DORADO-LANDIA!

La Paz – Las Arenas/ Muertos Bay/ Suenos Bay Fishing Report for Week of June 11-18, 2023

SHORT ATTENTION SPAN REPORT

WATER – Continually clearing and getting bluer and warmer, but still a few degrees colder than it should be and alot clouder than normal.  But overall improving. 

WEATHER – Overall, a nice week.  Some chilly breezy mornings giving way to warm days and evening breezes.  On the water, mostly pretty calm, but had two days where the day-time winds really kicked in strangely and the water got bouncy. 

SPECIES CAUGHT THIS WEEK – Dorado…and then some dorado…and more dorado.  But also roosterfish, jack crevalle, bonito, pompano, trevally, snapper, cabrilla, barred bargo, rainbow runners, yellowtail, amberjack. A few tuna popped up outside. 

LAS ARENAS – Some slower days, but this area has the most variety.  Look at the list above and every one of those species is a possibility if you fish with our Las Arenas fleet.  But, some days better than others.  Some days, the dorado go nuts.  Right at the end of the week, there were some huge dorado caught.  All big bulls. Other days, it’s a rockfish day and not a dorado to be found. 

LA PAZ – This was the dorado hot spot all week.  Especially the area north of the city around Las Cruces.  Schools of 5-30 pound fish.  At the islands, the usual fun aquarium fish like pargo, cabrilla and jacks to play with on light tackle. 

MEXICAN MINUTE LA PAZ VIDEO REPORT

THE BIG PICTURE and the REST of the STORY…

Nothing like this in Montana! Brad Bennett fought this big bull dorado for over an hour on light tackle and finally boated it. Great colors!

First time from San Diego, Dave Jenkins started out his 3 days with us with some fresh mahi on the boat .

Always good to have Dave and his dad Bill Johnson from Colorado visiting us. Fishing with Captain Pancho produced some big bulls and they released others!

Double roosters for Grant Checa and his dad Gianni. Both fish caught and released. Gianni brought down a whole group of dads and kids from Colorado this past week.

Good way to start the day. Fishing with Captain Gerardo, Earl Lawson from Marina CA hooked and landed this pretty striped marlin for a quick photo and release.

Lots of variety of good-eating fish for Ed Pak with a spread of snapper pargo, triggerfish, rainbow runner, cabrilla and a nice amberjack too!

I think Randy Rimple’s facial expression speaks volumes about this big roosterfish that Captain Armando estimated in the 80 pound class. The fish was released.

I’ve known Emily Duncan since she was 5 years-old and coming down to fish with her family. How time flies. She was down this week to plan her wedding in La Paz for next year! I’m feeling old. This gal can fish! Note the nice bull. Cerralvo Island in back.

All the way from Illinois, Jim Newman, loves to fish. Even when he’s not one of our pangas, he’s hitting the water. This nice trevally hit a surface plug while Jim was working the beach with a light rod.

Just a darned good day on light tackle and the flyrod!

Cool photo on the beach at Bahia Muertos. Jonathan Bernardini with kids Julia and Christian.

John Lowdermilk has fished with us for years from Colorado. Just outside of Bahia Muertos, a nice photo of his rooster. Catch and release.

Just a great photo with great colors, flat seas and a big smile from Tim Jenkins from Utah on his first trip with us. Son, Drake contemplates the tail!

Right up on the beach, Mark Stuart from San Diego, with a fun rooster for a photo and release.

Dwight Ortmann might look a little tired. Make no doubt…for their size these jack crevalle are sluggers and put up a helecious fight!  Dwight very sportingly released the fish to fight another day.

Dylan Williams with a La Paz bull to put in the box then to the freezer. Dylan is from Pennsylvania.

John Lowdermilk and Captain Jorge posing on the beach. Not the other “tails” in the lower part of the photo as well.

Jake and Scott Snapp with Captain Armando show off another nice mahi on the beach.

Not sure if Gianni or his son, Grant, caught this fish, but it’s still a good-looking bull dorado. Lots of legit bull dorado caught this week.

Dan and Jordan Le and a pair of mystery hands to pose on the beach with their dorado.

Christian Bernardini has a great smile to go along with his fish and an assist from dad, Jonathan.

Inshore fishing remains solid for anyone that doesn’t want to chase the bluewater species. Especially for pargo and cabrilla like this one especially on light tackle caught by Jim Newman.

Almost impossible to catch a fish jumping in the camera lens, but Earl Wilson nailed this shot of a fighting dorado. He said a moment later, the dorado spit the hook and got away!

Flyrod jack crevalle near the beach for Drake Jenkins. He also released the fish.

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The week had high spots and low spots.  There was some wind and some rough waters came back.  However, overall, there were alot more highs than lows.  Alot more good conditions than bad and alot more smiles than frowns.

For sure, no question, we’re into dorado season solidly now.  Lots of small school-sized fish for action and quite a few big pulls pulling people around and bending rods!

There’s a few spots in the channel between the La Paz Peninsula and Cerralvo Island that were just stacked with dorado for the last week or so.  Crazy dorado fishing.  You could get into a school of frenzied “kid” dorado or you could end up in a school of bigger bulls with attitude.

Actually, kind of a funny observation.  There have been so many larger dorado that some folks have been complaining (seriously) that it was a “bad day” fishing because they caught-and-released so many smaller ones and didn’t catch any or enough big ones.

A week ago, they would have been keeping these fish!

Anyway…

That’s not to say there aren’t dorado in other spots.  On the contrary.  There are dorado that can pop up anywhere.  There’s a good bunch of sargasso weeds bunching up on the surface now and that’s drawing the fish and as the waters continue to warm, I expect more dorado to show up.

The dorado bite was probably 80% of the catch, but that could mostly be because they were the easiest to catch and readily located.

However, we did get a few nice marlin hooks-ups and the roosters are still around and out although there were fewer in the counts.  That could possibly be attributed to the fact that not as many folks are focusing on the roosters which you have to commit to doing and lots of folks would rather go chase fish that are easier to find and “funner” to fight and better eating.

Inshore, we still have a pretty good variety including pargo, amberjack, jack crevalle, rainbow runners, cabrilla and big bonito.

That’s my story!

Jonathan