He’s a monster magnet! No matter the fishing, Roger Thompson always sticks big fish. He got this sweet cabrilla (Mexican seabass) off the north end of Cerralvo Island.
The only had one day to fish and it was their first time with Tailhunters, but Annika and James Gervais found a nice little jag of dorado and got a limit of fish like these. People ask all the time for “larger boats” to catch blue water fish and “go further out!” Notice how close to shore the caught these dorado!
SLOW PICKY WEEK TO END/ START THE YEAR
La Paz – Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of Dec. 29, 2013 to Jan. 5, 2014
I think the fish took the holiday weekend off. Honestly, it was scratchy fishing, at best. Cooler temps and windy conditions didn’t help. I think that was more of a factor then the good moon phase and it wasn’t enough to overcome the water and wind.
There was still some good inshore action. There’s still some dorado hanging out and some schools of 10 pounders were located pretty close to shore and a good spot for our pangas launching out’ve Bahia de Los Muertos near Las Arenas. Nothing, big but still some good light tackle fun and a nice surprise for winter fishing.
For other species, there were some good jags of bonito. Not such great to eat, but not much tougher than hard-charging bonito to keep a rod bent and since we’ve had quite a few families during the holidays the bonito have been great for the kids as well as folks just looking for some action on the water and something to do…especially if they’re snow-birds from chillier places just wanting to enjoy some sunshine.
There’s also some cabrilla (Mexican sea bass) that were in the counts. (Including the gem in the photos above that Roger Thompson caught off Cerralvo Island). Most of the cabrilla were little 2-3 pounders. Some rooster fish and decent numbers of sierra as well. No pargo to speak of and I would have to officially say that the great marlin bite of the past few weeks is probably done for the season.
The traveling Tailhunter Booth! See you soon! We will be in Sacramento…Denver…Puyallup (Seattle)…Portland…Yakima…Phoenix…Boise…Long Beach…Salt Lake City and Del Mar (San Diego) between now and March!
COME SEE THE TAILHUNTER BOOTH IN SACRAMENTO!
We start our 2014 Tailhunter Road Tour with our first show of the season in Sacramento CA. We’ll be at the California State Fairgrounds from this Thursday to Sunday. Come say hi and talk to us about coming to fish with us in La Paz in 2014. Come check out our
Brand new 24 page brochures
Tailhunter DVD
New Tailhunter t-shirts
New Tailhunter hats
Our booth will be in our usual spot in the main fishing hall and we’re excited to visit with you. Sacramento is always a MONSTER show for us with the ISE. Here’s more info. Check out the video. Click the link!
Jason Mills with us for the first time sports a nice fresh dorado while fishing off Las Arenas with the Tailhunter Fleet. It was a little tougher on the dorado as waters are getting cooler, but the fish are still around and a great bonus species to be catching in December!
Ralph Shawver and Captain Jorge pose with another unusual biter for December, a striped marlin. It was Ralph’s first time with Tailhunters. The fish could not be released and was caught just south of Isla Cerralvo.
TOUGHER FISHING FOR CHRISTMAS WEEK
La Paz – Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of Dec 22-29, 2013
It was a tougher pull this week for fishing around La Paz. After so many weeks of unseasonably good fishing for a variety of species, this past week was more typical of what we see around our area for this time of year. It was definitely chillier on the water. A few more grey skies in the morning and choppy waters. It was also much windier than in the past…perhaps the windiest week overall that we’ve had in awhile.
Whether because of the cooler temperatures or because of the wind or a combination of both, there were fewer of the blue water pelagic species that have treated us for so many weeks unexpectedly. The marlin and dorado were much harder to find and the bite was sporadic.
However, inshore, we did get into some nice jags of fun sierra which are always great sport and great eating as well as bonito which are great sport…and not such good eating! If you got into a school of sierra, limits weren’t hard to come by.
As well, we surprisingly still got rooster fish. None of the big guys, but some fun 8-15 pounders which were a nice bonus and all fish were released.
It looks like this coming week is going to be less windy so we have our fingers crossed for some better fishing!
NEW MAILING ADDRESS FOR TAILHUNTERS
Thanks to everyone who sent us all the great Christmas cards! You’re the best and we look forward to seeing you in 2014. We have a new U.S. mailing address for Tailhunters:
TAILHUNTER INTERNATIONAL
8030 La Mesa Blvd.
Box 178
La Mesa CA 91942
That’s our story! Wishing you all the best for a great 2014!
It was another surprising week of marlin running around our waters despite the fact that it’s WINTER! Usually, we stop seeing billfish around the end of October or so, but this year, they’ve been thick, hungry and willing to bite! Verda Boyd, our amiga from the Bay Area near San Francisco, always rocks the fish and go this one with Captain Jorge just outside of Bahia de Los Muertos. Unfortunately, they were not able to revive this fish, but most of the billfish are getting released.
Another of the bluewater surprises this late in the season is the continued presence of dorado. Not big ones, but fun-sized school fish around 10-20 pounds like this one that Llew Williams caught with Captain Pancho off Las Arenas.
It’s that time again! Just wanted to wish all our Tailhunter Family, Amigos and Tribe members a safe, happy and peaceful Christmas! God bless you all and best fishes always!
WINDIER CONDITIONS BUT GOOD VARIETY OF FISH!
La Paz – Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of Dec. 15-22, 2013
Lots of variety this past week. After the stellar fishing we’ve had the past few weeks that surprised many of us, this week seemed to be a little more typical of what winter fishing is like in La Paz. It was breezy and a bit chilly even tho’ the sun was out most of the time. It was a tad choppy as well. All typical winter weather when fishing this time of year.
However, the fishing had a really good mix of species with perhaps a bit more inshore fish than we had been getting which included nice bunches of sierra and cabrilla as well as bonito. However, the nice surprise again was the showing of striped marlin and other blue water species that we don’t usually see this time of year.
The marlin were respectable 90-130 pound fish and almost all were released (except a two that couldn’t be revived) but a real treat given that they were taken close to shore and most on light tackle. But sometimes, the marlin were…for lack of a better word…”PESTS!” Anglers either had caught and released a marlin or two or had no interest in marlin and wanted to catch something else and, as one angler laughing told me, “The marlin wouldn’t leave us alone! It was like they followed the panga around!”
As well, we still have schools of 8-20 pound dorado cruising nearby and we had a few bites on wahoo once again although most bites were lost. As well, we can’t discount that there are still nice trophy rooster fish up on the beach areas and in the shallows that are running 15-40 pounds and all getting released. All-in-all, not bad as we head into the first week of winter and the Christmas week!
That’s our story! Have a safe, happy and peaceful Christmas and holidays. God bless and best fishes always from our Tailhunter Family to yours.
Quite a surprise, but wahoo are still on the chew! Happy amigo, Fernando Sucre, from the San Francisco Bay area, was able to get in one day of fishing and scored this tasty wahoo near Cerralvo Island. The presence of wahoo has been a great treat so late in the season.
Recently retired amigo, Tim Zimmer, has been making the most of his free time fishing his brains out all over the country. He and his wife always make a point of visiting us in December and always do well. We had a great week of marlin fishing with most of them getting released. Check out Captain Jorge and Tim’s nice billfish.
Ken Gragg is another of our frequent amigos. This is his 3rd trip this year, and in 2 days fishing this week with Captain Gerardo scored 4 wahoo! This one seems to be missing it’s nose, but it’s a big fish. Captain Gerardo is NFL lineman-sized guy!
Check out the roosterfish! In December!!! What’s up with that? Steve Medley got in two days of fishing and scored this trophy roosterfish just off the beach to take a great photo and release the fish to fight again! It’s been the best roosterfish season in years!
Another bucket list fish! Prof. Mark Marcus came to visit us from Washington also popped a big rooster this week. He’s kinda struggling with the hot fish to take the photo, but it’s a sweet fish and was released after the photo! He also got a wahoo as well! See the photo below! Some great fishing!
DOUBLE ‘HOO! Professor Llew Williams from Florida and Professor Mark Marcus from Washington tag teamed for this double billing of wahoo off Cerralvo Island this past week. They took chunks back to our Tailhunter Restaurant for some great eats! Nicely done!
Chris and Damon Lewis are brothers who met up in La Paz for some fishing. Chris is from Mexico City and Damon lives in Redwood City near San Francisco. Yes! There’s still dorado in our waters. Normally, warm water fish, they’re still lingering in surprising numbers!
CRAZY MARLIN AND WAHOO LIGHT IT UP!
La Paz -Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of Dec. 1-8, 2014
It has truly been a surprising end of the season here in La Paz. Mainly because the season hasn’t ended!
Here it is almost Christmas. Yes, it’s getting cooler. Yes, it’s getting windier and choppier. We’re supposed to be fishing inshore right now for cabrilla, pargo, bonito, and sierra.
Instead, we’ve still got blue water pelagic species still biting. And it’s not just one or two. I mean, crazily, the fish or on a serious chew!
We had several days this week when almost every single one of our pangas hooked at least one or two striped marlin between 90 and 120 pounds. We’ve had several days where every panga hooked 1-3 wahoo each between 15 and 40 pounds. We’ve still got trophy rooster fish up on the beach up to 50 pounds. Plus, there’s schools of 10-20 pound dorado out there as well!
This is more like the kind of fishing report I’d be giving in the summer or fall. Not in December. Not just a few weeks before Christmas! It’s been a wacky year, but I would never have expected this. Some days, it’s been like a buffet line. Pick and choose what kind of fish you want to fish for! I have no idea what the inshore rock fishing is like because no one is fishing for the inshore species! Maybe there are pargo and cabrilla and sierra to be caught, but those species have to be feeling ignored because just a few further yards offshore, there’s dorado and marlin and wahoo ready to bite!
It’s been a great late season treat. No complaints!
Hope you and yours are having a good holiday season. Best fishes. Stay safe and well!
It was one of those nice tranquil holiday weeks. Not a whole lot of fishermen on the water, but a nice time to be in the area with some great weather and, not bad fishing. Here’s the morning view of Bahia de Los Muertos as we launch to go fishing for our Tailhunter Las Arenas Fleet.
They were a little tough to find early in the week, but the dorado bite got better as the week went on with most fish about 10-15 pounds like this decent bull held by our Captain Armando on the beach at Bahia de Los Muertos.
Yes! It’s hard to believe, but there are still good number of striped marlin and sailfish in the area to punctuate what has been a very good year for billfish. Most of the billfish have been running about 100-130 pounds and thankfully are getting released. Most of the catches have also been unintentionally caught when guys are fishing for other species and the line gets picked up by a billfish! A nice treat and very unexpected this late in the season!
Captain Archangel hoists up another roosterfish for the camera before letting it go. Another species we don’t often see this late in the season. But, we’re finding them in the shallow waters inshore near the lighthouse. All of them are getting released.
WEEK STARTS SLOW ENDS ON UPSWING
La Paz – Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of Nov. 24 to Dec. 1, 2013
Winds and waters got a little cooler this past week and we even had little flurries of rain that threatened. We still got some fish, but overall, being a holiday weekend there just weren’t that many anglers in town. The week started rather slowly and I figured that the season changes finally caught up with us. Fishing was slow. Just a few fish here and there.
But that’s what I had been expecting for about this time of year as the season changes to cooler conditions. Basically, that means fewer blue water fish like dorado and billfish and more inshore species like cabrilla, pargo, jack crevalle and sierra. So, after a few so-so fishing days early in the week, I was about ready to call it and say the warm-water species are gone.
But, then as the week went on, fishing got better. We started hitting more dorado schools. We had a few biters from billfish (sailfish and marlin) and even got a few nice-sized rooster fish! The dorado do seem a bit more scattered, but it’s great that they are still around. Likewise, the roosters are where you’d expect them…around the Las Arenas lighthouse and off Punta Perrico, but the fact that they are even here this late in the season is kinda cool! The marlin? Who knows! It seems that every day at least one of our pangas is getting hooked up and more often-than-not, several hookups a day. I think the waters are still warm enough to hold them in the area, plus there are still some big schools or bonito in the area which is perfect food for the billfish.
So, as of my writing, there’s still some pelagic species running around. Again, I’m not sure how long this will last, but we’ll enjoy it as long as we get it. The forecast for the coming week calls for some increasing winds and even a slight chance of rain so we’ll have to keep an eye out.
That’s our story! Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving weekend!
Big striped marlin for Larry Wilson from Montana. It was Larry’s first time fishing Mexico and first time fishing with Tailhunter International in La Paz. Larry caught numerous dorado on light tackle releasing many then he hooked onto this striped marlin also on light tackle. With the assist of Captain Pancho, he battled the fish to the boat…took a quick photo…and released the fish which swam off strongly! Larry was fishing south of Cerralvo Island.
John Virgin struggles to hold this big boy bull dorado for the photo! He got several of these fishing this past week with Tailhunters. This particular beauty with the great colors was taken just north of La Paz.
From Sacramento CA, Adam Wilfley and Craig Young pose with a few of their catch from Las Arenas while standing on the beach at Bahia de Los Muertos. Both guys got in on one of the days this week when the schoolie-dorade went crazy with fast easy limits!
This was a good birthday! Sharon Virgin gets a hand from husband John posing with her first sailfish. She also caught and released a hammerhead shark and several large dorado and bonito. They weren’t able to release the sailfish. She had several banner days of fishing with Tailhunters.
Jon Holtby won the “pot” from his fishing amigos with this big bull dorado while fishing north of La Paz with Captain Joel of the Tailhunter Fleet. The big fish was taken on bait near Espirto Santo Island just before the storm arrived. (It never really did!)
Check out the colors on Sharon’s fish! It seemed all the larger fish were taken this past week with our Tailhunter La Paz fleet while our Tailhunter Las Arenas fleet put up more numbers. Sharon took several big fish after a week with us here in La Paz.
If you fish with our Tailhunter Las Arenas fleet, this is often how the day starts! With a vigorous work-out catching giant squid for bait! Dean Wilson puts the wood to another big squid that fight surprisingly hard (see photo below). Husband Larry looks on.
Great bait and great eating, the giant squid have been with us now for several weeks although this is really one of the “little guys.” Some of them have been upward to 50 pounders and they get much larger! Captain Pancho is about to heave one over the gunwale of the panga. Note the other pangas all doing the same thing in the early morning hours.
We had several days this week at Las Arenas where the 10-pound dorado were as thick as…DORADO! They swarmed the pangas and limits came fast and easy with pangas releasing fish as fast as they could shake them off. Great undewater shot by John Virgin. Light tackle and flyfishers had a ball.
This is “Hurricane Manuel.” We surely dodged a bullet when the big storm veered away and left us with some wind…a little rain…and just some hazy skies!
HURRICANE MANUEL GIVES A SCARE BUT ONLY SPITS AND LEAVES THE FISHING ALONE!
La Paz – Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of September 15-22, 2013
We had a great bite going all week on dorado but then had to contend with the sudden approach of “Manual” that started as a little blip on the weather radar that became a “Tropical Depression” then reached hurricane status in a very short time.
It didn’t look good. It was on a collision course with Southern Baja and was surely going to slam into La Paz. Captains were pulling boats out of the water. Others from outside came running into the bay to seek shelter. Folks were in the markets buying water and flashlight batteries and bottles of tequila and cases of beer!
It looked like we were going to have to cancel fishing the rest of the week and I was preparing to contact anglers coming down on their vacations to try to postpone their trips.
Then suddenly, the strangest thing happened. The storm veered 90 degrees east…like it turned a corner. All we got was about an hour of hard rain in the evening and some strong winds for a day. That was it!!! Saved!
We ended up keeping right on fishing! It was a little bumpy leading in and leading out of the storm, but the fish didn’t stop biting. Dorado madness, especially after the storm moved off. In fact, I had not seen that kind of frenzy all season. We had some of our pangas run into entire hungry schools of 10-15 pounders where each boat caught and released 15-25 dorado each!
It wasn’t like that for everyone, but there were surely large chunks of mahi schools out there and most boats got limits or near limits or, lost alot of fish and “should have” had limits! (I saw some thumbs with blisters on them!) . As well, there were some larger fish ranging around as well with 25-35 pounders in the mix.
It was also a pretty good week on a few other species. We hooked a few wahoo around Cerralvo Island and also just outside La Paz Bay although all the fish either bit through or got off. We also got into some nice grade striped marlin and sailfish as well.
We have a mix of bait although it’s hard to tell what we’ll have from one day to the next. However, everything seems to have a place and works well. We’re still catching giant squid at Las Arenas which makes for great bait (plus good eating!) plus using some sardines, mackerel and caballitos plus using small bonito strips for larger dorado.
We could not have asked for better weather and fishing conditions this week with the end result being solid fishing action for both our Tailhunter Las Arenas and our Tailhunter La Paz fleets. Nothing quite like a beautiful sunrise on the Sea of Cortez and getting ready to head out for fishing at Las Arenas.
Photos just don’t do justice to the magnificence of our dorado. With incredible colors and acrobatic battles, they’re hard to beat as a sportfish! Ed Vander Veer, from Washington, has already made two trips to visit us this year and loves fishing ultra light tackle taking great fish like this one off Cerralvo Island.
It’s always great to have first-timers and getting them into the fish. Kurt Dittig, from Sacramento, was on his first trip to visit us in La Paz and spent 3 days ripping on the dorado including this 30-pound class bull taken north of La Paz.
It’s a long way from Wisconsin, but Dan Brown, was another of our first-timers this past week and shows off a fresh bull dorado while standing in our panga. He’s just outside the mouth of Bahia de Los Muertos.
She always does so well. Our amiga, Mary Heilman Vander Veer, never fails to put fish in the boat and she usually does it with light tackle. This big bull was no exception. Mary was with us for a whole week and poses with the fish on the beach at Bahia de Los Muertos.
Big smiles from Mike McArthur who came in from Los Angeles to squeeze in two quick days of fishing getting into the dorado fishing and added this bull to the rack from Las Arenas.
I”m getting lots of questions about the giant squid. Yes, we’re still getting them. They’ve been around for about 4 weeks and we catch them early in the morning as we head out. They’re fighters! But, they do make great bait, but also, folks forget that giant squid is the same as calamari! So, often they bring it back to our Tailhunter Restaurant to have us fix it up. This one is headed for some marinated calamari salad and some fried calamari plates. I’ve photographed it next to a soda can and my kitchen knife. It’s important to treat the squid meat correctly or it will come out tasting bitter.
DORADO CHARGE THE PANGAS ALL WEEK!
La Paz – Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of Aug. 8-15, 2013
Overall, we probably could not have asked for better conditions this past week. We had a few showers like the previous weeks, but nothing to keep folks off the waters and generally, the winds were kind to us as well with just some early morning and late afternoon breezes.
The good conditions made for some really excellent dorado fishing for both our Tailhunter Las Arenas as well as our Tailhunter La Paz fleets. Here and there an occasional boat might have had an off-day, but mostly speaking, most of our amigos fish several days and one slow day was usually compensated by 1 or 2 outstanding days where the fish attacked the pangas and guys more than made up for the off-day and in some cases were catching and releasing as fast as they could go.
No really big big fish this week, but our larger fish were in the 30-pound class with some occasional 40’s and, of course, large fish have a tendency to bust off too! That’s part of fishing and that’s why they’re bigger fish! But, lots of medium 10-25 pounders all week. Let me put it this way. Everyone who wanted a cooler of fish to take home or a day of bending rods got it!
The really cool thing the past few weeks is that we have had so many first timers…couples…wives…girlfriends…kids…and watching them get into these fish and then listening to the animated stories are just the best! But, in addition, they’re also experiencing stuff like whales and dolphin and sea turtles and manta rays as well plus just the overall experience of being in Baja and La Paz for the first time! Many of them bring their catches to our restaurant as well so they’re getting to enjoy their fish twice in the same day!
As for other species, there’s still marlin and sailfish around and we’re getting a hook-up or two a day. Most fish are getting busted off or released. I’d say we’re probably releasing about 90% of the billfish that make it to the boat. There’s also still a few rooster fish around, plus big jack crevalle and huge arm-tiring bonito that are beating up on the anglers. As well, we are still hooking a few wahoo but not many are making it to the boats before they get busted off!
Plus, there’s still giant squid to start the day also. Many anglers are using part of them for bait and eating the rest!
He looks a little tired for good reason! Sherman McDonell from Rock Springs, Wyoming had an epic week of fishing even tho’ fishing was way off. It’s hard to argue with big fish like this dorado and with Captain Armando and armed with a spinning rod and reel and 17-30 pound test, he went hand-to-hand with big dorado and roosters fighting fish for long battles of 30 minutes to over an hour and coming back a happy bloody mess each day and a big grin! I don’t think he got a single fish under 45 pounds all week. He calls La Paz his “happy place.” Big grins from Captain Armando.
Young Dan Whittlesey from Washington just graduated from high school and came down with dad and grandpa. He toughed-out a really rough week of scattered fishing but did get this incredible bull dorado with our Tailhunter Las Arenas fleet and Captain Victor holding up the tail.
From San Diego, Cole Chavira has been fishing our waters several times a year every single year since he was about 6 years old. He usually outfishes everyone around him and has been on these pages a zillion times! No exception here with this big rooster he caught and released off Las Arenas lighthouse.
It’s tough when you only have two hands and two big floppy heavy bull dorado, but Captain Armando helps Shelly McDonell with her catch after an epic big fish day at Las Arenas where she battled each of these fish on light tackle and spinning gear almost 2 hours each. Shelly rocks. She hunts and she fishes like crazy.
It’s always good when first-timers do well and even moreso when fishing is not that good like it was this past week. But Luke Brownlee from Green River, Wyoming put the wood to several big-time bull dorado like this one and the help of Captain Jorge from our Tailhunter fleet at Las Arenas.
When you come all the way from S. Africa and you have never ever been fishing, you make a great funny face when you land the biggest and first fish of your life like Jo Biddle holding a trophy dorado on the beach at Bahia de Los Muertos! Great shot!
Vegas in the house! Sandie Herrera really wanted a rooster and got hers here fishing off Las Arenas with Captain Pancho. The fish was released.
Great pose from Mitch Chavira, our San Diego amigo who was fishing north of La Paz when he stuck this dorado and got the great shot. There weren’t alot of fish this week and you really had to work it, but the fish that were hooked were generally all quality slugs!
Ron Burgess is our amigo who released that potential world record roosterfish last week. He fished with us the whole week and just was on fire! He also got his big dog-tooth snapper as well!
Norm Whittlesey has been fishing with us for many years. He hung in all week when fishing was really erratic but did manage this super dorado fishing with Captain Victor and our Tailhunter Las Arenas fleet. Check out the colors! I think I want to frame this photo!
Jason Takayoshi was down on his first trip with us. His experience was typical of how our fishing has been this past week. His first day fishing out’ve Las Arenas, they got goosed-egged. Totally skunked. Not even a bite! And Jason is an experienced angler! But, he kept up the smiles. Next day..his last chance…he fished with our Tailhunter La Paz fleet and ended up high-boat for the fleet with some big dorado as well and amberjack and multiple hook ups including fish on the iron. He’s posing with two of the big dorado here on the beach at Balandra north of La Paz.
Talk about a “gamer.” Kris Brownlee gets the award this week. Wow…rough water and seasick and she still hung in there and was not going to be deterred from fishing and kept smiling the whole time during the whole week! It was her first time to visit us in La Paz and she got some nice fish pulling on her like this hefty jack crevalle she caught and released with Captain Jorge.
Marie McClelland from Park City UT was another of our visitors on her first trip fishing with us and outfished lots of the regulars! She took this bull dorado north of La Paz fishing with Captain Alfredo.
Here’s a big boy rooster! Darryl Herrera and Captain Pancho hold up the kind of rooster that made our area famous! They caught this guy just off the beach at Las Arenas (you can see the sand in the background) and released it to fight another day. Darryl is from Las Vegas.
Charlie Detrick came down to see us from Washington and although he didn’t fare well his first day, he smoked the rods on some nice dorado the 2nd day like this sweet slug of a dorado he’s holding on the beach at Balandra!
VIDEO OF THE WEEK
Almost world-record rooster…Here’s a really well-produced video clip of Ron Burgess’ roosterfish he caught last week that might have been a new IGFA record. We will never know because he sportingly released it to fight another day! It’s not a long clip and well worth watching! Dave Lester, his amigo did a great job on it!
ERRATIC WEEK OF FISHING IS TOUGHEST OF SEASON
La Paz – Las Arenas Fishing Report for Week of June 23-30, 2013
This past week might have been the toughest fishing week of the season. It was a difficult week on so many levels with erratic fishing and conditions that just seemed to make no sense.
We can only attribute it to a collision of the “perfect storm” of variables that all came crashing in on us…
1. Colder than normal waters brought on by late season winds turning waters murky and green. Sometimes the winds almost like “winter winds” and the waters are so green you can’t see through it. On the surface the water can be 80 degrees, but a few feet down it’s 65! We can often see fish all over, but they are just not interested in eating!
2. The “super moon.” Normally, the full moon is not a big concern for us. But, this past week, they billed it as the “SUPER MOON.” It was the largest, biggest, fullest full moon of several years. Resultingly we had incredibly low tides and strong currents. Combined with everything else, it hit us hard.
3. Hurricane COSME…it didn’t hit us and fortunately veered hundreds of miles off-shore. However, it did bring some big swell and waves from the south as well as some evening showers. This contributed to rough water conditions for a few days as well as adding more muck to the over-turned ocean that was already in bad shape.
So…that was it in a nutshell.
On a more pragmatic level, it meant lots of our amigos had some disappointing days fishing. Rough waters and no fish. Flat seas and green water. Seeing fish that didn’t want to bite. Unusual long runs to find blue water. YIKES!!!
This is the time of year when we should be and normally are slamming fish. Instead we were scrambling to find good water and fish that were interested in coming to the party.
On the upside, the fish were were hooking were BIG! Take a look at the photos! We didn’t catch many fish, but the fish were beasts! Big roosters and even bigger dorado were the rule rather than the exception. Roosters were routinely 30-50 pounds. Dorado…wow…few of them were SMALLER than 40 pounds. There were a few days where there wasn’t a dorado smaller than 45 pounds on the beach.
That created some problems of it’s own. There’s a reason fish get BIG! That’s because they are smart and tough. If we had CAUGHT as many fish as we hooked it would have surely been a better week. I mean, hey…when you come down and the biggest fish you might have caught in your life is a bass or a steelhead or a rainbow trout and suddenly you’re hooked up to the biggest fish of your life and you’re sweating and you’re now on a fish for 30 minutes…then 45 minutes…then an hour or more…in the hot sun…and you pull a little too hard…or your button down the drag…or you backlash the reel…
A 40 or 50-pound fish is not twice as strong as a 20 pound fish. It’s EXPONENTIALLY stronger! It’s a beast that EATS 20-pound fish for breakfast and takes it personally against you that you stuck a hook in his mouth! They are mean and they are pissed off and they growl. It’s not like they’re gonna let you you just pull them into the boat!
The fish is just asking to get lost!!!
Even many of our most veteran anglers were losing these big fish. And after you fight a fish that long, it’s often too late and you’ve drifted too far to find another hook-up. You get one chance at a huge fish and if that opportunity is lost…whether by angler error or simple bad luck…that’s it! You come back with nothing! We had folks fishing 1, 2, 3 days in a row with that kind of luck. Hooking several fish a day and losing the fish. Not much can be said. That’s just the way fishing was this past week.
The majority of the fish were big dorado and roosterfish, but we did have some amberjack, good numbers of jack crevalle, some marlin and sailfish (lost) and surprisingly a number of sharks pop up (and off!). Some of our catch might also have been a function of the bait we were using. Because of the conditions, bait did become a problem…especially finding sardines along the shallows. So, we used mackerel, ladyfish, small bonito, ballyhoo, small tuna, mullet and zebra fish as bait which were all effective.
Hopefully, better things this coming week even as you are reading this! As I write , conditions seem to be improving!
Tailhunter Fish Report 