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Fishing Report for San Jose del Cabo, Baja
Capt. Eric Brictson
April 1, 2001
San Jose del Cabo - Saltwater Fishing Report
Anglers - April 1, 2001
There was plenty of warm sunshine for everybody to soak up here in Southern Baja, as high temperatures were now reaching the mid 80's. Sportfishing fleets reported good all around catches for species including, striped marlin, dorado, yellowfin tuna, pargo amberjack, yellowtail, grouper, sierra and roosterfish. We are in the midst of the transition time of winter to springtime fishing and both the conditions and catches have still been unpredictable from day to day. Water temperature averaged anywhere from 68 to 71 degrees and with recent winds and currents was off colored, greenish throughout much of the region, although clearer blue water was found further offshore. The seasons first strong swell developed from out of the south and much of the week there was high surf conditions, which made surfers happy but did not help the anglers situation.
It was not to the point that the panga fleets could not safely launch, but was large enough that the commercial pangeros who
net the sardinas each morning could not reach the rocky beach areas to the north of Punta Gorda where the bait was congregated. This meant that for much of the week the live sardinas that had been consistently available for months could not be netted and anglers were forced to use other options. Red crabs continued to turn the surface red on the Gordo Banks, the fish were gorging on these and proved to be a challenge to catch on lures or other baits.
Despite these adversities the majority of anglers were accounting for respectable catches. The yellowfin tuna bite was not consistent but were being caught everyday. Even without the live bait, the tuna were being taken on rapalas, feathers, cedar plug and chunk bait. The bite varied from day to day, just as did the clarity and temperature of the water. On the days when bait was available that did increase the odds of finding tuna action, but it was not a sure thing either because of all the red crabs that were on the fishing grounds. Daily catches per boat ranged from 1 to 8 yellowfin tuna and sizes varied from 15 to 80 pounds. The largest tuna landed were taken on chunk bait from the Inner Gordo Bank.
While the surface action was not consistent the majority of the panga fleets were concentrating on the rocky bottom areas like La Fortuna, Iman and San Luis where they found good action retrieving yo-yo jigs. A variety of quality fish were found, including amberjack, pargo, grouper, cabrilla, bonita and yellowtail. Several of the amberjack and yellowtail topped the 30 pound mark. The most abundant fish were the pargo and bonita and they averaged from 4 to 8 pounds.
With the high surf pounding the shoreline and the lack of live bait for much of the week the inshore action was limited to moderate catches of roosterfish and sierra. The large swell for this early in the year was very unusual and as conditions return to normal the fishing should only improve.
Good Fishing, Eric
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