ERRATIC FISHING FUELED BY CHANGING WIND AND FULL MOON

La Paz – Las Arenas/ Muertos Bay/ Bahia Suenos Fishing Report for Week of May 3-10, 2023

SHORT ATTENTION SPAN WEEK AT A GLANCE

Weather – Big thermometer.  Down into the chilly 50’s (again) up to the high 80’s and low 90’s.

Water – strong winds keeping the waters murky and disturbed.

Fishing – I’d give it at best a 3 on a scale of 10.  One day Las Arenas would be better.  The next La Paz would be better.  Very un predictable.

Species Caught this week:  Pargo mulato, pargo liso, cabrilla, sierra, jack crevalle, bonito, amberjack, yellowtail, tuna (just 1), dorado, snapper, rainbow runner, pompano, trevally

MEXICAN MINUTE VIDEO REPORT

THE BIG PICTURE and the REST of the STORY…

Our Wyoming amigo, Will Dolinar caught and released this pretty rooster just outside of Bahia Muertos. Roosters finally making their way into us. Will was able to releas the fish!

Good guy, Jimmy Williams was at Cerralvo Island just hoping to catch a few pargo and cabrilla for dinner, but saw a bunch of boiling fish and tossed a live sardine into the crashing fish and it ended up being this slug yellowfin tuna. Good thing Jimmy is a good fisherman because he ended up fighting this fish for 2 hours on 30 pound test!

Chuck Toeniskoetter gets photo-punked by his favorite Captain Victor as the show off some nice pargo liso, a trevally and some sierra. Chuck gave all the fish to Victor and the family.

Jimmy also surprisingly pulled this bull dorado off the island as well. There’s a few starting to swim around. Definitely, the largest of the week. Hopefully, more to come!

Definitely a good day. Stan Andre and Terry Hawk have been fishing with us for years and had a banner day on the tough pargo liso plus a trio of snapper. They donated all the fish.

Nice smiles and cold beers in hand from Donna and Will with a nice rack of yellowtail, amberjack, cabrilla, snapper, pargo and triggerfish. Pretty much a great catch of reef fish that they brought over to our Tailhunter Restaurant to have prepared for dinner.  Many thanks to them as well for bringing me some fresh real butter from the U.S.  Totally gold down here!

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Just when I thought things were starting to take off for our fishing season, we hit a bump in the road.  It was like we had taken the proverbial “two steps forward and one step back.”

But, there’s no controlling nature.

It was combination of things that hampered fishing.  I don’t want to sugarcoat things.

First, the winds came back.  Not those crazy northern winter winds that blew us all around for 5 months.  But, erratic winds that seemed to blow from different directions all during the days.  Sometimes from the south.  Sometimes from the west.  It might be a morning wind or an afternoon northern for a few hours that turns the water into white caps.   Totally unpredictable.

And some days there was no wind…

However, the windy effect not only dropped the ambient air temperatures (it got chilly and nippy again) but moreso, really turned over the waters and clouded them up again.

On top of it, we had a massive full moon this week.  Normally, I don’t worry too much about full moons, but in combination of the winds, we got a double whammy as it produced some strong tides and currents.

The overall effect was a mixed and unpredictable bag of fish.

I’ll be honest, some days were incredibly slow and picky with the fish simply refusing to chew.  Other times, a regular hot-spot would go cold.  Or one boat would find fish and the boat right next to it would struggle mightily.

The catch seemed different from day-to-day.  We got cabrilla, snapper, sierra, bonito, jack crevalle, amberjack, rainbow runner, pompano, trevally and triggerfish.  There were a few smallish yellowtail here and there, but overall, I think the waters have warmed and the yellowtail have moved off.  There were also a few dorado and one tuna hooked, but nothing to get too excited about with no further hook-ups.

Those big pargo liso that were schooling were biting earlier in the week then disappeared.  We’re seeing a few billish on the surface, but not yet willing to bite.  Hopefully, soon!

Roosterfish in the 5-20 pound class have moved in.

That’s my story

Jonathan