August 10, 2008
Anglers –
The start of August has brought with it similar weather patterns as July, this being hot and humid tropical weather. After the surprisingly powerful rain, wind, lightening and thunder squall of last weekend conditions have settled down, though at this time Tropical Storm Hernan is gaining strength below Manzanillo, but it appears to on a track that will keep the system well away from any landfall, but surely will contribute to continued high humidity. Tourism is generally slow during both August and September and this summer it appears that it will be even more slack than usual, the combined factors of the poor economy, high airfares, luggage restrictions, taxi manifestations, muggy weather and sub par fish counts are all accountable.
Ocean conditions have continued to improve, cleaner blue water now found within several miles of shore and water temperatures from 82 to 88 degrees. Schools of skipjack and bolito of various sizes have been abundant on the fishing grounds and supplies of caballito, mullet and sardinas are also plentiful. Fleets are fishing in all directions now, since there has not been any particular place where the action has been overly consistent. Inshore action has tapered off, though there are still decent opportunities for roosterfish, most anglers are targeting offshore species, which are now being found anywhere from several miles to over twenty miles from shore.
Recent catches have included striped and blue marlin, sailfish, dorado, yellowfin tuna, wahoo, skipjack, roosterfish and dogtooth snapper. While action for football sized yellwfin tuna has reportedly been wide open off of East Cape and La Paz, it has been much more hit or miss in the Los Cabos area, there are some blind strike tuna being encountered near Iman and San Luis Banks, but definitely not in big numbers. Yellowfin were also found schooling under pods of traveling porpoise anywhere from 15 to 25 miles outside of Cabo San Lucas, most of these tuna were in the 10 to 15 pound class, though there were reports of one 200 pound tuna landed from a cruiser based out of Cabo San Lucas. A handful of wahoo were taken on trolled lures while trolling in the open offshore blue water, most of these off of the Cabo San Lucas region. Dorado were spread out throughout the area, most boats were averaging four or five in their daily counts, the majority of the do dos this past week were smaller in size than they had been in previous weeks, only an occasional larger bull mixed in.
In the hot muggy weather and with the persistent strong southern current running, bottomfishing has not been too enticing or productive. For the more experienced anglers there has been the option of drift fishing over rock pinnacles with larger whole or strip baits trying their luck at winning a battle against a dogtooth snapper or grouper. Though most of the stories that are being told recently by anglers have been in the favor of the fish.
Billfish action has been found on lures and bait, most of the blue marlin are under 200 pounds and striped marlin action continues off of the Pacific and Chileno areas. This is the month when we typically start to see some monster blue and black marlin showing in local waters.
Local panga fleets out of San Jose del Cabo were finding their most consistent action near the Iman Bank, but considering the favorable conditions the action has been far below normal standards, peanut sized dorado and a few football sized tuna were the mainstay of the catch this past week. Of course it is the time of year where things can change overnight, this is what we are hoping for.
The combined panga fleet launching from La Playita/Puerto Los Cabos sent out approximately 40 charters for the week, with anglers reporting a fish count of: 5 hammerhead shark, 3 sailfish, 2 striped marlin, 24 yellowfin tuna, 126 dorado, 216 skipjack, 16 bonito, 9 dogtooth snapper, 7 cabrilla, 29 roosterfish, 7 sierra, 18 triggerfish and 9 amberjack.
Good Fishing, Eric
