Tailhunter Fish Report

Read Full Post »

PHOTO 1: Mark Cabantuan gets a hand from his fishing partner, Jon Luker, with Mark’s first wahoo. Mark also got his first marlin this week as well. Both anglers are from Santa Maria CA and are here for the 2nd time this year. The wahoo came up violently this week with some of the best wahoo action of the season near South Cerralvo Island.

WAHOO SLAM ANGLERS AT CERRALVO ISLAND WHILE TUNA AND DORADO REFUSE TO END THE SEASON! ONLY PROBLEM IS NOT MANY ANGLERS HERE TO SEE THIS!

PHOTO 2: Larry Mannis from Long Beach CA and Steve “The Hooter Hunter” Marabella from Wilmington CA hold up just a few of their many yellowfin tuna they hammered over 3 days of fishing out of Muertos Bay where the tuna bite continues to rage in the best tuna fishing in years.

PHOTO 3: Pro Bass Fisherman Rob McClean and his amigo, Rico, said they had some of the best fishing of their lives this week. Tuna, dorado and Rico’s big cabrilla were just some of the fish they took. Many of the fish were on light tackle. An ususally great bite of big cabrilla like the one Rico is holding tore into the pangas around Muertos Bay and Punta Perrico during mid week. It was weird. All of a sudden 12 inch cabrilla turned into 20 pount mutants that took many anglers into the rocks!

One side story on Rob and Rico…one day they hooked 4 wahoo fishing with Victor. Every single fish came off. Their last one was several yards from the boat when another panga running by and accidentally cut their line. Adios!

PHOTO 4: Nothing wrong with this dorado being held by Illeana Stevens. She was fishing live bait for tuna and was retrieving a live sardine slowly back to the boat when her rod doubled and she slammed in the hookset erupting with this nice female. Dorado were once again prevailant in many spots from La Paz all the way south and around the islands. They aren’t as big as last year’s run of giant dorado, but anglers targeting dorado are having no trouble finding fish. Some days are better than others but all it takes is one bait in the right spot and the frenzy is on!

PHOTO 5: Colton (“Cojones”) Jones and Stacy “Karaoke” were fishing with us for the first time and got into the tuna big time out of Muertos their one day out. Both are from the South Bay area near Los Angeles. With each progressing week, the tuna seem to get bigger with most fish in the 15-25 pound class and a few larger. Baits are very small so if you’re coming down, bring small #1 and #2 live bait hooks so you don’t stick a big hook through the small baits and killing them. Even so, both dead bait chummed in the current as well as live bait are the hot ticket to the tuna.

PHOTO 6: Scott Smith and John Bilbao had never been to fish in our area before and found the tuna and dorado waiting. This photo was their catch from just the first day! The yellowfin tuna seems to be gradually moving toward the south. The main body of tuna we’re fishing is now about 1 mile south of the mouth of Muertos Bay and perhaps 1/4 mile from the beach.

PHOTO 7 : Bruce Kawaguchi and Shannon Lovering hold up a few of their catches there at Muertos Bay. Bruce has alot of salt water experience, but We had quite a few folks with us this week who had not fished our area before and were surprised at how close the fish were and how uncomplicated it was to catch them. Basically, this is all flylined fishing which means, just put the bait on the hook and put it in the water! No special lures, trolling, weights or colores are needed. Just DON”T drop the rental rod in the water! The fish are in close to shore and in relatively shallow water. It’s not rocket science. I guess if you had a cane pole and a bobber you could do the same thing!

PHOTO 8: Our two Colorado amigas, Deb Pellini and Kathy St. Claire came down with family to fish a day…which turned into two…which turned into three! They sure had alot of fun. Kathy is a gourmet chef at a big resort in Colorado and had alot of tuna and dorado fillets to take home. I think we’ve almost convinced them to move down with us. They went right home and sent in reservations to bring even more family next October! These tuna kept getting bigger. They are currently all 20 pounders with some 30’s and 40’s now and then. Larger fish are getting picked up on the troll outside the channel.

PHOTO 9: Everytime I looked over at John and Barbara Waddell in their panga they were laughing. Most of the time, Barbara was bent…big time as she got fish after fish. Two of my favorite folks from the last week or so, they live in Calistoga CA . Usually fishing on the La Paz side produces the most dorado, but for the last two weeks, there’s been no shortage of dorado for our Las Arenas/ Muertos Bay anglers. If you want dorado, you can usually find dorado. The nice thing is the variety that’s also available. Tuna, sailfish, marlin, jacks, roosters and cabrilla have also been in the mix.

Read Full Post »

PHOTO 1: Over these, many seasons, some of the best photos, some of the best catches, some of the best times have come from these two guys. Mitch Chavira and and Charlie “Stix” McGee both from Encinitas CA. Usually, they are with Mitch’s son, Cole, who lately has a habit of outfishing both of them, but this past week, the two amigos came solo and slammed big dorado and tuna. Both guys have caught just about every fish in the area except the elusive wahoo. Well, this past week, Charlie got his north of Cerralvo Island. Mitch will have to wait! Check out Bob Marley looking at the catch!

EARLY WEEK HIGH WINDS KICK IT UP BUT THE HOT BITE FOR TUNA AND DORADO CONTINUES TO RIP FOR MUERTOS BAY ANGLERS!

The La Paz / Las Arenas Fishing Report for Oct. 27, 2008

PHOTO 2: Landon Frazier is ust 10-years-old from northern CA, just about outfished dad and the rest of the group this week with some of the biggest fish almost daily. He had never done this before, but over 3 days he now has “the bug!” Here he’s standing on the beach at Muertos Bay holding his biggest bull dorado. Along with the tuna bite we’ve had for over a month, dorado have now moved in with some fairly significant numbers with most fish running 10-30 pounds.

PHOTO 3: I know, I have Mitch’s photo above with the wahoo, this is such a well-taken photo, I just had to put it in the report. Mitch is a regular poster boy. For our La Paz boats, it was literally impossible to fish early in the week with the strong winds, but as the winds abated, the dorado bite came back nicely with fish back at the SE end of Espiritu Santo Island.

PHOTO 4: This is how a day SHOULD be…all smiles and bent rods! That’s Sergio up at the bow and Bob amidships both with tuna at the ends of their lines. They are fishing just yards offshore at San Juan near Muertos Bay. They had limits of tuna in a short time! It’s not rocket science. The tuna have grown larger up to about 20-25 pounds and are just around the corner from where we launch the boats. Basically, if you pin a sardine on the hook, toss it overboard and wait to get bit! Easy!

PHOTO 5: Ray and Otha show off a few of their nice yellowfin tuna on the beach. This is a nicer grade of football tuna. Undoubtedly, this is the best tuna bite we’ve had in years with a tuna bite ongoing now since about August but seeming getting better and better!

PHOTO 6: Derick Tagawa, Mark Kojima and Randy Nakayama pose here with favorite captain Adolfo “Yofo” next to a nice day of fishing. Lots of talk of sashime on the beach! They had two days like this and came back early to the beach each day plugged.

PHOTO 7: One of our long-time best amigos, Roland “Wink” Winkler made it back to see us after many years. Wink is in the middle flanked by Sergio and Bob. Wink’s never lets his wheelchair get in the way of a good day fishing and is one of the most fanatic of fishermen. He fished until his “arms were tired.”

PHOTO 8: Like I said, the tuna are getting bigger. Some qualify as something a bit more than “football” status. Duffy Shropshire holds up one of the larger sluggers from this week. These fish are literally minutes or yards in front of the beach. Live or dead bait does the trick. Baits are really small so if you’re coming down, small hooks are preferred. This week, I was using #1 and even #2 size live bait hooks. The only problem was when dorado came plowing through, the small hooks sometimes didn’t set well in the dorado’s mouth and we lost a few fish!

PHOTO 9: Scott Torney came down with mom, Virginia and dad, Jack long enough to squeeze in a day of fishing and shows off this nice bull dorado. We never really got the huge bulls we got last season, but there’s not shortage of mahi either! I’d say the average bull right now is about 20 pounds.

PHOTO: 10: Captain Jorge stands here with our Alaska amigo, Rod Brown, who makes the pilgrimage each year from Wrangell, AK! According to Rod, he and his brother Jeff had one of their best trips ever with more tuna and dorado than they knew what to do with so they were really popular with captains, and everyone else giving away much of their fish.

PHOTOS 11 and 12: Marty Johnson of Atascadero CA has been on these pages many times as well as the other publications that I write for. He’s one of the most enthusiastic fishermen you will ever see. Marty can fish with the best of ’em even though he hasn’t been fishing many years. He took one day off this past week to use his flyrod and fish inshore in La Paz Bay. This is just a sample of what he did with his flyrod and spinning rod. It was literally a fish a cast…sometimes more as one fish would spit the fly and another would quickly grab it up. Marty described it as one of his best fishing days ever. Originally he thought the fish he is holding was a snook. However, when we checked, it’s a rare weakfish, a species that is rarely caught. In the rack of fish in the photo below, you will see weakfish, barracuda, triggers, jacks and sierra.

THE FISHING REPORT

I guess I could just let the photos above do the talking. We sent alot of amigos home this week with stuffed ice chests! The week didn’t start like that. Those winds that hammered S.California also had an effect on us as well.

Heck…talk about winds…for those of you who have visited us in the past imagine waves big enough to surf on in La Paz Bay! Coming from the north, the waves were large enough to get the malecon (waterfront road in town) pretty wet! Obviously, we weren’t going to send anyone out in that junk.

So, we moved all our La Paz folks to fish with our guys who were already reserved t fish out’ve Muertos Bay. As you can see from the photos, it was a pretty good move. No one lost any days of fishing and not only did the fish cooperate, but on most days they exploded! Some days boats were back on the beach with anglers too tired or too plugged with fish to continue on.

The tuna bite is the mainstay, but the fish are getting a few pound larger every week. I put a few on the scale this week that went 25-32 pounds which is a nice grade of yellowfin…hardly a monter, but hardly a football either and strong enough and stubborn enough to make for a great drag screaming fight! I had alot of guys on light tackle this week who reported worrying about getting spooled on the smaller equipment! The tuna are inching their way south to an area near and in front of the friut loop house on the hill outside of Muertos to just outside the mouth of the bay.

Sometimes, it’s one-stop shopping. As you fish the tuna, here come the dorado! Good numbers of dorado are now mixing it up with the tuna also! In fact, if you only wanted to pull on dorado and nix the tuna that is entirely possible right now. The dorado aren’t huge either, but a 20-30 pound bull can put the hurt on just about anyone!

If you’re coming down, bring small live bait hooks as smal, as a #1 or #2. The sardines are eenie-meenie! They still work great, but if your hook is too big, you’ll impale your bait and kill it before it has a chance to get eaten!

Also, bring flurocarbon leader…25 and 30 pound fluro is about right!

As for other species, they’re here too. Just no one is fishing for them. I’m writing this from the Giggling Marlin Restaurant at Muertos Bay waiting for our boats to come back and as I look down on the waters only about 20 yards from my table, 30 pound roosterfish are crushing and tormenting a school of sardines. As well, we’ve had marlin, sailfish and wahoo hookups this week.

That’s my story!

Jonathan

Jonathan Roldan’s

Tailhunter International La Paz

Website: www.tailhunter-international.com

Phone: (626) 333-3355

FAX: (626) 333-0115

E-Mail: Riplipboy@aol.com

U.S. Office: 3319 White Cloud Dr., Suite A, Hacienda Hts. CA 91745

Mexico Office: Carr. a Pichilingue KM 5, Numero 205, La Paz, Baja Cal Sur, Mexico

“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.”

Read Full Post »

PHOTO 1: Wahoo showed up again this past week. Quite a few bites. Some got to the boat and were lost. Others were fought and lost. This is one 50 pound class ‘Hoo that didn’t get away! Our amigo, Gama “King” Flores from California was fishing in the tuna schools off Punta Perrico. He wasn’t even fishing for wahoo. He had a live sardine on the hook. No wire! This big skinny bit his 30 pound string and the fight was on! Gama won. Other fish this week hit black and purple CD 18 size Rapalas as well as a few of the dark Marauders.

MUERTOS BAY AND SOUTH CERRALVO EXPLODE WITH TUNA AND DORADO AS THE GREAT FALL BITE OF 2007 CONTINUES!

La Paz / Las Arenas Fishing Report for Oct. 20, 2007

PHOTO 2: Shane Vroman was here in May and was all over the big roosterfish. He came back this week and spanked the dorado and tuna. Shown here with some of the fish he and his amigo, Mike Berkowitch caught at Muertos Bay. The waters have been teeming with fish now for several weeks and no idea how long it will last, but bait has been close, then within minutes you could be in the middle of foaming fish. Shane and Mike said that several times they were in thick schools of tuna and dorado.

PHOTO 3: We had a bunch of great folks from Utah this past week. Dr. Bob Gray on the left stands on the beach with some of his yellowfin tuna. On the far side is his daughter, 22-year-old Tiffany Gray on her first salt water fishing trip. Steve Davis is next to her and Grant Glather is next to Dr. Bob. There was no shortage of tuna with most fish in the “football” category of 10 to 20 pounds, but just alot of fun to catch as fish were often coming out of the water and boiling around the boats.

PHOTO 4: Unlike previous weeks when Muertos Bay and Las Arenas were almost 90 percent yellowfin tuna, more dorado were taken like this nice bull held up by Tiffany Gray who came with her dad and amigos from Utah and Alaska. It was almost one-stop shopping some days. If you went to one spot, it was non-stop tuna. When you had your fill you simply moved the panga and caught dorado or roosterfish or went hunting for wahoo or billfish.

PHOTO 5: Santiago (“My friends call me Jim”) Garcia from Orange Co., California is given an assist from popular Captain Manuel Archangel. Santiago sent two day fishing for tuna and two days chasing only dorado and were not disappointed. Most of the doroad were in the 10-20 pound class like the tuna, but great fighters. However, there were larger bulls seen and lost. With everyone concentrating on the tuna, often the buoys…popular dorado hangouts were unmolested by boat traffic and were just waiting for someone to throw a bait in the water.

PHOTO 6: Dr. Blaine Austin from Utah is one of our frequent amigos and always does well. He was another of our Utah friends who came to visit this past week. He fished La Paz one windy day and then fished Las Arenas/Muertos with his daughter Jan and Sara where they had a banner time on the tuna and came in early.

PHOTO 7: Dave “Poolman” Baker from Huntington Beach CA (The O.C.), stuff an ice chest or two with his fish fillets after spending 4 days hammering the fish at Muertos Bay with Captain Victor. One day as he was on his way in, only minutes from the beach, this nice dorado whacked his line and was taken. The fish is so fresh, check out the incredible blue colors on it’s flank that were still shimmering.

PHOTO 8 – It’s a long way from Canada to Baja, Mexico, but Andrew Fitzel made the trek to find out what it’s like to fish in shorts and a t-shirt! Weather this week was perfect with daytime temps in the low to mid-90’s with very little humidity and water temps right about 85!

PHOTO 9; Callie Petersen has been visiting us since our earliet days here. She and her husband, Bruce, have been good friends of Tailhunter for many years. They used to live in Orange Co. California but now own a big spread in S. Dakota (or is it North Dakota?). Callie always does well with her fishing holding up a big-time bull dorado she got that blew up a sardine next to the boat.

PHOTO 10: As the week went on some of the tuna got a bit bigger, but size didn’t matter to some anglers. One of the neatest guys you will encounter, Roger Kunz, on the left is a good as they come. A Korean War Vet, he came with his cane and an attitude that he was gonna go out and hang fish like everyone else. What a gamer! Here, his nephew Marlon Kunz, gives a hand in holding up a nice grade yellowfin tuna. By the end of the week, some 30 and 40 pound fish were showing up.
PHOTO 11: You’ve been waiting for them! Yes, the big squid showed up this week briefly and it remains to be seen if this is going to be the start of a run! Several of the hug squigglies were hung and they were big ranging from 50-70 pounds! This one is being held by Santa Barbara resident Mark Trafelski.

PHOTO 12: We had friends from all over this week. Jeff Brown has fished with us before and its always a pleasure havng this amigo from chilly Minnesota come see us and have hm enjoy the sun. Here with Captain Marcos from our La Paz fleet, Jeff holds up several dorado. The fishing on the La Paz side was largely dependent on how strong the north winds were blowing, but the smaller dorado seem to be moving out and larger dorado coming in stronger.

PHOTO 13: Self-explanatory!

THE FISH REPORT

What another incredible week of fishing, especially for our anglers that fished out of Muertos Bay/ Las Arenas. Undoubtedly, this is a late season bite to remember!

It has been ages since I have seen tuna fishing like this around here. Talk about “fishy waters!” I think there must be a line of tuna and other species stretching from the channel between Cerralvo Island past the Arenas lighthouse; over to Muertos Bay then down to Los Frailes on the lower East Cape because the area is just plugged with fish.

The cool thing is that some of these gamefish are literally only casting distance from shore. Imagine going out 100 yards fronm the beach and tuna are coming out’ve the water for the chummed baits! Imagine motoring 5 minutes off the beach and finding yourself in the middle of a school of hungry dorado that are slashing each other trying to get anything thrown in the water!

That’s the way it has been the last few weeks and this past week, it only seemed to get better!

In addition to the packs of football tuna, dorado started moving in as well as sailfish and marlin. You never had to go far or you could literally pick a species then when you were tired go find something else to catch.

This isn’t rocket science either. Take your rod. Get a hook. Put a bait on it. Put it in the water. BOOM! You’re on. Just don’t drop the rod in the water like several guys did this week.

Fish are numerous, but not really really big, but nonetheless if you’re on light tackle can mean hours of mayhem. However, as the week progressed, the tuna started to eat steroids or something. The ten pounders turned to 25’s and 30’s. Same with the dorado. The larger bulls were getting hooked.

Several of our guys fought sailfish on light tackle and got beat up. When the sails came around again, they pulled their baits out’ve the water and were having one of that!

Quite a few or our anglers would get limits of fish so fast this past week that the biggest issue becaue what to do with the rest of the day. Many came right up onto the beaches where the roosterfish have again shown up and offered some great light tackle site fishing where you could see the big dorsal fins slash the surface.

Lastly, looks like the big sqiud have finally shown up! I don’t know how long they will be here, but if you are coming down you might want to pack one of those big heavy squid jigs in your pack. The squid were 50-70 pounds.

For those of our anglers who fished La Paz, it was good. Not great, but good. Some days there were problems with bait but the biggest issue was the north winds making things choppy and uncomfortable. The seasons are changing and no way to tell if we’ll be in winter mode fishing soon. Dorado were the mainstay and how you did depended on whether you found the school or not in the chop. If you found the school it could be crazy. If not, then you dinked for 3-5 dorad per day. But…the nice thing was that the mahi are growing bigger so more larger fish hit the fish boxes!

Looks like another nice week on the way!

That’s my story!

Jonathan

Jonathan Roldan’s

Tailhunter International La Paz

Website: http://www.tailhunter-international.com/

Phone: (626) 333-3355

FAX: (626) 333-0115

E-Mail: Riplipboy@aol.com

U.S. Office: 3319 White Cloud Dr., Suite A, Hacienda Hts. CA 91745

Mexico Office: Carr. a Pichilingue KM 5, Numero 205, La Paz, Baja Cal Sur, Mexico

“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.”

Read Full Post »

PHOTO 1: The week started off nervously as strong north winds came barreling down on us forcing us to cancel some boats, but with each passing day, the fishing came back stronger. Las Arenas continued to kick out the tuna. Here, Mark Stoller from N. California holds a 25 pound class yellowfin off Muertos Bay.

HIGH WINDS GIVE US A SCARE BUT TUNA COME RAGING BACK ALONG WITH DORADO AS WINDS CALM DOWN FOR GREAT WEATHER AND GREAT FISHING!

La Paz / Las Arenas Fishing Report for Oct. 14, 2007

PHOTO 2: Jillene Steven formerly of San Diego, but now living in La Paz fished for about 2 hours putting limits of yellowfin tuna aboard in short order with all fish between 10 and 20 pounds. It wasn’t complicated fishing as the fish were more than willing to eat a sardine on a hook sometimes as soon as it hit the water! Jill also got a few pargo as well.

PHOTO 3: Lest you think that we only have tuna hitting, Johnny Drucker, who just moved from Oregon to Redondo Beach CA was on his first trip down this past week and surely did get tuna, but he also got this nice bull dorado. Dorado are definitely in the area but so much focus has been on the tuna. However, refusing to be left out, the dorado schools sometimes maraud right through the tuna schools wacking everything in sight!

PHOTO 4: Hiding behind the nice bull dorado being held up by Captain Archangel, Steve Laurentis was also on his first trip and could not have done any better. He slayed fish daily, but this nice bull off Punta Perrico was the topper.

PHOTO 5: Seal Beach resident Lloyd Layne has been with us many many times since our first days here in La Paz. He never fails to do well. Many folks think there’s no roosters this late in the season, but it’s mostly because no one is fishing for them! Lloyd took a day off from tuna and dorado and went after roosters all day in Muertos Bay. He caught and released 15 roosters of varying sizes!

PHOTO 6: Ray Chow and his son, Nathan, are also old amigos of ours. I lost count of how many tuna they caught over 4 days of fishing, but the fish they hold here are a good example of the type of football yellowfin we’re getting right now. The fish are in a wide arc between the Arenas lighthouse and the mouth of Muertos so you could literally be in fish 3 minutes from leaving the beach once y0u have bait!

PHOTO 7: These are some special friends, Gary and Sheila Olsen from Utah. I could not get Sheila from smiling from ear-to-ear. She had never done anything like this but spent 10 days with us taking in just about everything La Paz had to offer. However, she also fished for 4 days and simply hammered the fish. Here, Gary, Sheila and I pose next to a day’s fishing in Muertos Bay.

PHOTO 8: OK…you know they’re here! This is a shot of a mako shark off the transom of skipper Juan Chuy’s boat. It was hooked by Tracy Maybank of S.California who must have hooked just about every pelgaic species we had to offer during 2 days of fishing. That’s quite a feat. However, even better was the fact that Tracy released almost all his fish including this shark! Good for him.

PHOTO 9 – Al Tesoro and his son-in-law Troy were with us for 3 days of fishing this week. They hoiste a few of their yellowfin tuna as well. Like so many others this week, it was easy to lose count of the fish but I know we sure put alot in the freezer for them. Using a little 25 pound flurocarbon was a nice tip and when the fish went down, changing to dead bait or live bait with a small rubber core sinker kept the fish biting.

THE FISHING REPORT

Well, amigos…what started with me cringing and standing on the Las Arenas Beach watching 6 foot breakers crashing down turned into a pretty good week after all!

I thought surely the fish gods were out to get me by sending in strong north winds many weeks too early and forcing me to cancel about 20 boats we had going out not to mention disappointing alot of anglers who had counted on going out. When the winds are that strong, it simply is not safe to put the small pangas out and try to get them out through the surf. So, we turned and drove back to La Paz. Looking at the weather forecast showed nothing but north wind all week. Not good!

Well, as it turned out yes…the winds blew, but with each passing day, it got better and better. So did the fishing!

By the end of the week we were praying for a little breeze and some guys laughing grumbled that the fishing was “too good” and we were done “too fast!”

Seriously, the best tuna bite in years continued right off Muertos Bay. I’m not kidding that withing minutes of leaving the beach, you could be thick into the yellowfin tuna. This has been on-going now for over a month! The fish are only “football grade” 10-20 pounders, but alot of fun on light tackle and voracious at times so that boats were limited by mid-morning and looking for something else to chase! Sardines fished live or dead were the hot ticket.

Looking for other fish, dorado would sometimes scoot through the tuna schools as well as sailfish. Inshore, chumming along the beaches often brought roosters or jacks that could be alot of fun for a few hours.

For La Paz, as well, once the winds died down, it was business as usual. The fish weren’t big, but if you hit the right spots, the dorado bite as fairly solid. Most boats hooked 4-10 dorado per day, releasing the smaller fish then chasing around to find others. A few times, dead seal and whale carcasses were found floating between the islands and swimming beneath were all the dorado you could want.

The hardest thing is keeping our La Paz anglers interested. Sometimes you could nick and plink all day and get discouraged, but I keep telling the folks that, “you’re just one bait away from the next big fish!” Well, so often, right at the end, the boat and skipper find the spot and it’s pandemonium!

Looking forward to another good week! You have one too!

That’s my story!

Jonathan

Jonathan Roldan’s

Tailhunter International

Website: www.tailhunter-international.com

Phone: (626) 333-3355

FAX: (626) 333-0115

E-Mail: Riplipboy@aol.com

U.S. Office: 3319 White Cloud Dr., Suite A, Hacienda Hts. CA 91745

Mexico Office: Carr. a Pichilingue KM 5, Numero 205, La Paz, Baja Cal Sur, Mexico

“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.”

Read Full Post »

PHOTO 1: Just another day on the beach. This was typical of catches thist past week with a good batch of fun football tuna and a smattering of breezing dorado. Jeff Sakuda and Marianne Sugawara from S. California come down 2 or 3 times a year and were worried they would not catch enough tuna. This rack of fish came in about 90 minutes of actual fishing! Las Arenas was red hot most of the week until Northern winds kicked in and shut things down late.

TUNA BITE IS EPIC AS RODS BEND AT LAS ARENAS WITH DORADO HIGHLIGHTS BUT NORTHERN WINDS LATE IN WEEK THREATEN TO TURN OFF BEST BITE OF THE YEAR!

La Paz / Las Arenas Fishing Report for Oct. 7, 2007

PHOTO 2: Zach Smith and Dave Deter strike the pose! Yellow”fun” tuna again took up residence in a spot just off the beach between the Arenas lighthouse and Punta Perrico. You had to be REALLY bad not to catch fish this past week. The fish would go like maddogs on the flylined sardines simply dropped over the side!

PHOTO 3: Pete Eby from Cleveland holds up his first-ever fish…a nice grade yellowfin tuna. You didn’t have to be a vet to land fish this week. The basic requirement was just don’t drop the rod into the water. These yellowfin would go on just about any boat tossed in the water and best of all, the fish were literally only about 100 yards from shore!

PHOTO 4: Speaking of veterans, two San Diegans, Don Melucci and Mike Foster come down every year. Their first day, they got hit by the tuna as well. Here they are standing on Las Arenas beach with the first day catch. If you had a bait in the water, you were bit. Most of the fish were football sized yellowfin between 10 and 20 pounds this week.

PHOTO: 5: Vern Maxwell from Pittsburgh PA holds up his first ocean fish. It’s a bull dorado. Fluries of dorado would often jet through the tuna schools and were a highlight of the good tuna fishing with most boats getting a shot at dorado without having to move off the tuna honey-hole!

PHOTO 6 : John Pastorello of Fullerton CA surveys some of his dorado catch taken on the La Paz side. Dorado continued to be the general catch for our La Paz fleet, but there were also some wahoo taken again as well as striped marlin, blue marlin and sailfish. The dorado this year are not nearly as big as the toads we got last year but the fish are still a fun 10-30 pounds on the average with lots of smaller ones surprisingly still around.

PHOTO 7: Even THIS guy can catch fish sometimes! They let all kinds of crazy people on the beach when the fish are biting.

PHOTO 8 : Frequent La Paz angler, Eric Zimbler holds up one of the larger tuna caught this week of about 25 pounds.

THE FISH REPORT

Read Full Post »

YES! SIX WAHOO!!! ONE BOAT ONE DAY!!!

PHOTO 1: I guess you could say that Norm Clayton from Escondido CA had a pretty good day. He was with his wife Noni and Captain Eddy Carballo. It’s a pretty good day anytime you get a wahoo, one of the most sought-after fish in our waters. Well, Norm got his 60 pounder. What a slug of a fish! Well, he turned right around and gave the whole thing to his captain. He didn’t want it! Why? Well, Norm didn’t get ONE wahoo. HE GOT SIX WAHOO in what has to be one of the most epic wahoo days ever down here! In fact, it was so good, he gave 3 fish to his captain. He didn’t have any more room! The day before he slammed tuna and dorado and now had to figure out what to do with SIX WAHOO from 40 to 60 pounds! Oh…it was also his birthday!!! Some guys have all the luck!

Norm read my fishing reports and brought the right stuff…a CD-18 purple and black rapala that simply got crushed by Mr. Hoo. over and over again! We had a banner day this week when several dozen wahoo blew up on the La Paz fleet…that’s right…not my Las Arenas fleet…the hot spots for the wahoo was for my La Paz boats that almost NEVER get wahoo! The fish zone was a place called La Reyna a little rock just to the north end of Cerralvo Island. in that one day, we hooked and caught more wahoo than in the last 3 years combined.

WHAT FULL MOON? WAHOO EXPLODE OFF NORTH CERRALVO IN BEST BITE OF SEASON. TUNA TEAR UP THE BEACHES AT LAS ARENAS IN A BLOODY WEEK OF FISHING PANDEMONIUM!

La Paz / Las Arenas Fishing Report for September 30, 2007

PHOTO 2: Just another day of dorado fishing! While tuna and wahool hogged the spotlight this week, there was no shortage of dorado no matter where you fished. Larger bulls up to 40 or more pounds finally started to show up but limits or near limits of the mahi were available as long as the other species didn’t “distract” you. Overall, the dorado have been much smaller this year perhaps due to the water temps being off, but anyone who wanted dorado got dorado.

PHOTO 3: Here’s a nice mix of fish! Scott O’Connor and Glenn Delmendo, both police officers from the Los Angeles area show off a great day of fishing with tuna, dorado and a sailfish that really added some adventure to the day. After fighting the fish on light tackle, they got it near the boat. Attempting to gaff the fish forwarad, the fish turned and instead the gaff stuff in the tail. The fish went ballistic again and took off with the reel screaming; the fish dancing across the water and the wooden gaff still stuck in the body! It almost pulled Glenn overboard when it took off again.

PHOTO 4: It’s not all surface fish right now! Some of the best fishing is inshore for cabrilla and pargo. Mike Recchia holds up a nice pargo mullato (barred pargo) he pulled out of the rocks.

PHOTO 5: Mike La Torre and Mike Recchia hold up some nice dorado from fishing north of town. Dorado continued to be the main target for our boats fishing out’ve La Paz. The nice thing is that the fish seemed to have moved close, right off the S. end of Espiritu Santo Island near Bonanza Beach which was such a hot spot last year. Live bait, lures and trolled slabs of bait al worked well. Good to see some larger bulls finally showing up too!

PHOTO 6: Carrie Shilyansky was so excited about the possibility of catching her first ocean fish! She had never done anyting like this at all. On her first day she simply slammed the fish and after that…it was all over! Carrie had the “bug.” Great to see someone get “turned onto” fishing. Here she’s holding a good sized Las Arenas dorado!

PHOTO 7: That’s popular captain Jorge with his arms crossed and that’s Robert and Nick Venezia from Los Angeles smiling and struggling with yellowfin tuna just off Las Arenas beach. Their first two days were s0-so. They decided to come back for a 3rd day and third time was the charm. They tore up the fish! I rarely saw a time when at least one of them did not have a tuna hooked up. Note how close they are to the beach. The cool thing about the tuna bite at Las Arenas is how close we are to the beach! No long boat rids!

PHOTO 8: Paul Scheuring from Los Angeles is the head writer and creater of the popular TV show “Prison Break.: The show is in its third season and it is Fox’s second most successful TV show (behind “24”). Paul was down for his bachelor party and took a day out fishing. Can’t ask for me…a striped marlin and a dorado. Captain Juan Chuy looks on.

PHOTO 9: Fernando Sucre from Palo Alto strikes the pose for the camera to hold up his dorado. Dorado bite has been solid all week. The hard part is not getting discouraged if the fishing is slow. You can go all day with nothing, but then come up on the spot and one bait in the water can turn into hours of pandemonium with fish from 5-50 pounds.

THE FISHING REPORT!

A full moon and even a late week tropica storm (Julliette) couldn’t stop the bite this past week. There were a few bumps here and there. You could hit a slow spot but overall, if you just check the photos, there was some nice fish to be caught and no one who wet a line went home with an empty chest.

In some respects, the fishing this week was just short of phenomenal!

Let’s begin with the wahoo bite north of La Paz at La Reyna. Listen…we just don’t hang that many of the speedy skinnies on the La Paz side. However, about mid-week kicked off by Norm and Noni Clayton’s 6 wahoo bonanza, other boats cashed in and fish up to 70 pounds were caught. Purple rapalas were the hot rig and double hook-ups were no uncommon. But this bite was unbelievable. We simply don’t hang that many hoo’s out of La Paz. Ninety-nine out’ve 100 wahoo come from our Las Arenas fleet! However, all of a sudden north Cerralvo Island simply exploded.

If you were fishing our La Paz fleet and didn’t get a wahoo, no biggie. More and larger dorado showed up this week as well with fish between 25 and 40 pounds more evident everyday! Willing to hit the live baits, slow trolled slabs of mackerel and bright colored feathers were all effective.

The second hot spots was over at Las Arenas. Where did all these tuna come from? After several years of scratchy tuna fishing, suddenly the area between the lighhouse and Punta Perrico…literally 100 yards from shore…has become the tuna battleground!

I’m not kidding, limits or near limits of 10-25 pound tuna every single day. The fish are foaming!!! Will this last? I don’t know, but imagine pulling up on the spot literally a jig throw from the beach, dropping a bait and in seconds foaming fish and a bent rod! Some boats were getting so plugged with tuna so early, they were coming back to clean fish by 11 a.m. on the beach!!!

I fished several times this week. The first time I was out to goof with Randall Lee who brought 20 of the Catholic Big Brothers Big Sisters group with him. By 11:30, both of us had hammered so many tuna without barely moving a spot, that we told our skipper to pull over to the Giggling Marlin Restaurant in Muertos Bay. For the next 90 minutes, we “hid” and had a great lunch before driving back to where the other boats were cleaning fish no one the wiser that we had only fished a few hours.

That was topped later in the week when Tropical Storm Juliet was playing games with us. Folks…it was more than a little rough. We had to wait at Las Arenas beach for the waters to calm so we could push off the beach. Well, it was so rough that the bait guys couldn’t get enough bait. I started the day with abou t 15 pieces. Not much, you say?

Well, an hour later, 10 yellowfin tuna and still had 4 pieces left! The othe boats were also similarly plugged with limits. 25 to 40 pound outfits or even lighter is ideal for this kind of fishing. Some flurocarbon leader is a bonus, but this was as simple a a hook and a small rubbercore sinker then HOLD ON!!

Dorado would breeze through the tuna schools as well and along the beaches we still have schools of roosters and jacks!

That’s my story!

Jonathan

Jonathan Roldan’s

Tailhunter International

Website: http://www.tailhunter-international.com/

Phone: (626) 333-3355

FAX: (626) 333-0115

E-Mail: Riplipboy@aol.comU.S. Office: 3319 White Cloud Dr., Suite A, Hacienda Hts. CA 91745

Mexico Office: Carr. a Pichilingue KM 5, Numero 205, La Paz, Baja Cal Sur, Mexico

“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.”

Read Full Post »

PHOTO 1: Now at your nearest music store and in concert…the “Get Bent Air Dorado Band!” Standing in the shallows at Balandra Beach, Joey Horvath, Drew Baumgartner, Joe “Pineapple” Caricugan (who is a professional musician) all from the Ventura Ca area, play some sweet music with this trio of mahi they took north of La Paz. I have no idea what the guy is doing behind Joe!

STORM HOVERS OVER US BUT TUNA AND DORADO REFUSE TO SHUT DOWN AND PROVIDE STEADY BITE FOR LAS ARENAS AND LA PAZ!

PHOTO 2: All the way from Ohio, Dave Stroud and Rich White rolled down here for their first visit and spent a few days tangling with dorado, yellowfin tuna and even the great-eating pompano Rich is holding in his left hand. Dorado and tuna were the prevailant species this past week. Nothing spectacular in terms of size, but the decent sized fish provided some solid action and good eating fillets for the freezers.

PHOTO 3: From Hacienda Heights, CA , John Ford and Bob Gonzalez are here on Arenas beach. John on the left is holding one of the larger tuna of the week. Most of the tuna were football-sized in the 10-20 pound class, but there were a few in the 30-40 pound class that kept things lively.

PHOTO 4: Every year for several years, Jeff Del Dotto and his son Chris come to visit us this time of year. This will be their first time getting their photos in the report! They’re from Tracy CA. The number of dorado that showed up around Las Arenas was surprising since Las Arenas had been “tuna land” for about the last 2 weeks. However, our boats found the fish at the buoys, as well as under a dead whale, a dead turtle and some other floating objects. A few tossed sardines at the object often got the waters boiling as the fish rose.

PHOTO 5: Randall Lee and Bob Holmberg from Los Angeles came down on a charity trip with the Catholic Big Brothers group. Their first day they fished Las Arenas and the two amigos post up several nice dorado and a tuna headed to the dinner table.

PHOTO 6: Glenn Delmendo and Scott OConnor, are from the Los Angeles area. They started off their trip finding a honey hole of dorado in the channel between Cerralvo Island and El Sargento.

PHOTO 7: Mike Alperin and his buddy in the back, Lee Cook, flew out here from the East Coast and I gotta admit…I like their style. Rather than necessarily chase the blue water species, the two amigos kept to light tackle, mostly using 8 pound test and spinning rods. Both are experienced anglers and in 4 days of fishing got over 20 species of fish including big bonito like this one held by Mike. According to Mike this bonito was just short of being a new IGFA record, “if only he had eaten a bigger piece of bait.”

PHOTO 8 : A better rack of mahi you will not see. The boys from Wayne Longs Utah group had never done anything like this but were well on their way to filling up the ice chest with this gerat rack of bull dorado.

PHOTO 9: Wayne Long from Utah brought several families to hang with us for about a week. The tuna were good to them this day. These yellowfin tuna were nice 15-25 pound “footballs.” The tuna bite has been the best in several years. Granted, the fish are not huge, but have been more solid than we’ve seen in many years with an on-again-off-again bite since July. The cool thing about the tuna is that they’re not very far from shore. There are several hot spots with some as close as within 100 yards of the beach. It’s not complicated fishing. Using live bait, just drop it into the water and hold on!

PHOTO 10: For our La Paz fleet, dorado continued to be the mainstay. If you want to specifically target dorado, then 90 percent of the catch for our La Paz boats is dorado. But marlin and big sailfish also appeared in the boat wakes as well.

PHOTO 11: Tim Eng and his son, David, from Rowland Hts. CA rolled in and quickly rolled out’ve La Paz. They got in one day of fishing and spanked the yellowfin tuna. Tim wanted to fish a second day, but David was too worn out from the first day. Tim thought they would only catch one or two fish.

THE FISH REPORT

You know…there are some weeks of fishing that are bad. There are others that are spectacular. But like life, there are some weeks that are just good. Nothing high. Nothing low. Nothing upsetting. Just a good week to cruise through.

That’s how it was this week. We kicked a little fish butt. Everyone got bent. Some folks got more than others. Some got less than others. But everyone had fish to bring home. Some got their first tuna or first dorado or first billfish. Most of the fish were that nice 10-30 pound grade. Certainly nothing that would put your knees, but at the same time a nice grade of fun fish to bend a rod and the fact that there were enough of them to keep you busy, meant that at the end of the day, you had some good fish in the box. At the end of the trip when you were pulling things our’ve the freezer, you realized. “Gosh, I guess I did catch a few fish!”

It was another good week of good yellowfin tuna for our Las Arenas boats. Most were footballs but a few hit into the 25-40 pound class. The bite rolled around a bit. We hit fish along the rock highway south of Cerralvo Island. There was also a good spot just off the Las Arenas lighthouse. Again, that little cove about 1/4 mile off the old Hotel Las Arenas kicked out some good fish as did Punta Perrico. The ticket is to get your bait and get to the spots before too many other boats showed up.

As far as dorado fishing, the best place would have been to fish directly north out’ve La Paz. Several areas were ripe. Around the corner at Las Cruces some of the better grade bulls were found at various times this week. Surprisingly, we even had a nice bite out at the El Bajo Seamount of dorado, some tuna and some billfish. It’s rare, but when the seamount goes off, it can be spectacular.

The cool thing was that as the week went on, dorado fishing also improved for our Las Arenas boats! Hitting spots like the buoys and from Punta Perrico down past Boca de Alama could be very productive. The larger bulls tipped in at 25-40 pounds.

Marlin are still around as are unsually large sailfish up to 150 pounds. Usually, it’s the sailfish that are smaller than the striped marlin, but this year, it’s just the oppositie. Also, yes…there’s still roostefish along the beaches. Either you will tangle with the fun 10 pounders or the big slugger 50-100 pounders will roll up in your chum line.

IF YOU ARE HEADED TO COSTCO

My amigo, Tom Gatch, who is a well-known write rand Baja sage, just completed his book called “Hooked on Baja.” I wanted to give a shout-out that the book is now available at Costco or else online at http://www.google.com/products?q=Hooked+on+Baja,+Tom+Gatch&hl=en&um=1&sa=X&oi=froogle&ct=title

If you go to Chapter 7, Tom has nicely stuck me in there with one of my stories. The book is filled with all kinds of fishing stuff as well as stories about and from some of the top Baja personalities (so I’m puzzled why I’d be in there, but grateful!). Check it out.

That’s my story!

Jonathan

Jonathan Roldan’s

Tailhunter International

Website: www.tailhunter-international.com

Phone: (626) 333-3355

FAX: (626) 333-0115

E-Mail: Riplipboy@aol.com

U.S. Office: 3319 White Cloud Dr., Suite A, Hacienda Hts. CA 91745

Mexico Office: Carr. a Pichilingue KM 5, Numero 205, La Paz, Baja Cal Sur, Mexico

“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.”

Read Full Post »

PHOTO 1 – Michael “Flipper” Thompson and Joey “Joey 805″Horvath were on fire for few days this week nailing yellowfin and this nice sailfish off Las Arenas where we had the best tuna bite of the year. No doubt, 2007, the tuna are back on the chew after taking a few years off.

TUNA EXPLODE OFF LAS ARENAS IN BEST BITE OF THE YEAR AS FISH CHEW ONLY 100 YARDS FROM THE BEACH!

La Paz / Las Arenas Fishing Report for Sept. 16, 2007

PHOTO 2 – Just had to post this. It’s our friends from the Get Bent group that comes down every year. Lots of fun and always ready to accomodate with a “candid photo” if you look closely. Thanks guys! The group spanked the fish their first two days loading up on tuna. As I’m writing this, the guys are currently out on the water and have two more days hopefully to top off the ice chests with a few loads of dorado and wahoo.

PHOTO 3: This was the first time down for Shawn Dixon and Kai Lu. This is the grade of yellowfin tuna we were taking all week. Almost within minutes of hitting the spot, fish foamed and would bite almost as long as you kept the chum coming. Some guy were pulling off after an hour to go look for other things to catch having plugged the fish boxes with too many tuna!

PHOTO 4: Drew Baumgartner got his first tuna ever this week despite lots of fishing experience. Lots of guys got their first tuna this week. However, true to tradition, Drew unhesitatingly ate the heart of his first tuna…and liked it so much…he did it again so we could photograph it then licked his bloody fingers! Nothing like tradition!

PHOTO 5: Mike and Julio Vega were also on their first trip with us. Holding a bunch of yellowfin tuna, the guys were literally fishing within casting distance of the beaches. Early in the morning the fish bit like mad dogs with some guys limiting in the first 60 minutes. As the boat traffic increased, the bite would diminish and the boats would depart. However, one by one, the boats would snake back into the zone. Guys using small 1 or 2 oz sinkers to get their sardines below the rampant needlefish found the bite just as hot.

PHOTO 6: Las Arenas used to be known as an incredibly fertile fishery for yellowfin tuna and made it’s name on the yellowfin as well as other species that could be caught close to shore. The bite this week has been reminiscent of the old days. In fact, there’s been an nice on again-off again tuna bite through the summer, but the last two weeks, the tuna have been biting like the old days!

PHOTO 7: Kelly Ashmore holds up on of the nicer grade tuna after his first day. The yellowfin don’t need much. Basically pin a bait in the hook Put the bait in the water. Hold on!

PHOTO 8: Since the hurricane two weeks ago it took a few days for the fish to get back to speed. This week there was no doubt, but we never expected it would be the yellowfin. Glenn and Frank Dellari from the N.Cal Area plugged an ice chest or two with fillets.

PHOTO 9: Three generations of the Van Steenkiste family. Roger on the left has already been here twice this year, but this time, brought his son Greg and his grandson Matt for their first times and did a banner number on tuna and dorado this past week.

PHOTO 10: Yes…there are still dorado around…quite a few actually, although the focus has shifted to the tuna bite this week. Las Arenas still had it’s share of dorado and for our La Paz boats, almost 90 percent of the catch has been dorado with fish ranging from 5-30 pounds, although there’s some larger bulls like this one held by Ivan Lau of El Monte CA. The larger dorado this week were willing to eat the baits, but also showed an affinity for slow trolled strips of bonito as well as trolled feathers that had dorado colors of yellow, green and red or orange.

PHOTO 11: Not all the tuna were footballs. There were some larger fish that came piling through and most of them did a number on the surprised anglers who just weren’t ready. However, this is one 45 pounder that didn’t get away.

THE FISHING REPORT

Well, if there were any doubts that the hurricane two weeks ago had done a number on the fishing season, those doubts went right out the window.

We’re back on track! Dorado continued to rip lips for our La Paz guys and we’re seeing more and more marlin again. Wahoo bit of the south side of Cerralvo Island and we just had one of the best weeks for roosterfish that we’ve had in about a month with everything from 70 pounders down to feisty 5 pounders.

However, the biggest news was the arrival…en masse…of the yellowfin tuna schools off Las Arenas. It was like the old days. Fish foaming and on the chew as soon as you pulled up the boat and stopped the motors. In a line of fish from the Las Arenas lighthouse all the way down to Boca de Alamo, all it would take is a few sardines tossed in the water to get the fish up and boiling. A few days, I could even see the fish foaming standing on the shore! The fish were literally withing casting distance of the beach on some occasions! Guys were getting plugged with all the fish they wanted in an hour or so then had to put the rods down to rest or else grabbed heavier gear and went looking for roosters or pargo or wahoo. Other guys came back with lighter and even ultra light gear and would hook fish after fish and bust them off or take longer times to battle the tuna having a blast!

If you’re coming down this week a few tips…

1. Flurocarbon leader seems to make a difference. You don’t need much. Just a few yards or 20, 25 or 30.

2. Small hooks for small baits

3. The larger dorado like dorado colored lures

That’s my story! Have a great week!

Jonathan

Jonathan Roldan’s

Tailhunter International

Website: www.tailhunter-international.com

Phone: (626) 333-3355FAX: (626) 333-0115

E-Mail: Riplipboy@aol.com

U.S. Office: 3319 White Cloud Dr., Suite A, Hacienda Hts. CA 91745

Mexico office: Carr. a Pichlingue KM5; Numero 205, La Paz, Baja Sur, Mexico

“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.”

Read Full Post »

Read Full Post »