Oct 12th to 18th, 2013
Overall Catch Success Rate All Species Combined 95%
Numbers at a glance: Billfish 10%, Dorado 92% Tuna 2%, Wahoo 9%

 

 

BILLFISH: We had low numbers of billfish this week, which is unusual, but we are pretty certain this was caused by a late season tropical storm.  Just before the storm though we had some nice catches such as those aboard Pisces Fearless on October 12th, when the group from Intrepid Investment released three striped marlin & caught a wahoo & seven dorado. This same day Phil Musial from Houston released two striped marlin and caught three dorado aboard Pisces Adriana & Patrick and Jean Neville from Bradenton, Florida, also had a nice day aboard Pisces Tracy Ann with a striped marlin released and thirteen dorado to the boat. The port was closed on October 14th but we experienced pretty heavy rains the day before too, which messed the water up and cooled it down. So our great striped marlin and sailfish bite turned off, as the fish looked for cleaner water and we had to wait for the beautiful blue water they like, to return. This started to happen towards the end of this report, but otherwise we might as well call this the dorado report. That said this week saw the first of the big fishing tournaments the Los Cabos Billfish Tournament. The tournament started on Oct 16th and forty boats participated – again due to the weather in previous days only two qualifying fish were weighed in, both on day one of the event. Team Extraction pulled in with a sizeable blue marlin that tipped the scale at 625 lbs. putting them in first place which held true throughout the competition. Angler Tom Lansing from Phoenix was thrilled as was his captain Hiram Montano. Neither Tom nor Hiram are new to fishing success having a string of places in recent years in all the tournaments. Hiram’s brother, Bruce was a crewmember aboard Expedition who touched the dock an hour after the big fish was weighed. Angler Glenn Richardson from Abbeville Louisiana had fought his large blue for three hours and would end up taking second place overall with his 516 lb. fish. Chupacabra took the top release honors and there were also categories for wahoo, dorado and tuna. All places are not official until tonight when the awards banquet takes place. As we write this the second tournament of the fall season is underway, the Bisbee Offshore where around 90 boats are competing in this two day event, before the main event set to start on October 23rd. The tournament taking place right now used to be called the “little Bisbee”; we hardly think it warrants this name anymore. Going back to regular fishing, as mentioned above the striped marlin began to show up as the weather got back to normal. Only ten percent of charters caught marlin this week and we had a single sailfish aboard Yahoo. Total marlin count was sixteen stripers. Our overall catch success rate for all species was ninety five percent, the only boats that did not catch anything, were those specifically targeting big blue marlin.

OTHER SPECIES: The dorado fishing was in complete contrast to that of marlin, but then again, they like the debris that washes into the sea during and after storms and have a penchant for hanging out under stuff floating making them easy pickings for pretty much every boat. The weights on this species were usually in the 12 to 30 lb. class with the standard catch around nine fish per day, though some caught as many as twenty one. The Pacific was the top spot to find dorado with a combination of lures and bait working.  Ninety two percent of our boats caught dorado, with many of the smaller fish released. Our total dorado count was 694 fish. Tuna catches were slow this week with just a couple of boats finding a few smaller fish, as usual C Rod was the top tuna boat with twelve caught in one day. Wahoo catches were better than those of tuna with nine percent of boats catching fish in the 30 to 50 lb. class. Wesley had some nice surf fishing trips where he was successful in catching roosterfish, needlefish & jack crevalle.
LOCATION: Pacific – lighthouse to Golden Gate.
WEATHER: Rain for two days, seas bumpy for a couple of days afterwards, right now so gorgeous it takes your breath away. Blue, calm seas, clear skies.
AVERAGE WATER TEMP: 83 F
BEST LURES: green, live caballito, white/blue, petrolero, ballyhoo

A NEW BEAUTY IS IN TOWN

Everybody wants to know who our new neighbor is....this beauty just pulled into the marina - 237 FT Alston Marine "Kogo" is named after the wife of the French/Saudi businessman Mansour Ojjeh, who purchased the steel hulled vessel in 2006. ...Mansour is one of the founders of the McLaren Formula 1 racing team. Tabloids have recently linked his daughter romantically with British driver Lewis Hamilton - we have a birds eye view from our office window so will let you know if we see any celebs sneaking about - but then again most people will be over at the scales waiting for big fish to come in.

 

 

LCBT No Billfish Day Two, but they are out there

Seeing as no billfish were weighed in on day two of the LCBF tournament we thought we would remind the anglers of what they are supposed to be catching - this great shot of an approx. 400 lb blue marlin was sent in by Captain Brent Rose of a fish released on Sunday by angler Matt Besley aboard Jeta.

Nice Fish in Tournament

We were holding our breath, waiting for what we knew was going to be a nice fish, to come to the scale late yesterday afternoon - it looked really big and perhaps a prize winner for Abbeville, Louisiana, angler Glenn Richardson. Once hoisted up the electronic scale told it's own story and registered it at 516 lbs - not big enough to bump Extraction's 625 lb'er from it's first place spot, but may hang in there to put them in the prize money. One more day of fishing left in this event and who knows what will show up later today - stay tuned.

BIG BLUE MARLIN CAUGHT FIRST DAY OF TOURNAMENT

 

 

Big Fish Caught First Day of Tournament: The Los Cabos Billfish kicked off with the day one of three of fishing. Forty teams signed up and despite cooler weather, a BIG BLUE was brought in today by Team Extraction - THE 625 LB FISH - was la...nded by Tom Lansing from Phoenix, Arizona aboard his 53 ft vessel. Skipper Hiram Montana is an excellent fisherman and no stranger to success; he has led Tom Lansing to many prize winning fish, including a win of Bisbee East Cape in 2010 with a 510 lb black marlin, plus a 4th & 2nd place in 2009 & 2010 in the Black Blue where this team have won almost a $1,000,000. Will this fish be the winner of this tournament? Hard to say, but that's going to be a tough fish to beat. Of course when we spoke to Captain Hiram, he wasn't giving anything away, but did tell us he caught it on bait on the Cortez side. The fish took two hours to bring to the boat.

Weekly Fishing News

October 5th to 11th, 2013
Overall Catch Success Rate All Species Combined 96%
Numbers at a glance: Billfish 62%, Dorado 85%, Tuna 15%, Wahoo 10%

BILLFISH: This week we had plenty of activity on the fishing front, but perhaps not as many billfish as we had hoped for. The marlin & sailfish rates went down slightly, but one of the biggest factors was that of anglers wanting to catch eating fish, such as dorado and tuna and perhaps to save the big ones for the upcoming fishing tournaments. This weekend the La Paz Gold Cup took place and though final results were not in when we visiting the weigh in yesterday, we did see that 56 boats had entered and at the time of our visit the largest fish brought in was a 287 lb. blue aboard Tenacious – it should be noted that the minimum weight in this tournament is 200 lbs., whereas in Cabo tournaments it is 300 lbs. Bigger fish may have come in later yesterday but so far we have not been able to obtain final results. In Cabo we had some blue marlin this week, the largest being 300 lbs. aboard C Rod, caught at the Golden Gate by Joe Deigel from Old Forge, New York, who went on assisted by Annette Owens to land ten tuna up to 100 lbs. & a dorado  off of Pozo de Cota – without doubt our angler of the week. This same day Bill Collector had a great day too, releasing a 230 lb. blue marlin & two striped marlin as well as catching two tuna and a dorado for Todd Weible & Barry Greim from Downingtown, Pa outside San Jaime. Jon Svendson from Scottsdale, Arizona had a fabulous time aboard Rebecca on October 10th, releasing a 200 lb. blue marlin, which took a blue & white lure, a striped marlin that took a live caballito & nineteen dorado on a combination of green colored lures & bait. Halcon was the top striped marlin boat, releasing five for Chien Kuowang from Taiwan off of Gaspareno. Tracy Ann did pretty well too, releasing three stripes & catching twelve dorado, for Patrick & Jean Neville from Bradenton, Florida – not as lucky as in previous years, as a couple of years back they caught an enormous blue marlin, over 700 lbs., on this same boat the day before the Bisbee. John Ostenberg from Boulder, Colorado had three nice striped marlin released in the opposite direction, at Destiladeras aboard Valerie. La Brisa & Rebecca both had nice mixed days, with two striped marlin, a wahoo & nine dorado and a sailfish, two striped marlin & four dorado, respectively. We did have a few boats “skunked” this with, but without exception they were anglers who had requested specifics, such as only blue marlin, or only large yellow fin tuna. Sixty two percent of our boats caught billfish, breaking down into 74 striped marlin, 10 sailfish & 3 blue marlin.

OTHER SPECIES: Dorado dominated the fishing scene again this week, but dropped slightly in numbers. Eighty five percent of our boats caught dorado, with catches ranging from one to twenty fish from 15 to 30 lb. The majority were caught on the Pacific and took live bait and green colored lures. Yellow fin tuna catches were not abundant, nevertheless fifteen percent of our boats caught up to ten fish, the majority football size, with the exception being C Rod with a couple of bigger ones at 70 & 100 lbs. Wahoo catches increased slightly this week with the majority of fish around the 35 lb. mark. Adriana did best with two the same day that weighed 45 & 50 lbs. caught by Jonathan Comune from Phoenix, Arizona, who also released a striped marlin and landed six dorado. Closer to shore we had a few skipjacks and shore fishing with Wesley produced jack crevalle & the odd rooster.
WEATHER CONDITIONS: Mostly clear skies, but as we close this report a tropical storm Octave is below us & has already produced some intermittent heavy rain. This is not expected to develop into a hurricane and is predicted to weaken as it approaches Baja. Seas a little choppy at the close of this report.
LOCATION: Pacific, Lighthouse to Golden Gate.
AVERAGE WATER TEMP: 84 F
BEST LURES: live caballito, ballyhoo, green colors, blue & white, orang/black.
Based on the catches of Pisces by Tracy Ehrenberg

So How Big is this Fish?

To put this into perspective you need to know that Wesley, the guy holding the fish is 6 ft 11inches tall!

What Do You Do in Cabo with College Age Daughters?

Hello Marco, My family and I met you briefly in the Pisces sportfishing office last Friday evening, before we went out on the Adriana Saturday morning. We caught and released 8 Striped Marlin and 1 Dorado (which we traded for a tuna at the fillet station). As recommended, we returned to Captain Tony's later that evening to eat our tuna, which was prepared as sashimi and sushi, and also cooked three different ways.   My college aged daughter (Rebecca, San Diego State) loved the entire boat and fishing experience, as did I. Unfortunately, my youngest daughter was a bit queasy on the boat. Even though we are on a budget, the expense was very well worth one of the most memorable days and experiences we have ever had as a family. Thank you for your time last Friday and for the great service provided by your entire staff. We will always fondly remember our first trip to Cabo and hope to return one day to fish again with Pisces. I also intend to post a very nice review on TripAdvisor while also telling my Cabo bound friends about your great company. Sincerely, Scott, Despina, Rebecca, and Stephanie Danville, Ca.

Marlin, Dorado & a Big Tuna

September 28th to October 4th, 2013
Numbers at a glance: Billfish 86%, Dorado 83%, Tuna 14%
Overall Catch Success Rate All Species Combined 97%

BILLFISH: Another stunning week of fishing in Cabo which gave us a near perfect record of every boat catching fish – however, we had a few anglers that wanted to fish exclusively for large yellow fin tuna (probably remembering that the all tackle world record for this species was caught this time last year) but unfortunately drew a blank. On the other hand though we saw a very high hook up rate for marlin and sailfish leading to a catch rate of eighty six percent.  Funny thing was when multiple billfish days were had it tended to be sailfish, rather than the stacks of striped marlin we are accustomed too. That said, striped marlin was still the most widely caught fish, with catches the week being of one or two fish plus a whole slew of dorado. One of the most outstanding catches this week was that of Pisces La Brisa on September 28th, when they caught and released a 350 lb. black marlin, a sailfish and boated a 60 lb. wahoo –the marlin took a black and silver lure.  The lucky anglers were Thomas Gillis from Boston, who was fishing with Richard Cantares, Edward Coniff & Ron Ledoux. Of equal importance if not a tad more, was the catch of Pisces Bill Collector this same day who released a 300 lb. blue marlin, four sailfish & four dorado for Sherif Ammar, Hadi Hasson & Burak Ozgur from Irvine, California. The location for these catches was between the 95 & 11.50 spot on the Cortez side. As mentioned above, we are having a bumper sailfish year, with multiple catches in a days’ fishing. Top boat was Pisces Yahoo with five released on live bait outside the 95 spot for Keith & Rhonda Philpott from Kentucky fishing with Brad & Patricia Brock from Whitney, Texas. There is barely a week that goes by when Tracy Ann does not get a mention and this week she make the report again for releasing a blue marlin around the 250 lb. mark for G.W Taylor from Lindale, Texas, who with his group, went on to catch twenty one dorado & a tuna. There were only two boats that had quadruple marlin days, Pisces 28 ft. Adriana who had the four billfish plus seven dorado for John David & Mark Mikulka at the Lobera. The other was C Rod with four marlin, six dorado and a wahoo for Mark Olsen & John Mardesich from St. George, Utah. Just beating these two for most striped marlin was Halcon who released five at Golden Gate for Kingle Wang from New Jersey. Live bait was the ticket for striped marlin & sailfish, whilst the bigger fish, the blues & the black took lures. Pisces anglers caught a total of 130 billfish this week, breaking down into 80 striped marlin, 47 sailfish, 2 blues & 1 black.

OTHER SPECIES:  Dorado were out in full force this week giving anglers plenty of chances to load up on one of the top eating fish. Catches ranged from one to twenty six fish, resulting in a catch rate of eighty three percent, so chances were slightly less of finding dorado than a billfish, but boy when found, double digit numbers were common giving us a total of 689 a big number, but a good portion were released to comply with catch limits. Dorado were found throughout our whole fishing area but catches were better on the Pacific between the Old Lighthouse & Golden Gate, with the Margaritas area one of the hot spots. The dorado are taking live bait and lures, not picky about the colors but it is common knowledge that they like green colors, perhaps because they are known to be cannibalistic. Size on the dorado was between 10 and 30 lbs. Tuna catches were on the slow side with just fourteen percent of bots catching between one and ten fish, usually small school fish around 15 to 20 lbs., however Halcon, the boat that caught the 266 lb. last week, caught a very nice 150 lb'er in front of La Bomba for Cristian Alcala from Pico Rivera, Ca.  – This fish took a green lure. Just a few wahoo this week, with 35 lbs. the average weight, the only larger one was 60 lbs. aboard La Brisa. Inshore just a few skipjacks and beach fishing with Wesley produced roosterfish and jack crevalle.
WEATHER CONDITIONS: Mostly good, weather had cooled off at night; seas mostly calm some whitecaps on both sides in the afternoon.
AVERAGE WATER TEMP: 83 F
BEST LURES: Live caballito, ballyhoo, black/silver, orange/yellow, green.
Based on the catches of Pisces by Tracy Ehrenberg

BIG WAHOO

Nice to finally see some big wahoo - this one taken aboard Pisces Adriana by Rocky & Annette Warren from Golden, Colorado - 64 LBS, that's a lot of delicious fillets.