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Posts Tagged ‘cerralvo Island’

A rare and treasured fish…at least this year! There’s been a dearth of wahoo caught this year. Only a handful have shown all season when we should be really getting into them! But Harry Hsu got this 30-pound class ‘hoo fishing with our Las Arenas fleet just south of Cerralvo Island.

Triple generation “man-cation” for Larry Bodle from Huntington Beach, his son, Ernie, and dad Jim. They blasted a nice day of dorado with us as they pose on the beach at Bahia de Los Muertos.

San Diego in the house! Alex Trasvina (closest to the camera) gets in the line up with dad, and cousins after a solid dorado day at Las Arenas. One of their boats had limits before 11 a.m. and were back on the beach goofing for roosterfish.

Bill Hsu from Diamond Bar CA  had a successful 3 days fishing with us as we had better activity than we’ve had in a long time with our Las Arenas fleet. Bill took this nice dorado on bait.

Earlier in the week, we still had lingering clouds and rain, but the dorado still cooperated. This is our son-in-law Brian Reid celebrating his birthday with us, our daughter, Jessie from Las Vegas and that’s Scottie Roughgarden from Hollywood CA playing around in the back!

People often forget that while everyone is a bit offshore chasing the “glamour” gamefish like dorado, inshore offers some great fishing. Stan Yung and his daughter Shantel spent several days working the reefs and rocks and went home with a mess of cabrilla and yellow snapper which are incredibly delicious eating! Stan was on his first trip with us and is from Glendale CA.

Gloria Paymani is a producer from Hollywood and is one of our newest fun Tailhunter amigas! She busted several days of fish and tied into this HUGE bonito that she says ran her around for “20 minutes” before she got it to the boat with a hand from smiling Capt. Alfredo with our Tailhunter La Paz fleet.

Colorado has been well-represented this year and this week was no different. Laura and Rob Duerr from Denver rocked the boat with a load of dorado and yellow snapper and pargo this past week and pose on the beach at Bahia de Los Muertos.

Ron Koslowski is probably wondering “How did a trigger fish end up in the fish box with all these dorado?” Fishing with Captain Pancho he and his wife stacked the panga fish box with a load of dorado to take home to Colorado.

LAST MINUTE ADDITION! Just as I was publishing this fishing report (Sunday night), Ernie Bodle and Scott Sylvester sent in their photo from Sunday’s great dorado bite! I had to get it into the report. Ernie got this nice wahoo and took the family jackpot (there were 7 of them fishing) plus Scott nailed the big bull dorado!

POST FULL MOON ANGLERS WORK HARDER FOR FISH BUT LAS ARENAS AREA WAKING UP FINALLY!

La Paz -Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of Aug. 2-8, 2012

It would seem that our bite during the full moon was a lot better than our bite AFTER the full moon this past week.  While there were definitely some high spots for fishing this week and some good catches, I would have to say that fishing was only spotty to good during this past week.  I’m not sure whether to blame it on the after-effects of last week’s rains; clouded water in some spots; or what.  I really can’t put my finger on it as there really doesn’t seem to be much different this week than last week when we had numerous afternoon showers.  But, the bite definitely wasn’t as good.

Dorado were our main species again this week.  Every day a few boats got into them nicely for both our Tailhunter Las Arenas and our Tailhunter La Paz fleets.  A few boats would find the right spots and get bent nicely but then other boats would scratch and scratch.  The next day, it would be just the opposite.  The “hot boat” or the “hot spot” would get cold and a different boat; set of anglers; or area would turn out to be the hot area.  No real rhyme or reason that even our captains could discern.

Las Arenas did better than it has been.  That was encouraging.  Much more dorado with some nice schoolie fish.  Las Arenas all year has literally been slower than slow except for roosterfish.  But this week we got into some decent dorado, roosterfish plus even a (surprise) wahoo!   Pargo were also a good fallback with pargo mulatto (barred pargo) and yellow snapper filling some coolers.

La Paz was OK.  Steady, but as mentioned, hit-or-miss.  Dorado ranged from smaller 10 pounders to some 25 pounders.  A few larger ones got away.  We also had a few sailfish show up in the bites with all fish released.

Hopefully, this week is just a bump in the road and we’ll be back on track by the time you’re reading this!

By the way…not sure how much of a difference it made, but some of our guys brought fresh frozen squid with them this week and swore it made a difference on the dorado so…if anyone wants to bring FRESH frozen squid (not the stuff you buy at the bait store), it wouldn’t hurt.

NEW ADDRESS

Tailhunter International has moved it’s U.S. address.  While Jill and I still live full-time down here in La Paz, our U.S. office is:

TAILHUNTER INTERNATIONAL

3566 Quail View St.
Spring Valley, CA 91977

or

TAILHUNTER INTERNATIONAL

P.O. Box 1149

Alpine CA  91903-1149

TWITTER AND FACEBOOK

Don’t forget, if you need a bigger dose of our fishing and other things from down here in La Paz, you can follow me personally (Jonathan Roldan) on Facebook and Twitter then “like” TAILHUNTER INTERNATIONAL SPORTIFISHING and “like”  TAILHUNTER INTERNATIONAL (the restaurant/bar).

Have a great week!  This coming week is going to be crazy…MEXICAN INDEPENDENCE DAY is like New Year’s Eve and Spring Break and 4th of July all rolled into one on the 15th/ 16th of this week!

That’s our story!

Jonathan and Jilly

Jonathan Roldan’s
Tailhunter International

Website: www.tailhunter-international.com

Mexico Office: Tailhunter International, 755 Paseo Obregon, La Paz, Baja Sur, Mexico

U.S. Mailing Address:  Tailhunter International, Box 1149, Alpine  CA  91903-1149
Phones:
from USA : 626-638-3383
from Mexico: 044-612-14-17863

.
Tailhunter Weekly Fishing Report:
http://www.tailhunter-international.com/fishreport.htm

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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Another big week for big dorado and another big week where it seems like the ladies were on fire! Debbie White from Oregon isn’t that big herself, but take a look at the size of this dorado she took off the east side of Cerralvo Island with Captain Pancho! Debbie comes down with her husband at least once-a-year and always does well. This fish is HUGE!

Big grins all around for another big dorado! Captain “Jolly Roger” Rogelio helps Mandy Carron with her first big fish of the trip. Mandy is from Boise, Idaho was on her first trip to La Paz (and is still here as I write this and out fishing!). This week fish of 30-50 pounds were no uncommon!

From New Mexico on his first trip, Dick Carroll, had 3 super days of fishing and spent one day chasing our exotic roosterish. He got this one just off Las Arenas.

This is one of the craziest fun guys who visits us every year at least once or twice! He rolls in from New Mexico and fishes hardcore and no one gets more excited about a fish. He spent 5 days riipping up on big roosterfish and added this trophy dorado with Captain Victor off Las Arenas.

It was another good week of billfish again! Quite a few fish hooked and released or lost. Many are being found around the dorado schools feeding on the same baitfish as well as the dorado themselves. Leticia Hayler holds up a nice on while posing north of La Paz.

Another hefty bull dorado off Cerralvo Island! Don White pulled this one while dragging a small pink feather trying to locate a school or tuna! Don’s our good amigo from Oregon. Take a look at the video clip below for more details.

I was hoping Jeanette Carroll was going to adopt us! No one had more fun than her fishing every day. Always laughing! Captain Victor was fishing with her just off Punta Arenas Beach (in the background) and got this nice roosterfish which she photo’d and released.

Not sure if Dr. Bo Herrera is ready to launch this roosterfish out into the water, but he did release it. Bo spent 5 days fishing and caught and released quite a few big roosters!

From Oceanside CA, Tom Slaughter and his son spent a few days fishing with us with our both Las Arenas and our La Paz fleet plus some snorkeling out at the island. Tom poses with one of his dorado north of La Paz.

As you can tell, it was a good week for roosters! For some co-incidence, we had alot of amigos from New Mexico this past week. John George was working a spot of Cerralvo Island and got his roosterfish before releasing it.

VIDEO OF THE WEEK

Don White boats a huge bull dorado off Cerralvo Island!  Click the screen or the YOUTUBE link!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCPk8pkfZVQ&feature=plcp

BIG DORADO ROOSTERFISH AND MARLIN SET THE PACE THIS PAST WEEK!

La Paz- Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of July 14-22, 2012

We just had one of the most solid and steady weeks of fishing of the season.  No down days.  It was almost like a reading a book a menu.  If you wanted roosters fish with our Las Arenas Fleet.  If you wanted dorado, you fished with our Tailhunter La Paz Fleet!

Overall… Good fishing for both dorado, roosterfish and marlin.  If you fished with our Tailhunter Las Arenas fleet, the roosterfishing was good to outstanding with 3-8 nice roosters each day ranging from 20-50 pounders (all getting released).  As well, if you went outside, there was a shot at larger bull dorado up to 50 pounds as well as striped marlin.

If you wanted dorado, you simply told us you wanted to fish with our Tailhunter La Paz fleet.  It was almost like dialing in an order on the internet.  Every day most of our pangas got full limits of dorado and losing and releasing many many more fish.  We got several fish that did not fit on the 50-pound handscales and several in that class that were lost each day by the captains’ accounts!

Our largest that hit the scales was a slug bull of 47 pounds and that same day, I believe we had over a dozen fish that were at least 30 pounders.  There were several keys.  One was finding the right spot near Espiritu Santo Island or around the corner in the canyon or around Las Cruces.  If you found sargasso weeds, that would be a decent indicator. Second was just being patient.  Sometimes, it would literally be slack bite for hours and clients getting pretty frustrated.  Then, WHAM!  Just after 1 or so in the afternoon  the fish just blew up and it would be pandemonium in for an hour or so of double and triple hookups…catching and releasing as fast as they could go…and at the end a fish box stuffed with tails and exhausted anglers ready to head back.

All-in-all, a pretty good week!

That’s our story!

Jonathan and Jill

 

Jonathan Roldan’s
Tailhunter International

Website: www.tailhunter-international.com
U.S. Office: 3319 White Cloud Drive, Suite A, Hacienda Hts. CA 91745
Mexico Office: 755 Paseo Obregon, La Paz, Baja Sur, Mexico
Phones:
from USA : 626-638-3383
from Mexico: 044-612-14-17863

.
Tailhunter Weekly Fishing Report:
http://www.tailhunter-international.com/fishreport.htm

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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It was a great week for the larger dorado! Captain Victor gives and assist to Nicki Vavao on a huge pig-of-a-bull doado! It was not unusual to see 30-50 pound fish this past week. Nicki took over an hour to put this fish aboard, but total props to her. Not only was it her first time fishing in Baja. It was her FIRST TIME fishing…EVER! And this is her FIRST FISH…EVER! That’s gonna set the bar pretty high for the future!

Once again, the ladies were on fire this week! Geri Sandstrom, is from Idaho and she’s LOVES to fish, but had never gotten anything larger than big kokanee. Needless to say, she more than topped her personal best with 3 days of solid fishing for dorado and roosterfish!

We love having father-son fishing trips! Tom Slaughter and his son, Mike, spent 3 days fishing and snorkeling with us and got into some of the nice dorado bite we had including these two while posing at Balandra Bay north of La Paz.

This has been one of the best roosterfish seasons ever! Take a look at this huge trophy roosterfish that Scott Voldness took off Las Arenas. Scott’s from Utah and the big fish was released.

From Arizona, these two were a kick to have around for 4 days of fishing. Joe Cullwell and Dylan Martin hold up a double pair of dorado after one day of fishing north of La Paz.

Sam Sybesma comes to see us every year. He spent a few days fishing with our La Paz fleet having fun with the dorado but on his last day went with our Las Arenas fleet to see if he could get a roosterfish! WINNING! That’s Punta Arenas Beach in the background.

Another one of our father-son trips this week. Lyndon Mumm and his son, Matt, pulled on some great dorado during the week. Big smiles all the way around. They also took our island snorkel trip with the sealions as well.

Our good amigo, Dick, had to cancel his trip this last year, but towed his boat down to get in on the dorado bite and shows off his first day catch with, Randy Lyons.

Good way to start the week with a striped marlin for Al Sandstrom from Idaho. It was another good week on the billfish with most fish running 90-150 pounds. I believe we got over 20 hooked this week with all but a few released. We probably had another 10-15 break off or get unbuttoned. Al got this his first day and also got into the dorado nicely!

Jimmy Csutoras almost didn’t make it down, but got here at the last minute and slammed into nice dorado like this one. Jimmy is from Northern Cal.

Brothers Fred and Mike Sontag rolled on the dorado big time after 4 days fishing. Fred is from St. Louis and Mike is from S. Carolina. They hold up a nice pair standing on the beach at Balandra Beach north of La Paz.

BIG BITE OF BIG DORADO SET PACE FOR THE WEEK WITH ROOSTERS AND MARLIN!

La Paz – Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of July 8-15, 2012

It wasn’t as spectacular as last week’s dorado slam during the full moon, but there was some excellent fishing to be had nonetheless. I was a little worried as the first 2 days of the week it was like someone turned off the mahi-mahi spigot!

Whereas the week before our anglers were reporting 10, 20…40 or more dorado hookups per day and releasing fish as fast-as-they-could-go, the first two days this past week suddenly shut down to 2 to 6 dorado per panga.  That’s a huge drop in production!  I was sweating!

However, as the week went on, we got into a little rhythm again.  It was not wide up and there was an occasional day or panga that had an off-day, but more-often-than-not, the fishing day produced limits or near-limits of dorado.  If you were only fishing 1 day, that might be the day you had the stink on you, but if you fished 2, 3 or 4 days, at the end of the trip, our clients usually still found they had more fish than they knew what to do with!  They might have a day or two that was less than stellar, but then they had another day or two that was an explosion of fish that made up for the other slack times.

Often, I had to tell our anglers to just be patient.  Often, the days started slow.  I mean…really SLOW!  It’s noon and they have 1 fish aboard!  Then, at noon or 1 p.m.often when other fleets are heading in, our guys would hang out just a bit longer.  It would be all the difference in the world as that late bite would turn into dorado pandemonium with double-triple-and-quadruple hookups!  Often, our captains weren’t bringing in our clients until 3 or 4 p.m. or even later…giving that little bit of extra time to get onto the bite.

The coolest thing about this week that differed from last week was the appearance of some big quality bulls.  Whereas last week there were just a few of the fish over 20 pounds, this week fish between 25 and 40 pounds were hooked daily and many of the larger fish were lost and the clients coming back with only wide-eyed stories of big battles or broken lines.  Even some of our captains were talking about 50-pound class fish swimming out there or busting off after long fights.

Another big surprise were the marlin.  I think this past week, I counted over 20 striped marlin hooked amoung our Tailhunter anglers of which almost all of them were released.  There were probably as many that broke off or came unbuttoned during the battle.  Personally, I think the marlin are more active because there’s not only more bait in the water (sardines, mackerel, cocineros, jacks, and caballitos), but also, there’s so many little dorado swimming around that they’re feeding on the young dorado.  In fact, one of the best trolling color feathers right now just happens to be yellow and green!

One other item of big news…LAS ARENAS FINALLY TURNED ON!

That’s major headlines.  After almost 3 months of some of the dreariest fishing I have seen in years with no bait, we finally got some smaller tiny sardines this week as well as the larger baits and what a difference it made!  It wasn’t wide open, but our pangas were getting into some nice dorado between 10 and 15 pounds, but also some of the big slugger mahi over 30 pounds.  In addition, it also produced good billfish action…I think one day 3 of our pangas hooked and released 7 marlin alone!  Plus, the roosterfish continue to bite as well.  So, this is all very promising and I’m glad both sides finally started to kick out some fish!

That’s our story!

Jonathan and Jill

 

Jonathan Roldan’s
Tailhunter International

Website: www.tailhunter-international.com
U.S. Office: 3319 White Cloud Drive, Suite A, Hacienda Hts. CA 91745
Mexico Office: 755 Paseo Obregon, La Paz, Baja Sur, Mexico
Phones:
from USA : 626-638-3383
from Mexico: 044-612-14-17863

.
Tailhunter Weekly Fishing Report:
http://www.tailhunter-international.com/fishreport.htm

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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It’s been a long time since we had a nice dorado bite as we waited for waters to clear up and get warmer! It’s about time! Dorado finally kicked it into gear! Our buddy, Len Atkinson from the Sacramento CA area hasn’t visited us in a few seasons but good to have him back as he and Captain Marcos try not to get their shins slapped by a struggling big bull dorado!

TUNA? Yes! Mary Wehner always seems to do well. She and husband, Dave, went just east of Cerralvo Island with Captain Victor and found a couple of big dorado as well as this nice slugger yellowfin tuna! Everything just seemed to finally get better about mid-week!

Early in the week, with waters still on the chilly side, we had another run of nice yellowtail around Espirito Santo Island. Check out this trophy held by Joel Ofrancia who visited us from Washington to get some sun, fishing and diving. He caught 5 of these beauties!

Talk about a fishing vacation! Larry Watkins from Los Angeles decided to go “all in” and spend two whole weeks with us to get get ONE ROOSTERFISH! Well, he picked a good time because the roosterfish were tearing it up and he got this this colorful rooster just off Cerralvo Island. Some days the boats averaged 4-8 roosters per day in the 20-60 pound class. Almost all fish, including this one were released.

Tbis is Gerda Siewart from Anaheim CA with Captain Gerardo of our Tailhunter Las Arenas Fleet. Gerda had never been fishing before. She was also nervous because she just had surgery last week. But she went out anyway…and had a blast! She says she’s hooked. First day 7 roosterfish. 2nd day 5 roosterfish. 3rd day big yellowtail and cabrilla. 4th day a box full of dorado. She just let the captains fish and said, “Let’s have some fun!” She’s never stopped smiling the whole time! This was the only rooster she couldn’t release.

Cameron Hutcheson from Orange Co, CA is another of our clients who had a great time on their first trip…roosterfish…yellowtail…dorado! All of them were on their list they were hoping to catch. Cam holds up a big bull dorado he caught north of La Paz!

It’s a long way from Michigan to La Paz! But check out this trophy bull dorado that Jim de Boer holds on the beach at Balandra. It was great to finally see some of the larger models decide to bite and we’re happy that Jim came all this way and was able to get into quality fish. He also got his first roosterfish as well!

I gottta hand it to Mike Harvey who lives in Montana. This guy busted his butt all week trying to get a roosterfish…even fishing from the beaches at night. He finally got one on his third day. In fact, he got several plus got a nice load of dorado as well when the bite turned on mid-week. Mike’s posing with this sizeable rooster right off the lighthouse at Las Arenas.  Mike’s already got reservations to come back in September “when the fish are bigger!”

Marlin finally got a bit more active as well this week. We’ve been seeing them for week turn up their noses at us. Guy Petree and his buddy Oscar hold up a fish they got north of La Paz. They released the marlin after the photo. Guy is coming back later this week for more fishing!

The man behind the fish is Brian Hutcheson! He’s from Cote de Caza CA and on his first day popped this nice rooster off of Cerralvo Island. First time fishing with us, he had a banner 3 days of fishing.

Monster yellowtail for Dr. Norm Harris who gets a hand from Captain “Fettucine” Alfredo off Espiritu Santo Island. Great catch! Doc is from Santa Ana CA

BEST WEEK OF FISHING TO KICK INTO SUMMER!  IT’S ABOUT TIME!

La Paz/ Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of June 17-24, 2012

It was like night and day in the difference between fishing early compared to later in the week.  For 2 months, I kept saying that all we needed was a little kick in water temperature and the tough fishing would improve.  Well, the water temps went up by 2 degrees this week into the low 80’s.

By the same token…it was THE BEST WEEK of the SEASON on so many levels!  Still not quite up to standards, but what a difference in this week compared to the last few months!  We still need to get better, but just take a look at the variety of species in the photos!

It was like someone threw light switch!  The first day of summer…June 22nd…everything changed!

Early in the week, with waters still a bit chilly, our bite consisted of a very good roosterfish bite with fish between 20 and 60 pounds. Great fun but not very good eating.  As well we had a pretty sweet bite of 20-40 pound yellowtail off the west end of Espiritu Santo Island.  That was good for a few days  and we had some fun.

But about mid-week waters started warming.  We were seeing more marlin.  We started seeing breezing schools of dorado.  Everyone was excited.  Just one problem…they wouldn’t eat.  Not even remotely interested in biting!  So frustrating to see so many dorado and they just had no interest in biting.

Then, about Thursday the water temps kicked up a notch.  The dirty green cold water started to dissipate and BOOM!  Dorado started slamming!  It was like someone threw a swtich.  Some of the dorado were real punk squirt fish, but others were in the 20-40 pound class and larger fish were lost.  As well, marlin started to jump into the act as well as sailfish and each day we hooked, lost , caught and released several.

Not everyone caught fish everyday.  Some boats did great some days then not so good the next.  Also anglers lost a lot of fish as well.  However, for those who fished a few days, there were definitely fish to catch and opportunities to put fish in the boat compared to what it’s been lately.  All very encouraging!

Hope this is something we can finally count on.  The bite has been a long time coming after a really slow spring bite.

That’s our story!

Jonathan and Jilly

 

Jonathan Roldan’s
Tailhunter International

Website: www.tailhunter-international.com
U.S. Office: 3319 White Cloud Drive, Suite A, Hacienda Hts. CA 91745
Mexico Office: 755 Paseo Obregon, La Paz, Baja Sur, Mexico
Phones:
from USA : 626-638-3383
from Mexico: 044-612-14-17863

.
Tailhunter Weekly Fishing Report:
http://www.tailhunter-international.com/fishreport.htm

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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A late…really late burst of fish on Sunday gave us some hope that things are turning around after what many are saying is the toughest fishing in many years in Baja…not just La Paz…IN BAJA! But on Sunday, our amigo, John McVay got two nice dorado off Las Arenas at the start of his week-long fishing!

A big high-five to Gerda Siewart! This was her FIRST DAY fishing..ever! Except for fishing off a pier. She was a bit nervous being in a panga, but on top of it all, she just had surgery last week and was ready to head for shore if things got a bit uncomfortable for her. However, on the contrary, she said she had the “best day ever!” With the help of Captain Gerardo, she put 7 roosters on the hook plus a jack crevalle and an amberjack releasing all but 3 fish. Roosters are biting! Good job, Gerda!

OK…go figure! It’s mid-June and waters are still cold enough that we’re getting yellowtail around Espiritu Santo Island. Amy Lenhart from Idaho shows off one of their many fish. It’s crazy…many days of nothing then the yellowtail start biting!

When you’re 8 and 10 years old and on your first Baja fishing trip with dad, every fish is a monster, especially when you bait your own hook; put it in the water; and reel the fish in all by yourself like 8-year-old Sean and 10-year-old A.J. Rose from Colorado.

One upside to the colder dark water and one of the reasons for the dark green water is the algea bloom going off, but that means whale sharks are back! These gentle giants are incredible creatures and one of the highlights of visiting La Paz is a swim with a “fish” that can be 10-50 feet long! Don’t worry…they eat plankton but are true members of the shark family and a highlight of any visit to get in the water with them. Thanks for Bob and Becky Solee, our Oregon, amigos who had whale sharks swimming around their fishing panga!

Nice bull for Troy Lenhart who was on his first La Paz trip with us and took this bull dorado north of La Paz where some fingers of warm water seem to have finally moved in!

The latest water temperature chart from http://www.terrafin.com shows that waters are finally getting back up there into the 80 degree range, but still unseasonably cooler than normal. We need more of the yellow and orange colors around the La Paz area, but as recently as last week, we had only cold blue colors!

TOUGH WEEK OF FISHING PUNCTUATED BY  A PROMISING TURNAROUND SUNDAY!

La Paz/ Las Arenas Fishing Report from Week of June 11-17, 2012

Not much to tell you about.  It wasn’t that great a week of fishing.  Honest.   Early in the week we still had that nice snap of yellowtail of solid 20-50 pound fish off Espiritu Santo Island.  But the cold waters that seemed to have brought the fish in then started getting warm like it should be in the first place.  That colder water was replaced by warmer water and well…there went the yellowtail replaced by sporadic dorado, roosterfish, marlin and cabrilla fishing.  But it was hard scratchy fishing for both our La Paz and Las Arenas fleet.  You gotta work at it.  You have to have your “A” game or be pretty lucky and if you do run into fish, you might not get a second chance if you miss the fish!  That’s the way it was this last week.  It might help also, if folks come to fish for what’s here rather than fishing for what’s not biting.  But, everyone is trying so many different things, it’s just such a crazy non-bite! Hopefully, as we get away from the big full moon and other things, fishing will kick in again.

BUT WAIT!!!

I’m writing this SUNDAY evening.  AND WE HAD A PRETTY DECENT DAY TODAY!  It wasn’t all-out-nuts, but maybe the best bite in over a week!  Our Las Arenas pangas ran into some scattered decent dorado, roosterfish, marlin and amberjack!  Our La Paz guys…wow…bigger dorado up to 40 pounds, marlin plus…(get this) yellowtail up to 25 pounds!

Captains that were struggling to get nibbles were grinning today.  Are things changing?  I sure hope so.  Best dorado day of the year so far!  Fingers crossed that by the time you’re reading this we’ll be on the upswing!

That’s our story!

Jonathan and Jill

Jonathan Roldan’s

Tailhunter International

Website: www.tailhunter-international.com
U.S. Office: 3319 White Cloud Drive, Suite A, Hacienda Hts. CA 91745
Mexico Office: 755 Paseo Obregon, La Paz, Baja Sur, Mexico
Phones:
from USA : 626-638-3383
from Mexico: 044-612-14-17863

.
Tailhunter Weekly Fishing Report:
http://www.tailhunter-international.com/fishreport.htm

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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One little flurry of fast-moving tuna looked promising but turned out to be a fluke and didn’t develop into much, but the fish were quality slugs like this one that Carlos has! But that was it…gone like ghosts!

Roosterfish were surely the highlight of the week either because that’s what everyone focused on or because that’s all that was biting. But for many folks, getting a rooster is a unique thrill and a much sought-after trophy fish like this beautiful fish held by Joe Jacobs caught near Espiritu Santo Island and released.

Some of the roosters we’re getting have been quality fish. The photo great, but we don’t have many photos mainly because most of the fish are released. They don’t taste very good either so lucky for them! Captain Archangel with our Tailhunter Fleet at Las Arenas hefts a nice one before letting the big fish swim off.

This is the satellite view from the http://www.terrafin.com. It shows the water temperature surface gradients around La Paz which could explain alot of things. Every week the water seems to change from warm to cold and back to warm then cold again. The fish might just be shocked. However check out the reading from June. 2. The green and blue colors are cold waters in the 70 degree range. The orange and redder colors are the warmer waters. A week ago, almost all the waters around La Paz were in the 80 degree range! Now, if you’re on a boat, the waters are cold and green.

ROOSTERFISH  MARLIN HIGHLIGHT OTHERWISE SLOW SLOW WEEK OF FISHING

La Paz/ Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of May 27 to June 3, 2012

A tough scratchy week of fishing here.  None of us can get a “read” on this.  It’s maybe the most inconsistent season I have ever seen.  Water temps rise and fall by 10 degrees warm…cold…warm…cold.  Winds are dead then howl…then die again.  As I write this the palm trees are bending over from strong northwesterlies and it looks like the port captain will shut down the port.  This after a week of relatively calm waters.  The bait situation is fluid.  Our La Paz boats have bait, but the water temperatures are so varied that the fish are lockjawed.  Marlin and dorado ignore the baits and lures and we have to scratch out any kind of a bite.  On the Las Arenas side, our fleets have no sardines or they are very tiny. So, the guys have resorted to using frozen ballyhoo, or jigging up pilot fish or cocineros or liso (mullet).  It’s hard to chum if you don’t have sardines.  I’m recommending guys bring fresh frozen squid or mackerel right now.  Not the kind you buy at the bait store.  Fresh frozen is the kind you buy in the market that’s for human consumption.  It could make a big difference.

On the bright side of things…

The marlin finally seem to have woken up.  For weeks the marlin have been lethargicly sunning themselves on the surface.  No interested in anything.  Well, each day now, the marlin seem more active. We seem to get a hookup or two each day and sometimes more.  Credit to the anglers and captains for releasing all fish.  Most of the fish have been about 120 pound stripers although we had one that one of my captains estimated close to 200 pounds that busted the line during the fight.

Also, if you want a roosterfish…we got those running around.  Most days each of our Las Arenas boats is getting 1-4 of them up to about 40 pounds.  All on bait.  Really tough on the flyfishermen with no chum to speak of right now.  But using mullet and cocineros, the conventional fishermen are getting the roosters.  We’re also getting a few dorado now and then up to about 25 pounds, the occasional snapper or pargo as well as cabrilla.  But nothing to get too excited about.  Hope it turns around.

NEW TAILHUNTER WEBSITE IS LIVE

After 7 months, we’ve finally got the new website up and live.  Check it out  www.tailhunter-international.com

With increasing frequency, folks have been having problems with viewing the website as more folks use browswers other than Microsoft Explorer.  Many folks are increasing using Google and Yahoo browsers and we wanted to keep ahead of the curve to reduce future problems and bring you up-t0-date information.  Hope you find the new site enjoyable and informative.  Thanks to our master IT guru Bil Pulford for the great job and patience.

Have a great week!

That’s our story!

Jonathan and Jilly

 

Jonathan Roldan’s
Tailhunter International

Website: www.tailhunter-international.com
U.S. Office: 3319 White Cloud Drive, Suite A, Hacienda Hts. CA 91745
Mexico Office: 755 Paseo Obregon, La Paz, Baja Sur, Mexico
Phones:
from USA : 626-638-3383
from Mexico: 044-612-14-17863

.
Tailhunter Weekly Fishing Report:
http://www.tailhunter-international.com/fishreport.htm

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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Ryan O’Connor holds up one of the big tuna that showed up off the south end of Cerralvo Island and surprised us all late in the week. Ryan is from Miami. This fish was close to 100 pounds and he and his dad put 4 nice fish in the boat!

I was as surprised as any when Chuck Eaves and Captain Jorge pulled this huge slugger out’ve the fish box on the panga! WHOA!!! Close to 100 pounds and not only the first tuna of the season, but the largest as well. Great way to start! The fish initially were found running with porpoise. More video of Chuck below this weeks’ photos!

Good start for their first day of fishing for Curt Weiss and Henry Hernandez from Florida who pose with 4 of their big yellowfin tuna in the shallows at Punta Arenas. These fish were the first tuna run of the season we had seen!

Ben and Kendra Gillette usually spend their anniversary in Hawaii, but opted for La Paz this time. Ben had wanted to use his flyrod, but when these big tuna showed up he wisely put down his flyrod and grabbed the bigger conventional guns! Big smiles to go along with their nice fish!

Rick Walker from Washington, has had better trips to see us but ran into some of that tough fishing early in the week. However, he did put the largest dorado of the week aboard one of our pangas. The dorado are here, but the bite has been scattered. One day on…next day off!

Nelson Kwok was spearfishing on the north end of Cerralvo Island when he stuck this monster amberjack which was scaled at 87 pounds. This beast is a cousin to the yellowtail and makes great eating. Water temperatures around the island are about 83 degrees right now. North Cerralvo has traditionally been a hot spot for finding amberjack. (Thanks for the photo, Hawk!)

Again…thanks Hawk for all the photos you get me! He got me another photo of Nelson Kwok from N. Cal with one of the yellowtail he got go go along with the big amberjack (shown above). We thought the yellowtail had left us over a month ago, but with water temperatures all over the place, yellowtail are showing up in the cooler waters.

Video Clip:  A short video clip of Chuck Eaves’ big tuna being pulled from the panga.  My video camera went on the fritz right after this or I would have had more video footage of all the tuna we got!

FLURRY OF NICE TUNA HIGHLIGHT OTHERWISE  UNUSUALLY SLOW WEEK!

La Paz/ Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of May 20-27, 2012

This past week was perhaps the strangest week of the season.  Maybe it was a continuation of last week. In word, maybe “strange” wasn’t strong enough…it stunk!   We have jokingly been blaming the eclipse and big waves generated from the hurricane hundreds of miles to the south, but nothing adds up.  More likely, it’s been a combination of a number of factors. 

 

It would seem the conditions are all good.  Water temps are in the low to mid 80’s and air temperatures have been in the mid-80’s to mid-90’s.  Perfect vacation weather!  But you really have to look closer at what the satellite readings are telling us about the surface temperatures.

 

Around our Las Arenas/ Cerralvo Island areas, the surface water temps are in the 80’s.  Good warm water for species like dorado, wahoo, billfish, etc.  But north of La Paz around Espiritu Santo Island, the water temperatures are around the mid-70’s!  Those are more like cooler spring-time temperatures that produce yellowtail, pargo, cabrilla, sierra, and more inshore fishing.  But…75-80 degree difference… That’s quite a change.  Plus there are fingers of warm water in the cold areas and fingers of cold water in the warm areas.  I can only speculate what it’s like UNDER the surface!

 

So, I think the fish are all messed up!  I think they are ready to take off and go, but we’re just going through a really rough transition time between our spring and summer conditions. Add to that the fact that there’s a huge bank of cold water down as cold as the mid-60’s hovering off Cabo San Lucas and the East Cape to our south that’s really hurting those areas AND threatening to move up into our area and we end up with a real “chop suey” of conditions!

 

So, not only are the fish confused, but moreso, it has affected our bait situation.  Some days bait is almost impossible to get.  This is mostly with our Las Arenas fleet which has resorted to using frozen ballyhoo, cut squid, live pilot fish, caballito jacks and liso (mullet).  It’s pretty hard to chum with these species and I especially feel badly for many of the flyfishers who come to La Paz this time of year when normally we have tons of sardines to chum up the fish for them. 

 

For our La Paz fleet, the bait has been a little easier, but still tougher than normal.  We’re getting some sardines but supplementing that with mackerel and caballitos. 

 

Bottom line is that there’s not many bullets for the guns!

 

But, we are getting some fish…

 

For our La Paz fleet, we have been surprised by the re-emergence of yellowtail again.  We had a great bite going for 3 months that just simply fell off the boards about a month ago.  Then, with the re-emergence of cold water, we suddenly have yellowtail biting again as well as pargo, cabrilla and little flurries of dorado and marlin in the warmer areas.

 

For our Las Arenas fleet, with even tougher bait stocks, the fishing was reduced to some bonito, some roosters and the occasional pargo and cabrilla.  I mean, “STINK” doesn’t even begin to describe it!  There were some nice amberjack at the north end of Cerralvo but then that was it!  Guys were really working hard and our captains were even staying extra hours on the water to do their best to get fish for the clients!  (But hat’s off to the fishermen who really put in the time and kept up the good attitudes and kept smiling through it all without a whole lot of whining.  Good sports!  Honestly, many of our clients the past week or so are regulars so they know how goood the fishing can be and are as perplexed as we are about the lack of bite!)

 

But then the highlight of the week, on Friday off the south end of Cerralvo Island…

… a big school of moving dolphin came through.  A few of our boats chased them and got immediate hook ups on slugger-sized yellowfin tuna.  Other boats joined in.  Instead of moving off with the dolphin, the tuna stayed…and bit!  And for a few great hours guys had bent rods on 40-100 pound yellowfin that just spanked the guys!  All our pangas got 1-4 fish each but all of them lost 2-5 other nice tuna as well.  They were pretty tired at the end of the day but these were feisty hard-charging fish.

 

The next day, most of the guys didn’t want to chase tuna as they were pretty beat up so it’s hard to know if the tuna stayed around, but inshore, the guys found roosters between 10 and 70 pounds as well as some small dorado and a few marlin and sailfish hookups that were either lost or released.  All roosters were also released.

 

So…I don’t know where that leaves us, but I’m encouraged by what we saw at the end of the week and hope things settle down!

Happy Memorial Day week and weekend everyone!  God bless all you vets for your service!

 

 

That’s our story!

Jonathan and Jilly

 

Jonathan Roldan’s Tailhunter International Website: www.tailhunter-international.com U.S. Office: 3319 White Cloud Drive, Suite A, Hacienda Hts. CA 91745 Mexico Office: 755 Paseo Obregon, La Paz, Baja Sur, Mexico Phones:  from USA : 626-638-3383 from Mexico: 044-612-14-17863

.

Tailhunter Weekly Fishing Report:  http://www.tailhunter-international.com/fishreport.htm Tailhunter YouTube Videoshttp://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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It was a great week for BIG dorado and probably none larger than this 45-pound best that our amigo Angela "TPG" Farrell from Oceanside CA nailed just off Cerralvo Island fisihng with our Tailhunter Las Arenas fleet. Tim, her husband, lends a hand and a big smile on ths fish. Tim got his own big fish...a huge 50 pound rooster the next day. The dorado were hungry all week and we had both quality and quantity. Angela and Tim make at least one trip a year to visit us and always do well!

Man of bronze with tuna! Steve Artis holds up a nice 20-pound class yellowfin tuna he picked off Cerralvo Island fishing with Captain Archangel. There were little flurries of football tuna every few days near the island, but nothing wide open so the few that were caught were welcome catches. Smaller sardines and cedar plugs worked well.

It was a week for some really nice quality bull dorado typical of this time of year like this big bull held by Ronnie Collins on his first trip with us at Tailhunter

Sometimes, it's not the size of the fish...it's the size of the smile and the kid in all of us, especially when it's your first fish and it's a pretty dorado like Eric Sirkow's fish with Captain Archangel.

Funny guy, our amigo, Paul Nagata from the San Francisco got some nicer tuna, but chose to pose with this bruiser of a yellowfin that he caught with our Las Arenas fleet. Everday, it seemed we got a handful of footballs and hopefully, the bite will come on stronger.

Hug your catch! Our buddy, John Pastorello from Fullerton CA hugs a real pretty dorado fresh out-of-the-water. He and his crew had banner 3 days of fishing with us. Great colors on this fish!

Speaking of great colors...Dr. Desmond Sjaufowkloy often comes to see us and comes at the last-minute to get in on a quick bite and always puts fish in the boat like this great photo of him with one of his many dorado. Again...great colors!

You will never find a better guy than Art Savedra from Las Vegas...pro race car driver and owner of ARTS off-road race car tech. The man drives and the man fishes and does both well. Using his mini Whopper Stopper rod, Art put the wood to the fish for 3 straight days then decided to try SCUBA diving with us for the first time and did that great as well!

Jon Luker has been with us many years, but Shane Foster was on his first trip and got into some great fishing over 3 days packing in dorado as well as tuna like these!

Nate and Darrell were on their first day fishing with us and had their day interrupted when we had a quick summer storm hit and everyone had to run back to the beach and wait it out. However, after about an hour we sent the boats back out and everyone got hooked up on marlin, sailfish and dorado like the ones the guys got here!

VIDEO CLIP OF THE WEEK

Some good footage and still images from the week!  Click the link:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZAsl6pdF6Q

DORADO PUT ON A SHOW FOR ANGLERS!

La Paz/ Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of Aug. 22-28, 2011

It was a not only a week for good dorado fishing, but a week for big dorado as well.  Especially if you were fishing with our Tailhunter La Paz fleet, the action was fast and furious.  Sometimes, our boats were back onshore at the beach by 10:30 or 11 each day with the anglers tired, laughing and saying, “no mas!”  

 

“We released twice what we caught!” said one. 

“We were barely out of the bay after getting bait,” said another of our fishermen “and in an hour it was some of the crazy fishing I have ever seen.  There were so many dorado around the boat!”

“It took us longer to catch bait than to fill up on limits plus release many other dorado.  We had some 20-40 pound fish, but there it looked like there were others in the school but the smaller fish would beat them to the bait.  We had double and triple hookups solidly for most of the time!”

 

“No sooner did my wife boat one fish then the captain was handing her another rod with another fish one while I tried to film all the action!  We caught limits then then went to catch pargo and roosterfish!  We were laughing all day!”

 

And so it went.  One angler laughingly complained that he filled his ice chest in one day and still had 4 more days to fish!

 

The crazy thing was that along with all the smaller schoolie sized fish there were so many more larger bulls this week.  We’ve had some great weeks of dorado fishing, but I don’t re-call having so many larger fish in any recent weeks. For many of our fishermen and fisherladies, it was their largest fish they had ever caught.  For many of our first-timers they got spoiled right out the gate with such quality as well as quantity.

 

For our Las Arenas fleet, it wasn’t quite so good.  It was a bit scratchier, but there were still some good catches in between some slower days.  A boat might do poorly, but the next boat would get into a good bite.  Dorado were the mainstay just like with our La Paz fleet, but as well, there were some good quality fish in the mix with 20-30 pounders not uncommon.  Additionally, what we lost in quanity of fish was made up for by the variety of fish that were available.  In addition to the dorado, there were some smatterings of tuna, pargo, roosterfish, cabrilla and some really nice bites on sailfish and marlin that were amongst the dorado and bonito schools feeding that seems to show no hesitation grabbing a hooked sardine.  Some anglers had some real thrills having a billfish hooked on light tackle.

 

If you’re planning on coming down in the near future, several things to mention…

 

We had some little baby tropical storms this last week.  It’s that time of the year when some pretty hard downpours come through.  It might rain for a just a few minutes most times and one panga might get wet but 100 yards away another is bone dry.  Having a cheap pancho or windbreaker isn’t a bad idea.  Several creative guys brought the big trash bags from their rooms and just cut holes in them for their heads and arms and kept on laughing and fishing in the rain!

 

For gear…plain wooden cedar plugs seem to be the rage of the season.  You might want one or two.  Also, flurocarbon leader in 20-40 pound test is a good thing to bring along as well as smaller live bait hooks for some of the smaller sardines.  A #2 and a #4 sized hook is good to have as well as 1/0, 3/0 and 5/0 hooks.  The tuna we found this week at the smaller baits.

 

That’s our story!

Jonathan and Jill

 

 

 

Jonathan Roldan’s
Tailhunter International

 

TAILHUNTER FISHING FLEET #1 Rated on Trip Advisor

TAILHUNTER RESTAURANT BAR #1 Rated in La Paz on Trip Advisor

 

Now follow us on FACEBOOK TOO

 

Website: www.tailhunter-international.com
U.S. Office: 3319 White Cloud Drive, Suite A, Hacienda Hts. CA 91745
Mexico Office: 755 Paseo Obregon, La Paz, Baja Sur, Mexico
Phones:
from USA : 626-638-3383
from Mexico: 044-612-14-17863

.

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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It’s a bit of a trek from Montana and S. Dakota for Cliff Garber, Colton Nye, Chris Voller, Ryan Baumgart who were on their first trip to La Paz. Two days of good fishing produced nice catches of dorado for the guys…typical of the action this week!

Scott McKenzie from Seattle already made one trip to see us in the spring and has another trip booked next month in September, but last week brought his sisters, Jana M. and Lauren Moser down on their first trip to La Paz. Jana just took the California Bar Exam last week. Lauren is still in law school and all had an excellent trip. (See Steve’s accounts below!)

Our good buddy, Wally Lee, from San Francisco visits us yearly and shows off one of the dorado he caught during his 3 days fishing. However, he caught over a dozen species oveall including cabrilla, yellow snapper, pompano, and several species of pargo.

Yellowfin tuna were again elusive this week, but they threw a few teases at us at the south end of Cerralvo Island like this pair that Captain Victor found. (thanks for the shot, Hawk!)

Here’s at you! Jeff Lee poses with Captain Jorge and a nice big pompano caught off the sand near the Las Arenas lighthouse. Great eats! The fish tend to school right where the sand slides off into deeper water.

You don’t get many of these in Montana! Chris Voller holds up a fresh mahi on the sand at Las Arenas. Both our La Paz and our Las Arenas fleets did well on dorado this past week.

There weren’t alot of trophy-sized dorado this week, but nice -grade fish such as this dorado shown with Jana Moser and Captain Victor were pretty typical and it wasn’t unusual to get limits or near limits daily of the hungry colorful fish!

LATE SUMMER DORADO STILL ON THE CHEW!

La Paz/ Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of Aug. 14-21, 2011

Well, the full moon didn’t play games on us this time and Hurricane Greg went wide left so all-in-all, a good week of fishing, especially if you came to load up on dorado fillets!  For both our Tailhunter Las Arenas Fleet and our Tailhunter La Paz fleets, dorado were 90% of the catch most days if that’s what you wanted to do.  The fish are fast, feisty, hungry and fun!  Pretty much all you want in a sportfish and since we had so many first timers with us this week, they were perfect gamefish during a pretty solid week.

 

Most of the fish weren’t big by any means, but 10-20 pound grade fish were the norm and more than enough for some anglers to handle, especially after a full-day of rod bending.  Theere were some larger 25-35 pound fish and some larger ones lost, but most were that medium-class mahi.  Some days, the schools were even smaller with lots of 5 pounders providing crazy action as it’s amazing what a voracious dorado will hit when it’s in full turbo but as one angler told me, “They were fun and we must have caught and released a dozen for every one we kept.  It was a blast!”  So, no shortage of action.

 

I think the surprising action was found by our anglers that decided to fish inshore.  During this time of year, most fisher-folk like fishing the blue water for the “glamour species” like the dorado, tuna, marlin, wahoo, etc. ”  The inshore stuff gets ignored but since almost no one is fishing inshore, it’s a great opportunity to find spots that haven’t been hit in a long time and likewise, find yourself the only boat working the area!  In the past week or two, I’ve had several of our anglers ask me to send them inshore and they’ve done great on some great eating fish like cabrilla, pargo, snapper, parrotfish, sheephead and ambjerjack as well as fun fish like pompano and their not-so-good-eating (but still great fighters) the jack crevalle and roosterfish!

 

Tuna and wahoo remained elusive at best.  This has to be the poorest wahoo season I can remember, but no telling what will happen the next few weeks which is traditionally our best time of the year for wahoo.  The tuna are the same way.  Every few days, they pop up and everyone gets excited…then they disappear.  We’ll keep an eye out for them for sure.  We should be coming up on prime time for our yellowfin.

 

There’s still alot of billfish in the water.  We hooked, lost, and released several this week.  Check out Scott McKenzie’s  great first-person account (photo above with his sisters)…

 

“… first day out of La Paz we had about 11 beautiful dorado up to 35lbs, plenty of double and triple hookups making for a frenzy of fun on the boat with (Captain) Boli!!

Second day, out of Las Arenas, we fished with (Captain) Victor the master. Right out of the gate a sailfish lost, with yard long dorado keeping us busy regularly, and a couple of marlin lost until late in the afternoon a bonito strip-bait fell prey to a marlin (about 60-70 lbs??), 4th time was the charm as we got a good hook set, and it was on our light tackle rod to boot!! 

A long fight ensued with everyone getting a chance at working this fish to the boat where it was admired and released! Second day- 7 nice dorado to 25-30 lbs, 1 marlin caught n released, 2 marlin lost, 1 sailfish lost….. doesn’t get any bettter than that!!

 

That’s our story!

Jonathan and Jill

 

Jonathan Roldan’s
Tailhunter International

 

TAILHUNTER FISHING FLEET #1 Rated on Trip Advisor

TAILHUNTER RESTAURANT BAR #1 Rated in La Paz on Trip Advisor

 

Now follow us on FACEBOOK TOO

 
Website: www.tailhunter-international.com
U.S. Office: 3319 White Cloud Drive, Suite A, Hacienda Hts. CA 91745
Mexico Office: 755 Paseo Obregon, La Paz, Baja Sur, Mexico
Phones:
from USA : 626-638-3383
from Mexico: 044-612-14-17863

.
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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