the hell with the stock’ mentality. There were a lot of the Captains however that limited their clients to only a couple of these for dinner, then took off to look for larger fish. My hat is off to these guys; they care about the future of the fishery here. Also inshore there were scattered Pargo up in the rocks as well as a few larger Yellowtail to 40 pounds just off the bottom in 120 feet of water.
NOTES: I hope the winds die down, but it looks as if it may continue to blow for the next four of five days. Normally this type of wind only lasts three days then we get three days of good weather. It remains to be seen if we will have the same pattern this season. There are still whales around but they are getting ready to return to the north. No music this week, I wrote this report to the sounds of the wind blowing, my dog snoring and one of the cats crying for treats. Until next week, tight lines!
George & Mary Landrum
Water temperature 42 - 76
Air temperature 61-89
Humidity 22%
Wind: NNE at 4mph
Conditions: Sunny
Visibility 13 miles
Sunrise 7:23 a.m. MST
Sunset 7:31 p.m. MST
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