Fishing Report August 23rd to 29th, 2014

Overall Catch Success Rate All Species Combined 99%
Numbers at a glance: Billfish 97%, Dorado 93%, Tuna 14%, Other 16%
 BILLFISH: We had a fabulous week here in Cabo and that was even with the port being closed for two days due to big seas caused by Hurricane Marie that was out in the Pacific. The darker moon in conjunction with more stable water temperatures  was exactly what we needed to get the bite to pick up and boy did it pick up.  All but a few of our boats caught a billfish this week, usually with the bonus of eating fish too. We had just one boat draw a blank and that was because the anglers got sea-sick and asked to come back in. Striped marlin picked up the pace and regained their place as the most abundant billfish in Cabo, followed by good amount of sailfish and a couple of small blues. Cody Brunette, Jacob Lewis from & friends from Midland, Texas had an outstanding day aboard C Rod on August 24th when they caught and released both a blue and striped marlin a 45 lb. wahoo and eight dorados close to Migrino. This same boat did very well a couple of days later when they caught and released a sailfish, two striped marlin, seven dorado and six tuna near Las Margaritas for John Platon and friends from Gig Harbor, Alabama. La Brisa slammed it this day as well, with two sailfish, two striped marlin, three dorado and a tuna for the Alfords & Pollards from Tyler, Texas. Foster Sayles from Galveston fished aboard 28 ft. Adriana and had great success releasing three striped marlin, one sailfish and a dorado at Los Arcos and Margaritas. Flora T newcomer to the fleet, again proved their worth, making the fish report again with a blue and striped marlin released and two dorado boated for Matthew Small, another Texan.  Last but not least La Brisa had a notable catch for Ashley Griffin & party from Houston,  with three striped marlin released and seven dorado. Pisces anglers caught a total of 83 billfish this week consisting of 36 striped marlin, 18 sailfish and 2 blue marlin.
 

OTHER SPECIES:  After the rains is a good time to fish dorado, as they congregate underneath floating debris making them easier to find, but then again, the catches were getting consistent even before the rains. This week they were the most widely caught fish in Cabo, giving us a total catch of 222 fish equivalent to ninety three percent catch success rate. Catches ranged from one to fifteen fish up to 20 lbs. There was a tie for top dorado boat this week between Adriana and Valerie, who both caught fifteen each in one day – of course limits were respected.  Tuna catches slowed way own with just fourteen percent of our boats catching school size fish. There was one massive tuna caught out of San Jose the day before the port was closed that weighed in at 335 lbs, aboard Gordo Banks pangas – this fish easily makes the top ten of the largest tuna every caught here. The only other fish we caught were a few wahoo up to 45 lbs. and skipjacks.
LOCATION: Pacific - Los Arcos, Gaspareno, Migrino, Pozo de Cota, Golden Gate.
WEATHER CONDITIONS: Heavy rain on the 25th followed by rough seas on the 26th & 27th, when the port was closed.  Now hot and humid with partly cloudy skies.
AVERAGE WATER TEMP: 85 F
BEST LURES: Caballito, ballyhoo, green, purple, petrolero, blue and white

Fish Report August 16th to 22nd, 2014

Overall Catch Success Rate All Species Combined 94%
Numbers at a glance: Billfish 62%, Dorado 85%, Tuna 19%, Other 24%

Brian Meadors Aboard Rebecca Three Striped Marlin Released

BILLFISH:  The bite in Cabo has definitely picked up since our last report, with a 20% increase in billfish captures up from 44% to a 62% this week.  Our turnaround may be due to water temperatures becoming more stable and to the moon being in its darker stages. Temperatures on land have been around the 90’s, accompanied by high humidity, sunny to partly cloudy skies, and even a few showers in San Jose del Cabo and the Pacific side. 
The Shambala stands out this week, with an impressive capture of two marlin species for anglers Katie Gorman and Kris Couillard, both from Massachusetts, and Deb & Kim Barrow from Washington state not only did they land a 240 lbs. blue marlin, on a green lure, they also caught and released two striped marlin estimated to be around 120-140lbs, on live bait and as if that was not enough, they went on to catch a wahoo, dorado and seven tuna – pretty impressive for this all girl team.  All their action took place at the Pozo de Cota area of the Pacific side close to shore.
The Rebecca also did well out on the Pacific side near Migriño, for Brian and Linda Meadors from Texas. They caught and released three Striped Marlin in the 80-120lbs range on live caballito and also caught tuna and twelve skipjacks – they could have done even better, as they hooked two blue marlin both of which got off, but that left a lasting impression on this couple, for a trip that Brian said “I will remember forever”.
The Ruthless one of our ever popular 31 ft. Bertram’s, caught and released two striped Marlin in the 100-130lbs range, as well as a sailfish estimated in the 80-90lbs range for Kent and Trevor Hughes from Austin, Texas.  A few days later this same boat caught a 252 lb. blue marlin & eight dorado for William Acker from the same town. On August 20th, another one of our Bertram’s, this time the Tiburon had a great day for Brade family from Midland, Texas when they released a blue marlin, just shy of 200 lbs. & two striped marlin, whilst boating a dorado for the table. Valerie had a superb day for Joe & Shelly Martini from Florida on August 21st at the Golden Gate, when they released four sailfish on a combination of lures and live bait and also boated four dorado. Newcomer to the fleet Flora T II had a muscle tiring day for Kelly Johns and friends from Dallas when they released a blue marlin, striped marlin, sailfish and caught twenty five dorado, twelve of which were released. Michael Harrell out on La Brisa was very fortunate to hook a black marlin at Golden Gate, which they tried unsuccessfully to release – it was a young fish at 182 lbs., but they were able to release a striped marlin and boat five dorado.  Pisces anglers caught a total of 46 billfish this week, consisting of 33 striped marlin, 9 sailfish, 3 blue marlin & 1 black marlin.
 

Scott & Wesley William from Texas - La Brisa 35 lb wahoo, two dorado, one marlin relased

OTHER SPECIES: Dorado catches soared this week to a whopping 85% making them the most widely caught species in Cabo this period. The good thing is they were fairly close and spread along the Pacific coastline meaning most boats could find them. Catches ranged from on to up to twenty five fish with the average right around five fish per charter. They took pretty much anything, live bait or lures in a variety of colors. Our total dorado catch was 264 fish.  Tuna catches dropped a little more this week with just 19% of boats catching usually just a single fish, the only exception was Tiburon who caught twelve up to 35 lbs., twenty miles off of Balmaceda for Doug & Eve Pena. A half dozen wahoo were caught but none more than 38 lbs., but nevertheless much appreciated by those who got to eat them. The only other species caught was skipjack.
WEATHER:  Mostly sunny, hot and humid, with clouds threatening rain that never came. Seas were moderate with swells on some days.
LOCATION: Pacific side from the Lighthouse to Golden Gate.
AVERAGE WATER TEMP: 86 F
BEST LURES: Live caballito, green, orange & assorted colors.

Weekly Fish Report August 9th to 15th, 2014

AUGUST 9th to 15th, 2015
Overall Catch Success Rate All Species Combined 70%
Numbers at a glance: Billfish 44%, Dorado 27%, Tuna 22%, Other 27%

BILLFISH: People are so used to incredible fishing in Cabo, that it is hard when we get a few up and down days. With full moon on August 9th and a big moon all week, boats were hard pressed to have consistent fishing – they would do great one day, then were “skunked” the next, for no apparent reason – though we did notice a couple of degrees drop in water temperature. Our seventy percent success rate would be considered decent anywhere else but we are used to spoiling our anglers with much better rates. However, as usual those that hit it did very well. Michael Dexter from Norman, Oklahoma headed offshore thirty six miles aboard Pisces 31 ft. Ruthless, where he was able to release two blue marlin, just under the 200 lb. mark on August 10th. Ruthless followed up with another blue marlin this time at San Jaime for Briana & Ben Moyse from Chicago on August 12th, then did well again on the 13th with their third blue marlin of the week, estimated at 235 lbs.,  as well as a striped marlin for Texan angler Matthew Adamson. Top one day billfish boat, was 31 ft. Rebecca, with Linda & Terry Smith, Mike & Pam Kelleher & Mike Sparkman from Norman, Oklahoma (again) on board on August 12th, when they released EIGHT sailfish and a striped marlin outside the 210 spot – all took live bait. Rick Walsh from Cleveland, an old friend and client, was out on Rebecca on August 9th and managed to release two sailfish, nice catch, but not amazing, so why did he make the fish report? Well he told us that he had a nice tuna on for thirty minutes, with the fish over 100 lbs., when “Flipper” passed by and cut the line with his mouth, true story….now we don’t know if the dolphin (porpoise) was named Flipper but it did cut the line. Not hard to believe as it is a known fact that dolphin and tuna go together. You want to find tuna, then look for a school of dolphin (porpoise) and the tuna will be underneath. One of the better days was August 11th, though when we saw Cabolero catch a 215 lb. blue marlin, thee tuna and three dorado for Pete & Rita Chow form Denver, Colorado. The Rebecca was lucky again and released a 220 lb. blue marlin for Timothy Lynch from Florida and our new 31 ft. Bertram Tiburon also released a blue at San Jaime, around the 200 lb. mark  for Nick Lopez from Brea, Georgia. Sailfish again outnumbered the Cabo staple striped marlin, though some of them were quite small at 60 lbs. Our total billfish catch was 36 fish, consisting of 13 striped marlin, 7 blue marlin and 16 sailfish.

OTHER SPECIES: Dorado catches are on the climb and surpassed those of tuna this week. Twenty seven percent of our boats caught dorado up to 30 lbs. Tiburon caught the most dorado at the Golden Gate for Joe Hibbard & Glenn Slomin from Miami Beach – they caught fourteen and released eleven as well as four skipjacks.  Catches were of between one to six fish over a wide area, but generally speaking the Pacific was better.  Tuna catches were a little lower at twenty two percent and catches of one to nine per boat. Weights varied from 15 lbs. all the way up to a 113 lb. fish caught by David Pincus from Houston aboard 28 ft. Andrea. Believe it or not the most abundant fish this week was skipjack with a mixture of both the good eating white type as well as the black.  They were caught up on the Pacific side, fairly close to shore near Migrino.  Something to do when nothing else was biting and a lot of fun on light tackle. Our total skipjack count was 164 fish.  Wahoo is the best eating fish around and we had a couple of boats to catch these at around 40 lbs. Linda Smith from Oklahoma caught three roosterfish aboard the panga Gloria off of Chileno.
WEATHER CONDITIONS: Hot with some clouds, we had a couple of brief rain spells, like ten minutes each, but no real rain. It did rain quite heavily at San Jose airport as well as La Paz, Swells on a couple of days, but mostly calm.
LOCATION: Golden Gate, Sea Mount, Migrino, Herradura, Los Arcos, San Jaime, 210 up to 35 miles out.
AVERAGE WATER TEMP: Slightly cooler water, down to 84 F
BEST LURES: live bait, cedar plugs, feathers, green/yellow,  blue/white

August 2nd to 8th 2014 Fishing Report

Overall Catch Success Rate, All Species Combined 74%
Numbers at a glance: Billfish 51%, Tuna 35%, Dorado 12%, Other 9%
 

BILLFISH: Fishing was not easy this week, with some boats running up to 40 miles, though usually for tuna and still blanking out, whilst others stayed in around the 20 miles mark and did better. There was no set recipe for success an even though seventy five percent of our boats caught fish, this is not as good as we expect. It’s hard to say why, but we feel the weather is not as hot as it should be….if you are visiting you would say we are crazy, “it’s baking out there”, but we should have more tropical storms out in the Pacific; it seems they are taking a different track towards Hawaii at this time, plus we had a waxing moon all week with full moon happening the last date of this report. The sea surface temperate satellite maps tell the story too; the water is blended near Cabo with no clear temperature breaks. Nevertheless, billfish were the number one catch for Pisces anglers this week and though some boats got “skunked” others had remarkable catches. Pisces 28ft Uniflite Andrea had one of the top catches of the week on August 3rd for Jace Richards & Julia Worden from Aubrey, Texas on board.  They fished 25 miles from the 180 spot and released two blue marlin up to 210 lbs. & two striped marlin around the 100 lb. mark – the blues took lures and the stripes took live bait. This same day 31 ft. Cabo Cabolero had a slightly larger blue at 250 lbs. that took a  Petrolero lure at the 95 spot for Peter Martine from New York, who also landed a 30 lb. dorado. We are seeing quite a lot of juvenile blue marlin; with Speedwell having a 146 lb’er die on them & a 170 lb. striped marlin that was successfully released for Jay Wiviott from Long Beach, California.  The next day out this same boat did manage to release another small blue and a striped marlin at the 11.50 spot for Aubrey Pilgrim from Long View, Texas. Some unlucky anglers from Boise Idaho had a big blue on for over three hours that they struggled with, before it got off – captain J.R of the Rebecca told us the fish took a “tigrillo” lure and was just shy of 400 lbs. Speedwell must have had their blue marlin radar on this week as on August 5th, they released another smallish one, just under 200 lbs., a striped marlin & a sailfish for the Jacobson & James’s from Laguna Beach, California. Brad, Charles & Bradley Shields from Georgia, chose to go out on our 38 ft. Blackfin C Rod and were not disappointed to release a 300 lb. blue marlin, an 80 lb. sailfish and boat six tuna.  The Pereda family from Coral Gables, Florida’s request was to target blue marlin. They chose to go with captain Abel of the C Rod and were thrilled to exceed their dream, releasing a blue marlin around 220 lbs., a striped marlin and a sailfish, at the Cabrillo sea mount – the blue marlin took a tigrillo lure, the striped marlin a dead ballyhoo and the sailfish a live caballito. The 31 ft. Bertram Ruthless, captain by Julio Castro did well to release two striped marlin and boat a wahoo and tuna for Grant Cowie and friends from Laguna Beach. Pisces anglers caught a total of 38 billfish this week consisting of 22 striped marlin, 11 blue marlin, and 9 sailfish – with three fish kept, the rest released.

OTHER SPECIES: Tuna catches dropped off this week, due to perhaps the presence of commercial boats in the area; still, thirty five percent of our charters did find tuna, though in lesser numbers than previous weeks. Most tuna caught by one boat was for Lawrence Young & friends from Houston, Texas who caught sixteen up to 20 lbs. at the 95 and 11.50 spots – Lawrence also released the only shark of the week, a 70 lb. pilot, aboard the 50 ft. Flora T. The largest tuna however, were caught aboard 28 ft. Andrea by Justin & Stacey Counterman from Pennsylvania. They caught a total of six 28 miles out from the 150 spot, with three small up to 20 lbs. and the others weighing 80, 90 & 120 lbs. respectively. Catches per bait ranged from one to nine fish giving us a total catch of 107 fish. Dorado catches were quite a bit slower with just twelve percent of our charters hooking up to fish around the 20 lb. mark. Yahoo the 42 ft. Bertram did the best for Dorado with the largest fish of the week, a 40 lb’er, for Mike Goedecke from Lake Charles, Louisiana and also for numbers for catching five in one day on August 4th. The only other fish to be caught were few wahoo and skipjacks. Biggest wahoo of the week was 48 lbs. caught aboard Ruthless for Grant Cowie from Laguna Beach, CA after it took a Petrolero lure.
WEATHER CONDITIONS: Hot, sunny, partly cloudy, rough seas on a couple of days, now dead calm.
LOCATION:  all over the place – 20 to 40 miles out from Land’s End, Herradura, 95 spot, 11.50 spot, Cabrillo Sea Mount, Elias Calles, Moros Prietos, Barco Varado, and Punta Gorda.
AVERAGE WATER TEMP: 86- 87 F
BEST LURES: Blue marlin lures – trigrillo, petrolero, striped marlins live & dead bait, sailfish live bait, tuna cedar plugs, dorado live bait and yellow & green lures.

Here's the Fish Report!

JULY 19TH TO AUGUST 1ST, 2014
Overall Catch Success Rate All Species Combined 92%
Numbers at a glance: Billfish 68%, Tuna 64%, Dorado 15%, Other 10%
 

BILLFISH: This report covers the last two weeks as we were unable to get his out last week – but boy was the fishing good. The most unusual thing we saw this period was the amount of sailfish being caught, which have never before outnumbered marlin, but which have for the last couple of weeks. Besides a mix of billfish we saw great numbers on yellowfin tuna as well several wahoo and a few big dorado. Andrea our 28 ft. Uniflite had an outstanding week with some incredible catches – the best day for this boat was July 21st when Michael Long Sr. & Jr. were aboard with Michael Knize, all from Dallas. They caught an approximate 280 lb. blue marlin, a 250 lb. black marlin, a sailfish and 84 lb. tuna, 40  lb. dorado and lost a wahoo – now that’s a fantastic day! This same boat also had our largest billfish of the week, a blue marlin close to 400 lbs., which was released outside the 11.50 spot for New Zealand anglers Ross Whitmore & Brent Mitchell who also released a striped marlin.  The Wilder family from Taft, Texas also had a super busy day aboard Pisces Cabolero, releasing a 300 lbs. blue marlin and three sailfish, as well as landing a couple of yellowfin tuna up to 50 lbs. Our new 31 ft. Bertram, Tiburon, is already making a name for itself; on July 25th they had the Vega family aboard from Baja and caught a 200 lb. blue marlin, three sailfish, two tuna and a 40 lb. dorado. C Rod, Shambala & Yahoo all had blue marlin a little between 180 under 300 lbs., which they released. Bob & David Thompson from New York had an amazing day Pisces Valerie, catching & releasing eight sailfish and eleven yellowfin tuna. Striped marlin catches were rarely more than one fish, though there were a few boats that managed two in a day plus some smaller game. Pisces anglers caught a total of 98 billfish, consisting of 50 sailfish, 35 striped marlin, 12 blue marlin & 1 black marlin. All but five fish were released.
 

OTHERS SPECIES: We saw great numbers on yellowfin tuna this period giving us a total catch of 694 fish. Some of the tuna were of a good size, such as a 103 lb ‘er caught aboard C Rod, by Diana Melton from Houston, Texas who also went on, with friends, to catch a total of twenty fish, twenty miles out from the Herradura. Matt & Bob Trent from Oklahoma City caught twelve tuna aboard Andrea, with their top fish weighing 100 lbs.  On July 22nd Judy Durr from Farmer Ville, Louisiana caught seven tuna up to 95 lbs. as well as a striped marlin aboard Rebecca. Sixty four percent of our charters caught tuna, which when found, produced multiple hook ups. Dorado catches were considerably slower and tended to be picked up whilst trolling for billfish. The largest dorado was caught by John Carnes from Woodlands, Texas, weighing in at 65 lbs. aboard Yahoo. Mark Chiavetta from San Jose, California was fortunate to catch two wahoo 45 and 55 lbs. respectively aboard Bill Collector as well as land twenty tuna up to 100 lbs. and release a striped marlin. There were a few other wahoo as well as some bonita, roosterfish, plus one mako and one pilot shark.
WEATHER CONDITIONS: Hot, sunny, partly cloudy, port closed one day due to a local - storm that brought rains and sudden rough seas, which have now calmed.
LOCATION: Cabrillo, 11.50 spot and outside this location, Herradura, off of Land’s End, boats travelled 3 to 33 miles offshore.
AVERAGE WATER TEMP: 87-88 F
BEST LURES: Tigrillo (orange/black), guacamaya (orange/green/yellow), green & white, ballyhoo, caballito, cedar plugs.

12 Year Old Catches Big Tuna

Some kids luck out and their parents bring them to Cabo for summer holidays. This was the case for 12 year old Ricky Earley who landed this tuna, that was heavier than he is. The fish weighed 119 lbs and was caught by this young man aboard Pisces Valerie. Well done Ricky!