REPORT #1113 "Below the Border" Saltwater Fly-Fishing reports since 1996
East Cape
Mexican Seiner in Vista Sea Sports front yard this week...photo Mark Rayor
Weather is still a little ‘squirrely’, with wind one day, then, none the next.
There are plenty of billfish and dorado being seen on the outside throughout Palmas Bay. The fish are lethargic most of the time and seem to be full of the preponderance of squid that is here right now. One boat slid up on a shark buoy, threw out a handful of sardina to see if there were any dorado hanging out only to have the Sea erupt as a school of sailfish ran down every last one as they hit the water! The dorado that were caught this week seemed to be good quality, 35 – 40 lbs. None-the-less it was another “more shots than snaps for most anglers.” Another indication of the spring turnaround is the number of blue marlin which were spotted this week; one hotel reported two landed.
Closer to shore, the skipjack and white bonito were feeding on the surface making them easy targets for anyone who was interested.
I guess the large schools of small yellowfin have left the building, compliments of the Mexican seiner fleet. Hopefully, at least some of the fish split before the nets hit the water and will return after the seiners leave.
Beach action included ladyfish, pompano and a few small roosters and jacks. The trick was to find the bait (sardina and mullet) and stay with it until the bigger fish showed up.
The week could be summed up…right place + right time equals some good action!
Tip: When fishing the beach, keep moving until you find the bait. When you are casting, “fan cast” left-center-right, and then move on if nothing happens. Don’t keep casting over the same water unless you see some kind of indicative signs that there are fish there.Water temperature 66-78
Air temperature 60-89
Humidity 47 %
Wind: ENE 7 to 9 knots
Conditions: Partly Cloudy
Visibility 11 miles
Sunrise 6:41 a.m. MDT
Sunset 7:50 p.m. MDT
Magdalena Bay, Baja Mexico
Still cooler water temps outside, so most of the action has been confined to small yellowtail and an occasional skipjack or bonito. Just inside the Entrada, there is a good showing of sierra. The tricky part is getting to them before they sink out. Still, good halibut action in the shallows near the sandy beaches like Belchers.
Not many takers, neither anglers nor fish this week. Even the rumors of pargo, corvina and a few snook biting up above Lopez Mateos wasn’t enough to lure anyone out. Maybe it was too much partying on Cinco de Mayo?
Water temperature 62 - 70
Air temperature 62 -88
Humidity 39 %
Wind: NW 6 knots
Conditions: Partly Sunny
Visibility 5 miles
Sunrise 6:46 a.m. MDT
Sunset 8:00 p.m. MDT
Zihuatanejo, Mainland Mexico
Very little change for the inshore fly rod situation. I fished with "Doc" Coalthurst, from Portland OR, down South at Puerto Vicente Guerrero and did not do well on roosters or jack crevalle.
Adolpho. on the panga Dos Hermanos, told me he is getting good jack crevalle action up around Saliditas, which is about a one hour boat ride to the North.
Cali, fishing with Martin, took 2nd place in last week end's 120 boat tournament. The sailfish for the 1st place was only 38 kilos (about 86 pounds). This is a record low for weights in the 32 year annual tournament. Cali told me there were a lot of fish, but almost all of them were below the 30 kilo mark.
Ed Kunze
Water temperature 80 - 84
Air temperature 77-99
Humidity 60%
Wind: SW 3 mph
Conditions: Mostly Sunny
Visibility 9 miles
Sunrise 7:17 a.m. CDT
Sunset 8:09 p.m. CDT
Cabo San Lucas
WEATHER: We had just another week in paradise with our daytime highs varying between 90-95 early in the week and 85-90 later in the week. Our nighttime lows varied as well with 75 early in the week and 65 later in the week. That nighttime low of 75 on Monday and Tuesday night forced us to turn on the air conditioner! We had partly cloudy skies all week long with winds at 10-15 knots from the northwest with occasional higher gusts.
WATER: There was little change in the surface conditions from last week. The Pacific side of the Cape had swells at 3-5 feet and the Cortez side had 1-3 foot swells. The water temperature on the Cortez side was a pretty even 74-76 degrees from the shore out to around 12 miles, then it became 67-69 degrees for another 12-20miles, then there was a pretty strong break where it warmed right back up. On the Pacific side the temperature remained around 66-69 degrees. On the Pacific side from the Golden Gate and across the San Jaime Bank and toward the beach the water was a fairly dirty green, the closer to shore you got the dirtier it got. This plume of cool, green water extended to the south of the Cape keeping the water outside the 1,000-fathom line that dirty green.
BAIT: There was plenty of bait this week as the larger boat brought in plenty of Mackerel to sell to the Panga bait boats. With the small moon the bait boats were able to catch plenty of Caballito as well. This week the bait was the usual $2 per bait. When we purchased bait on Saturday, our supplier informed us that as of this coming Wednesday all the boats were raising their prices to $3 per bait. Keep in mind there has not been a raise in the bait price for almost 8 years, so this is not unexpected.
FISHING:
BILLFISH: Once again the billfish were very easy to find this week, all you had to do was get out on the water. From just off of the lighthouse on the Pacific side around the Cape to the Punta Gorda area they were everywhere. Early in the week they were on the surface sleeping and tailing. Unfortunately, they were also full! They may have been stuffing themselves on squid once again, but for whatever the reason, you could throw baits to 25-30 fish and be lucky to find one or two that were hungry. A few boats resorted to drifting live baits deep, and this technique did work a little better than trolling lures while casting bait to fish on the surface. As the week went on the fish seemed to move up the Cortez coast just a bit and then back to in front of the arch. At the end of the week the ratio of fish baited and fish hooked improved a bit and most boats that tried to work Marlin were able to catch between two and four per trip, definitely an improvement over earlier in the week. Mackerel was the bait of choice; Caballito just didn’t seem to get the fish interested. The Striped Marlin averaged around 120 pounds.
YELLOWFIN TUNA: At the beginning of this week all the purse seiners we had out front last week had gone north, leaving us with just “scales drifting down” where before we had great fishing. Of course the fish were not around, they had all moved out or had been scooped up in the nets! Well, on the positive side, on Saturday this week the fish re-appeared just two miles out off the arch and lighthouse. These fish were also a bit larger with most of them between 20-30 pounds with a few pushing 40 pounds. One hour in the fish resulted in 16 Yellowfin for one of our groups of anglers. Almost anything worked, as these fish were very hungry. I went up on the Cortez side on Saturday and we got into a very larges group of dolphin with birds everywhere and large schools of bait showing up on the depth sounder. No Yellowfin though, and I could see two super seiners just on the horizon to the north, off of Los Frailles. I wonder if they had already gotten all the fish?
DORADO: The warmer water out front brought more dorado into our area and most boats were able to get at least one or two fish per trip. One of my friends was fishing up off the Punta Gorda area earlier in the week and found a dead whale that had been around long enough to attract quite a collection of life under it and was able to limit out on fish averaging 15 pounds. There were a few fish in the 30- pound range there as well. Everywhere else the bite was just all right with bright colored lures and live bait fished for Marlin getting the most fish.
WAHOO: The moon phase might be wrong for Wahoo this last week as I did not hear of any of them being caught.
INSHORE: Our anglers tat fished off of Pangas this week continued to do well with a varied catch including Roosterfish to 15 pounds, Sierra to 8 pounds, Yellowtail to 15 pounds and an assortment of bottom fish such as snapper and grouper to 10 pounds. The majority of the fish were found just off the beach on the Pacific side but when the late afternoon winds kicked in the afternoon trips worked off of Gray Rock and Cabo del Sol for the same type of fish. On Saturday, when the Yellowfin showed up so close to the arch, almost every Panga out there was in the mix, and they all did well. Quite a few of the Pangas were working just off the beach for Marlin as well throughout the week, and were averaging just about the same as the cruisers.
NOTES: The Seiners left, that’s good news, there are Tuna out front again, that’s good news! Live bait is going up in price on Wednesday, that’s bad news! I’m done with this week’s report, that’s good news! Until next week, tight lines! Give a listen to the music of an old Fender Stratocaster player, Dick Dale on his album “Spatial Disorientation”, that’s weird news!
George & Mary Landrum
Water temperature 67 - 75
Air temperature 57 - 85
Humidity 53%
Wind: SSE at 18 mph
Conditions: Sunny
Visibility 10 miles
Sunrise 6:42 a.m. MST
Sunset 7:50 p.m. MST
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