Overall Catch Success Rate 100%
Numbers at a glance: Billfish 61%,
Dorado 41%, Tuna 47%, Other 24%
BILLFISH: The good thing this week was that we
had a perfect score, every single boat we sent out caught something and more
often than not, quite a lot of fish. This period striped marlin was the species
most likely to be encountered by anglers aboard Pisces boats. We had great
catches of other species too, but nevertheless more boats found marlin than
anything else. As predicted in our previous fish report, the stacking up of
boats off of the Old Lighthouse who were bottom fishing for the stripers, came
to an end after three weeks, the fish spread out and charters are moving up the
coast, mostly to Golden Gate to find them.
Catches ranged from one to three marlin per boat, with our top boat
Pisces Yahoo, having a fabulous day releasing five striped marlin for Greg Stewart
from Palin City, Alabama, who also caught a tuna, grouper and two dorado. Our
little 28 ft. boat Adriana, really must have flown to be able to get to Golden
Gate & back on a half day trip and release three striped marlin for Mike
Flanagan from Pennsylvania. This same boat had three big stripers on January 8th,
up to 200 LBS at La Bomba & Golden Gate for Joe Xumphonphakdy (yes we
questioned that name too) & Megan Laube from New Jersey. It was nice to
finally have some live mackerel available – striped marlins’ absolute favorite,
improving the odds of hook ups. That said those boats that took caballito for
bait also did well. Sixty one percent of
our boats caught marlin this week, giving us a total of forty eight fish, all
released.
OTHER SPECIES: Marlin might have been the most
frequent catch this week but for sheer numbers yellow fin tuna could not be
beat. Our top tuna boat this week was Pisces Rebecca with an amazing catch of
fifty fish up to 25 LBS, (many released) for Steve Turner from the aptly named
Fishers, Indiana - he along with his friends also release a striped marlin.
They fished 38 miles to the south of Cabo on January 10th. This same
day Pisces Tracy Ann did not want to be left out, but they went to San Jaime
where they were able to catch thirty tuna, two dorado and release a striped
marlin for Daniel O’Connor & buddies from Australia. Pisces Bill Collector went a long way out,
forty miles from Lands End, to be able to catch thirty five tuna up to 30 LBS
for Jo Ellen Jablonski & party from Illinois. Forty seven percent of our charters caught
tuna giving us a total count of 324
fish. Dorado catches remain good, with
forty one percent of boats catching between one and ten fish up to 25 LBS. One
of the better catches was by George Leopold from Santa Fe, California aboard
Pisces La Brisa, for ten fish caught at La Ballena on live mackerel and an
assortment of lures. The dorado are more
spread out now, but generally were found along the coastline about a mile
offshore between the Lighthouse and Golden Gate. Several boats caught grouper up to 20 LBS as
well as skipjacks and the odd sierra inshore. Just a couple of small wahoo were
taken and the only other catch was that of a blue shark, a tiny 20 LB specimen,
released aboard Adriana by Ken Kinslow from Oklahoma.
LOCATION: Pacific – Golden Gate, Margaritas,
San Jaime, Migrino, 30- 40 miles south.
WEATHER: Perfect
AVERAGE WATER TEMP: Water is still warm at 74 F
BEST LURES: Live mackerel, live caballito, cedar
plugs, green/black, petrolero
