Gordo Banks Pangas
San Jose del Cabo
November 2, 2008
Anglers '
The Los Cabos area is now bustling with visiting anglers anxious to get out on the fishing grounds and see what they can find. Crowds might be slightly down from previous years when the economy was not in such dire straits, but nevertheless fleet operators are very busy and from the looks of the calendar will be for at least the next several weeks. Weather is still quite warm considering it is nearing the month of November, there is plenty of sunshine, highs in the upper 80s.
There have been swirling breezes from the north, east, south and west and this has stirred up the water clarity some, though the latest reports were more favorable, as there were now cleaner currents moving back in. Water temperatures varied from 80 to 85 degrees and swells were moderate. Bait supplies consisted of mackerel out of Cabo San Lucas and sardinas for San Jose del Cabo panga fleets.
Striped marlin action continues to be wide open for anglers venturing in the direction of the Pacific, which meant mainly fleets based out of the Cabo San Lucas Marina. Many charters have been accounting for double digit catches on the stripers, while working the normal fishing grounds such as Golden Gate, Jaime Bank, El Faro and the Finger Bank. There have also been more numbers of the striped marlin moving off of Chelino and to the Gordo Banks, nowhere near as numerous as on the Pacific, but they are showing up. A few sailfish mixed in the daily fish counts as well, several blue and black marlin were seen feeding in the vicinity of the Gordo Banks, perhaps on the abundant juvenile dorado that were present. Weed and debris current lines were attracting schools of dorado, mostly fish in the 5 to 15 pound range, but an occasional larger specimen to over 20 pounds was also being hooked into. In recent days dorado seemed to be found in all directions, concentrated close to shore, anglers were catching easy limits and releasing many other fish. The do-dos were striking on virtually all types of lures and baits.
Yellowfin tuna action was found off of the Hyatt and Santa Maria area, live sardinas were working best for this action, these were the standard football model tuna, 10 to 15 pounds. One problem was that of all the skipjack that were mixed in, at times they would dominate and not give the yellowfin a chance to reach the baits. A few wahoo in the 15 to 25 pound class were taken from this same area, some on fly lined sardinas without any leader, lucky, but once anglers switching to wire leader the wahoo would shy away. A handful of wahoo hit on trolled lures, but that was earlier in the week, the past couple days the anglers that did specifically target the wahoo did not report much at all. The other main spot where yellowfin tuna were being found was on the Inner Gordo Bank, everyday anglers reported that they saw feeding tuna, some days this occurred early in the morning and on other days the feeders did not come up until midday, but there were definitely some nice sized tuna schooling on the bank. Most of the tuna that were hooked into and landed weighed in the 40 to 60 pound class, though some much larger fish were seen and hooked, only to be lost, this could be good news for local tournament teams gearing up for the coming WON Jackpot Tournament. Bob Deeter from Northern California was fishing with skipper Tony Miranda on the 26 ft. super panga 'The Hooker' and landed a 120 pound yellowfin while drift fishing with a strip of squid, they went down to a 60 pound fluorocarbon leader to get bit and the fish took over two to finally bring to gaff. These yellowfin on the banks were striking on strips of giant squid, that once again have been fairly easy to catch in an area just to south of Punta Gorda, also smaller sized skipjack and even a few chihuil and now being able to be hand lined in for use as trolling baits.
Off the bottom there has been a few huachinango and dogtooth snapper, not great numbers, but they were quality sized and provided some excellent eating fillets for anglers that did get into this action, though at timers strong currents made it difficult to target the deeper rock piles where these bottom dwellers were holding.
The combined panga fleets launching from the La Playita / Puerto Los Cabos area sent out approximately 154 charters for the week, with anglers accounting for a fish count of:
11 sailfish, 5 striped marlin, 3 hammerhead shark, 15 wahoo, 8 dogtooth snapper, 64 huachinango (red snapper), 788 dorado, 189 yellowfin tuna and 24 bonito.
Good Fishing, Eric
