FLY HOOKER SPORTFISHING
Captain George Landrum
gmlandrum@hotmail.com
www.flyhooker.com
Cabo Fish Report
Sept. 17-23, 2007
WEATHER: We once again were treated to normal summertime weather in Cabo, with our daytime highs in the mid to upper 90's and nighttime low in the mid 80's. Combine that with a fairly high humidity level and things were nice and sweaty most of the week. As the week drew to a close we were all watching the slowly approaching Hurricane Ivo, which then became Tropical Storm Ivo, den finally regressed into merely a Tropical Depression, much to our relief! Cloudy skies with a bit of rain are just what we need!
WATER: Surface conditions were great all week with the swells increasing just a bit to a possible six feet at the weekend due to the effects of Ivo. Water temperatures on the Cortez side of the Cape and around the Pacific side to the southern edge of Golden Gate Bank were a steady 84-85 degrees. At the end of the week there was a very defined temperature and color break on top of the Golden Gate. This temperature break started as an eddy of cold water off of the Cape mid-week and has been pushed to the north over the course of the past few days.
BAIT: Exactly the same as last week, the prevailing bait this week was Caballito at $2 per bait, Mullet at $2 per bait and Sardinas at $25 per scoop. A few boats were able to make their own Mackerel during their fishing trips and these seemed to be the bait preferred by the fish.
FISHING:
BILLFISH: The story of the week, and possibly of the month, continues to be the unprecedented number of Striped Marlin being caught. While Cabo is known as the marlin capitol of the world for a good reason, having these numbers so close and at this time of year is simply amazing. Boats that wanted Striped Marlin only had to go to the Golden Gate Bank, and between the Bank and the shoreline this week to get into simply incredible action. Most of you who read my reports know that I am pretty even in reporting the action, right? Well, when I have clients that can go out and release 13 Stripes one day and 15 the next, and do it during a normal charter, then that's something to shout about. These numbers were not abnormal either; a lot of boats were getting into that kind of action. Bait balls were everywhere and the Marlin were busting into them all over the place. Slow trolled live baits, drop-backs into the lure pattern when the lures were pulled at 9 knots and dropping live bait around the bait balls all worked extremely well on these concentrated fish. While the action on Striped Marlin was hot, the Blues have been slow to show, but we did have one boat that hooked up and landed one of about #250 and then hooked and fought for a few minutes another on of about #400. This action was at the 95 spot and was not typical. Most boats were not finding any Blues, and normally at this time of year we would be having reports of 60% of the fleet having a blue into the spread. A friend of mine caught a #565 pound Black on Friday while fishing around the Gorda Banks, the first large Black I have heard of so far this year.
YELLOWFIN TUNA: We are finally beginning to see some Yellowfin action, and it is about time! There are still football fish to 20 pounds but the buzz this week was about the fish in the #80-#150 class that were found as close as 5 miles from the arch. These fish were associated with porpoise and they moved back and forth between the lighthouse and the San Jaime Banks for about four day in the middle of the week. First boats into them were usually able to hang one or two fish, the largest I heard of was #180 but I was also told by a credible source that there was one fish in the #250+ caught. The fish moved on later in the week but it was a good introduction to what we can expect in the near future. Other fish were found on a consistent basis at the San Jaime Banks and they were in the 40-60 pound range and I did have one report of a boat going to the Cabrilla Seamount and finding some fish that size there was well. The best baits were live Mackerel but most of the boats had to resort to live Caballito. Mackerel seemed to out-fish the Caballito by about two to one.
DORADO: The Dorado action remained consistent this week and most of the action took place on the Pacific side. Just like last week the fish seemed to be concentrated close to the beach, within three miles out for the most part. Ranging in size from little slippers of 6 pounds to some very nice Bulls of #60, the average was #20. Bright lures and live bait were the best producers. The debris in the water that was north of the Golden Gate Bank last week and I found unproductive at the time has finally started to produce some nice fish as well. Boats venturing just to the north of the bank early in the week were getting some decent schooling fish under some of the larger debris, and what is nice is that the current line seems to be holding the stuff in the same area!
WAHOO: There were scattered Wahoo again this week and they were mostly caught by boats working close to shore for the Dorado. The largest fish I heard of was 40 pounds and most of them were half that. These speedsters were not common but a few boats were flying two flags at a time. I imagine that if you had targeted these fish this week there might have been some decent action.
INSHORE: Inshore fishing remained slow for the traditional species this week as the number of Roosterfish was down and the Pargo just were not on the bite. Most of the Pangas were focusing on Dorado and did have fine action with them. Bottom action was slow as well with mostly small snapper and an occasional Amberjack and Grouper in the mix.
Notes: I have a four-day trip starting Saturday and will have a bit of information next week about conditions and fishing up around the East Cape if you are interested in checking back then. I just hope the wind from the Tropical Depression stays away! Also, please take the time to check out the link below and fill out the survey, your help is needed.
Hello Cabo Anglers!
The Billfish Foundation is working to ensure the future of Cabo's amazing bill fishing. Efforts have been made before in Mexico to pass laws that would hurt Los Cabos fantastic fishing. While these efforts have all failed, we want to prevent future threats. Local charter companies have identified you as a Cabo angler. Can you please help us by taking a few minutes to complete a survey? The results will be used to help pass stronger conservation laws intended to improve fishing success rates and the Cabo fishing experience. All responses will be completely confidential.
To take the survey, please click: http://www.southwickassociates.com/surveys/cabo_survey/Default.aspx?sicd=AJJMEI-73 . The Billfish Foundation has hired Southwick Associates to administer the surveys. We sincerely appreciate your help in protecting Cabos unique fishery, and hope to see you fishing again in Los Cabos.