Anglers Find Good Numbers of Dorado Close to Shore
Capt. Eric Brictson
December 31, 2011
San Jose del Cabo - Saltwater Fishing Report
December 31, 2011
This is now family time in Los Cabos, as scores of vacationers have been arriving in search of warmer Holiday Season sunshine. Conditions are now very comfortable considering that it is winter time, mostly clear sunny days, with highs reaching the mid to upper 70s. Northern winds have resided in recent days and anglers have been enjoying calm ocean conditions. Water temperatures have ranged from 70 to 73 degrees. Clarity has varied from area to area, splotches of clean blue water and in other spots there were dirty green currents sweeping through.
Live bait supplies rebounded some from the past report, sardinas, mackerel and sardinetas have been readily available from the commercial fleet, at times anglers were able to jig up their own mackerel and scaly sardinetas, these baits were the bait of choice for targeting offshore species, particular striped marlin. The marlin action off of San Jose del Cabo slowed down, but charters out of the Cabo San Lucas were finding more stripers on the Pacific fishing grounds.
Anglers trolling the waters off of the Pacific side of Cabo San Lucas were finding very good action for yellowfin tuna, the region some 5 to 20 miles off of the Old Light House saw more concentrations of these fish. Yellowfin tuna in the 10 to 50 pound class were found traveling with porpoise, a few much larger tuna were accounted for, including at least one that weighed over two hundred pounds. Anglers out of San Jose del Cabo did not find much tuna action at all, we only heard of a handful of yellowfin caught, there was one 60 pound tuna landed off of the Gordo Banks on Thursday, maybe with settling conditions something will develop on this high spot, recently there have been either skipjack or dorado and some hungry sea lions.
The most common catch out of San Jose this past week was dorado, anglers found good numbers of these fish close to shore, the grounds from Punta Gorda to Cardon have been most productive. Trolling lures to find the schools and then drifting with live bait was most affective. Charters were catching limits most days and releasing other fish, sizes averaging 5 to 15 pounds. Smaller sized schools were encountered, often just outside the surf zone, later in the day birds could be seen circling above a few feeding dorado, anglers had to move quickly and cast their baits into this activity, this was occurring near the marina jetty area on a daily basis recently.
Anglers also started to do more scouting out for action off of the bottom rock piles, so far while using yo-yo jigs they found mixed results for a few leopard grouper, pargo and small yellowtail, we do expect to start seeing a seasonal swift in current and more numbers of these cooler waters species to move onto the shallow rocky structure.
Inshore there were scattered reports of limited numbers of roosterfish and sierra, most of these smaller sized, but a fun option, especially if offshore waters become too choppy. This action should become more prevalent as we progress though winter and into spring time.
Whales are arriving in force, now on their annual winter migration, they will be feeding and calving in local waters for the next few months.
The combined panga fleets launching from La Playita/Puerto Los Cabos sent out approximately 66 charters for the week, with anglers reporting a fish count of: 3 striped marlin, 52 sierra, 14 roosterfish, 2 wahoo, 5 yellowtail, 226 dorado, 5 yellowfin tuna, 18 bonito, 11 cabrilla and 14 pargo.
Good Fishing, Eric
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