La Paz – Las Arenas/ Muertos Bay/ Suenos Bay Fishing Report for Week of April 11-18, 2024
SHORT ATTENTION SPAN FISHING REPORT
Weather: Quite a temperature swing some days. High 50’s at night to high 80’s or low 90’s at night. Mostly sunny although some mornings are cloudy and can be chilly. Winds cut back this week nicely.
Water: Much calmer this week since the winds cut back and much bluer and warmer which reflected in a better fish bite. You can tell the waters are warming since there has been a sargasso bloom which could last a few weeks until the water gets even warm and it does off.
Bait: Sardines and mackerel in abundance!
Fish Hooked This Week: Yellowtail, pargo, roosterfish, tuna, banqueta, cabrilla, sierra, jack crevalle and bonito
MEXICAN MINUTE LA PAZ VIDEO REPORT
THE BIG PICTURE and the REST of the STORY…
Jorge has a big grin on his face with his catch of a gorgeous barred pargo. These are great eating fish and highly prized. The heads are highly valued for delicious fish soup! Jorge was using a live mackerel fishing over the rocks.
The big schools of big pargo liso (mullet snapper) have moved into the shallows to spawn and can be extremely aggressive and put up an impressive fight. Mark Bonsack from Cle Elam, Washington always fishes well with us.
Wow! Paul Nagata, another of our regular amigos for many years and visits us several times a year, poses with a trophy cabrilla he caught off Punta Perrico.
Another of the solid anglers who fish our area often, you can tell that it can be a bit nippy in the morning as Kevin Shiotani holds up an early morning jack crevalle. Another slugger when hooked.
Mark hooked this yellowfin tuna just off the beach just south of Bahia Muertos. On a scale, it logged in a legit 56-pounds!
Jorge was out with Captain Boli and headed north to El Bajo north of La Paz and using live mackerel scored a limit of yellowtail and were done fishing after an hour! The yellowtail have been on the chew around Espirito Santo Island!
Mark has a knack for these baquetas which are deeper water grouper. We don’t see many of these in the counts during the season!
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It seems every week…even every day is different right now. I wouldn’t go so far as to say it’s erratic. I’d say it’s pretty typical of this time of year.
Last week we talked about how the strong north winds came back and how that might have affected the bite along with the eclipse perhaps being another variable that affected currents, tides and surely the fish!
The bite was off and the northern winds returning caused us to have to cancel a few trips…like like in the winter when it gets too rough oftentimes to get out and fish or simply makes it too uncomfortable or even dangerous.
Well, this past week, the winds cut back again. Waters settled. Waters warmed. And all kinds of schools of bait showed up…en masse!
Those are a great combination for fishing and for sure, it reflected in the bite.
The big schools of pargo liso showed up around Punta Arenas, Punta Perrico, Muertos Bay and Cerralvo Island. These fish school up this time of year to spawn and can range from 5-50 pound “horses” in the shallow waters where sharp teeth, sharp gillplates, sharp scales, a rocky environment and simply a beligerent and aggressive attitude make them difficult and tough sportfish. They can be extremely frustrating and most fish are lost after rugged battles.
Pargo like these mullet snapper are now on the spawn in the shallows!
Also in the shallow inshore areas, there was a good bite of jack crevalle, bonito, cabrilla and even a few smaller roosterfish.
Smaller roosters have moved in. Waiting for the big boys!
Around the islands and especially north of Espirito Santo Island and the El Bajo Seamount the yellowtail have been putting on a great chew with fish going 10-30 pounds. In some cases, the fish were literally foaming and limits were coming in fast. The fish were eating live mackerel which we were easily caught using sabiki rigs in La Paz Bay under the tankers anchored just offshore, then heading out to the fishing grounds.
Yellowtail can pull hard. We had a good week for them!
The forktails were also chasing the yo-yo jigs in blue/white and green/yellow patterns as well as slow trolled deep running Rapalas, Yo-Zuris and Nomad lures.
Almost to the gaff!
But, like I said, things change every week. No dorado to speak of just when I thought the dorado bite might be taking off as per last week’s report. Strange because the waters were warming, but most of our catch this week was of the colder water variety.
I think overall, things will improve although we’re still going to get little episodes of wind for a few more weeks. And I’m sure for a few more weeks, at least, we can expect the unexpected which just means if you have a bait in the water, we’re not sure what we’ll hook!
But that’s why this time of year is called the “transition” period when we have both cold water fish and warm water fish and so much variety. The cold water fish will gradually be moving out and warm water fish like the dorado, tuna, wahoo and billfish and hopefully larger roosters will start moving in!
That’s my story!
Jonathan
Jonathan Roldan’s
Tailhunter Sportfishing www.tailhunter.comMexico Office:
Tailhunter Sportfishing
755 Paseo Obregon, La Paz, Baja Sur, Mexico
U.S. Mailing Address: Tailhunter Sportfishing
8030 La Mesa Blvd. #178 La Mesa CA 91942
Phones:
from USA : 626-638-3383
from Mexico: 044-612-14-17863
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