Yes, Ziggy! You finally made the first photo in the fishing report! Our amigo, Ziggy Haspod from Santa Barbara spanked the nice dorado all week fishing with Captain Boli and our La Paz fleet with limits every day including this sweet bull dorado.
Best wahoo season in my memory in years! There’s still wahoo on the high spots around Cerralvo Island. Darryl and Kathy Pietek pose with Captain Armando and one of 2 skinnies they hooked. They lost another one that busted the Rapala off. The Pieteks are from Loma Rica CA.
Sometimes, when you don’t try so hard, good things come to you! Mario Salazar from the Los Angeles area was on a billfish frenzy the 3 days he fished with our Las Arenas fleet. I think the final count was 8 marlin and sailfish in 3 days. I lost count. He was fishing with our Captain Archangel with our Tailhunter Fleet. This was a release so you get the great photo of him fighting the fish! Most of the billfish we’re hooking these days are all getting released.
Richard Sellers came to visit us all the way from Australia to do some freediving and spearfishing. It started slow but by his last day he said, he had dorado and marlin swimming around him like he had never seen before. He did get this nice bull dorado and also another “mystery fish” none of us had ever seen before. Scroll down to the last photo in the report!
Big smile from Steve Heune from Modesto CA was on his first fishing trip with us. As per my report this week, his first day, he fished with our Las Arenas fleet and they ran into one of those days when the fish were lockjawed. We switched them for their 2nd day to fish with our La Paz fleet and they stuffed the fish box with a limit of dorado!
Might be my favorite photo of the week. It’s all about smiles. Dane Fuller pulling on his first marlin ever. Dane’s from Childress, Texas and was on his first trip to La Paz where he got his first marlin, and first dorado…and biggest dorado. Just a great Kodak moment in Baja. It’s not about fish in the box, it’s about smiles on the face and good times with amigos.
One of our favorites guys…Donnie “Coach” Rea from Ventura CA always does well fishing with us. He’s showing off another big bull he got this week fishing with our Captain Marcos and our Tailhunter La Paz fleet.
That’s alot of mahi! A thirty-pound-class dorado for Mike Figley from Arizona that he caught north of La Paz. There’s some nice big bulls around right now.
Lance Heune from Modesto CA holds the gaff on a day when he put a nice limit of dorado on the boat in short order fishing north of La Paz around Espirito Santo Island.
Late breaking news…just as I was putting together the fishing report Sunday night, our pangas hit giant Humboldt squid off Las Arenas. They made great bait for the dorado (and great eating!) and usually means that if they stay around, often the tuna rise up out’ve the trenches and follow them up! Hope they stick around. Captain Archangel hangs one of the big squirmers here!
Our Australian amigo, Richard Sellers (photo above with the dorado) shot this while spearfishing. He called it a “triple tail” but none of my captains or anyone we knew had ever seen one. In almost 30 years fishing and diving here in Baja, I’d never seen one or heard of one so we ran to the books and internet. There are very few mentions of photos of them in Baja but folks from the Atlantic and Caribbean know all about them where they are much more common and, in Australia, of course! At first, I thought I knew what it is. But, it looked like a cross mutant between a pargo and cabrilla! The triple tail was good eating!
LAS ARENAS FISHING PICKY BUT OUR LA PAZ BOATS FIND GOOD ACTION ALL WEEK!
La Paz – Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of July 28 to Aug. 4, 2013
It was a pretty decent week of fishing. Not the greatest, but not bad either. Let me explain…
I have to say that I’m thankful we have our two fleets with one of them in La Paz and one of them at Las Arenas. It gives our clients some choices about where to fish and we can also move them if necessary to get them the best conditions or to find fish.
As sometimes happens, weather or fishing dictates that sometimes one side will be better than the other. It happens. Normally, this time of year both our fleets are bendo and deep into all manners of fish.
However this past week, Las Arenas really sorta dropped off the fishing map. Not one was it rougher from some long distance storms to the south that brought in some chop and swell, but there was a lack of bait. Additionally, the better fishing was either outside at the buoys or all the way out at the 88 spot.
One the good side, the buoys held some decent dorado and the 88 produced more of those monster bull dorado and a number of hooks ups on striped marlin, sailfish and even a few big blues (all billfish either released or broke off). But that’s a long way to run and if it was one of those bumpy days and you were one of the pangas that scratched, it’s a long long day.
Las Arenas just wasn’t happening. The captains worked hard and busted humps looking for fish or trolling, but it was just one of those weeks.
But, like I said, thankfully, we had our La Paz fleet. So, folks would try a day or two at Las Arenas then we’d have them switch over to our La Paz fleet.
And everyone got fish! Limits or near limits of dorado from punk-sized schoolies to 30-plus pound bull mahi as well as some stripers and sailfish and even a few sharks hooked up. The fish were well north so it was a bit of a ride and the bite was often late…well past 1 p.m. So, often I had to tell our clients, just be patient and let the captain fish. Don’t jump the gun. Sure enough…the late bite came in and there would be the feeding frenzy!
Sometimes our pangas weren’t coming back until 4 or 5 p.m., but that’s because our captains were working it hard. We go out at 6 a.m. often several hours before the other fleets and my guys are willing to stay the extra hours to wait for the bite when other fleets are coming back at 1:30 or 2 p.m. It made a difference and all of our clients this week still went home with full ice chests!
Bait as tough for our La Paz fleet as well, but going out extra early, we’re able to jig up some mackerel and caballitos then go look for some sardines. Then go hook a few small bonito. By the time you hit the fishing grounds, you’ve got 2 or 3 different types of bait aboard and gives you an edge. Add in some trolling and now you’re cooking with gas! But, as I said, we just had to tell folks “be patient.” Our captains are all working hard to find the fish. And we found them. It was just later than normal!
MORE ON MEXICAN FISHING LICENSES
A few weeks ago, we started telling you about the big SNAFU with Mexico not printing out enough fishing licenses for the whole country. Big Oops! They’re trying to find a KINKO’s to handle it, but in the meantime, everyone is scrambling.
Baja still does not have any printed fishing licenses to sell. They keep telling us “in a few weeks” but we’ve been hearing that for awhile. In the meantime, the only way to have fishing licenses is still to purchase them online or find a tackle store there in the U.S. that sells them over-the-counter or online (some will mail them to you). However, for southern Baja, they now have their own website to sell them that works pretty well. Here’s the link:
http://apps.bcs.gob.mx/finanzas/finaweb/fonmar/
Just remember that the amounts are in pesos so divide the number by about 11 or 12 and you won’t have a heart attack!
That’s our story!
Jonathan and Jilly
Jonathan Roldan’s
Tailhunter International
Website:
http://www.tailhunter-international.com
Mexico Office: Tailhunter International, 755 Paseo Obregon, La Paz, Baja Sur, Mexico
U.S. Mailing Address: Tailhunter International, P.O. Box 1149, Alpine CA 91903-1149
Phones:
from USA : 626-638-3383
from Mexico: 044-612-14-17863
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Tailhunter Weekly Fishing Report: https://fishreport.jonathanroldan.com/
Tailhunter YouTube Videos: http://www.youtube.com/user/pangapirate
“When your life finally flashes before your eyes, you will have only moments to regret all the things in life you never had the courage to try.”
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