One Month Closer to Spring…

Charlie McCrow of London, England, with his 20 pound rooster on the fly, Panga - Dos Hermanos II with Captain Cheva, Photo and Guide - Ed Kunze
Endless Season Update February 28, 2010
REPORT #1204 "Below the Border" Saltwater Fly-Fishing reports since 1996

East Cape

Typical up and down wind didn't prevent some lucky anglers to land some nice-sized yellowtail. Actually, the no-wind days outweighed the windy ones. For some it was just a mixed bag, producing some fun days on the water; to keep things interesting, several of the local reefs are holding grouper, cabrilla and pargo

There is enough bait around to attract both jacks and roosters. There are a few schools of 'grandes' exhibiting their ability to provide many more refusals than takes. There were a few nice sized fish caught, but not in the 'Bubba' class for sure.

As normal the trick was to stick with the inshore as long as it produced. Many days it remained consistent throughout the fishing day. On other days it slowed down and heading outside, while tempting, was not worth the effort. Thank goodness we are done with February and getting closer to Spring every day!

Current East Cape Weather http://tiny.cc/EastCapeWeather303

Magdalena Bay, Baja Mexico

The most consistent activity throughout the bay is the whale watching which continues to attract many tourists eager to photograph the mom's and their calves.

Lance Peterson and his friend, Brad Ellis, spent several days fishing out of Lopez Mateos with excellent results. They caught a variety of species including the elusive snook..all on the fly.

Lance reported that though they were mostly smaller fish, they were still very cool. Even though he has caught more roosters on the fly than anyone else I could name, this was his first snook on the fly and he was stoked! The fishing was pretty impressive. He went on to say that his Panguero Roddy was a master at boat handling. Having the right Captain, the right gear and the skills to make it happen made the team a deadly combo!

Current Magdalena Bay Weather http://tiny.cc/MagBayWeather150

Zihuatanejo, Mainland Mexico

The blue water fishing has been a bit erratic, but the quality has increased dramatically. The boats are averaging about a sailfish a day each, but the 15 boat blue water boat fleet caught three blue marlin on Tuesday, six on Wednesday, and another five today (Thursday). Plus, the action is taking place only 10 miles off the beach in front of Ixtapa. This does not reflect how many other boats, armed with lighter sailfish gear, lost a blue. For every blue marlin hooked, there had to be at least three lost.

As Paul Phillips was telling me..."there is a blue water dead sea area out there, and when it passes through, the fishing will be decent." The beautiful blue water…better than I had seen in a month…was at 14 miles but held no life. It passed through, and we are now getting fish.

Inshore has been incredibly unseasonable, with a great showing of roosterfish. Fly fishing client, Charlie McCrow of England got a nice 20-pound rooster while fishing with Cheva and me on the panga, Dos Hermanos II. We were up at the Pantla/Buena Vista Beach area, which Adolfo had tipped us off as to being a good bet.

And Adolfo, on the Dos Hermanos, has been doing his usual inshore magic. Fishing the areas from Playa Linda to Troncones, his conventional gear clients caught 15 jack crevalle and 6 roosters on one day, and the next day they caught "mucho" jacks and 4 roosters…Ed Kunze

Current Zihuatanejo Weather http://tiny.cc/zihuatanejo582


Cabo San Lucas

Striped marlin are being caught, but not in numbers to get excited about. Fish were seen close to the shore in the greenish water on the Cortez side, and anglers bottom fishing for grouper and snapper who dropped a live mackerel halfway to the bottom in 150 feet of water hooked two marlin, releasing one and losing the other. Other boats were seeing one here and one there on the surface in the same type of conditions. There was no consistent bite nor was there any regularity to the areas they were being found.

Well, the yellowfin had some regularity to where they were being found, and that was way out there! Most of the fish found this week were from football size to 30 pounds and it was a long run for a consistent bite! While there were fish found as close as 18 miles due south and 24 miles at 210 degrees, most of the action has been due east 35 miles or due south at 40 miles, a long two-hour run for the charters. If you got into the right porpoise pod, the action was 'hot and heavy', but there were a lot of pods with no fish. If you did happen to be in the right ones, almost anything was working, from feathers to marlin lures to cedar plugs.

Dorado seemed to be missing in action this week. While boats were able to find the type of debris that would normally hold these fish (weed lines, dead seals, wood), there were few if any fish under any of them.

Inshore fishing provided the most consistent action. Though not large, there was an abundance of fish. The most common catch was sierra and most boats did not have any problem limiting out on them. Small swimming plugs, hootchies and live sardina, all rigged with a small trace of wire leader resulted in plenty of fish in the box. Anglers working yo-yo style jigs on the rocky bottom did well on amberjack to 25 pounds, grouper to 20 pounds and snapper to 20 pounds with an occasional larger specimen of each in the mix. There were also plenty of roosterfish to be had; unfortunately most of them were in the small five pound or less class, but there was an occasional school of 20 to 25 pound fish that gave good action. Yellowtail provided some steady action with fish to 30 pounds for boats that worked the points on the Pacific side, but several shrimp boats put a crimp on the action as they anchored on the schools and had 10 guys hand-lining with shrimp heads as bait. Watching the fish come over the rail one after the other really let you know how many there were in the school.

Whales are still providing a show for everyone, both humpbacks and a few grays are always in view. I don't know if there is any correlation between these things, but along with the warm, green water has come the Humboldt squid. A lot of the boats are stopping to jig up a few of these after a long offshore trip just to get something for their anglers to pull on. Spot the bird piles working just off the surface and you can see the squid. Pull up so that your lures sink and pretty soon you are hooked up. Don't get inked though, it's pretty nasty to get off. ...George and Mary Landrum
Current Cabo Weather http://tiny.cc/cabo191