Yellowtail and Snapper Bite in Cool Conditions
Capt. Eric Brictson
February 6, 2011
San Jose del Cabo - Saltwater Fishing Report
February 6, 2011
Anglers –
Global weather patterns continue to create cooler than normal conditions throughout much of Northern America, as perhaps three quarters of the United States is now either snow or ice bound. This has made traveling that much more difficult and crowds of tourists recently arriving in the Los Cabos area have been noticeably lighter than average. The skies have been clear and sunny, though temperatures this past week were downright chilly, a low of 41 degrees was reported on Friday morning and daytime highs barely reached 65 degrees, surely this cold wave will not last long, though now is a time when you definitely want to have a warm jacket available, as wind gusts were predominately from the north and they dropped the chill factor even lower.
Ocean water temperatures ranged from 66 to 69 degrees, most certainly will start on a warming trend next month as the days progressively become longer. Swells were minimal, though with the combination of persistent winds and strong currents, this attributed to limiting the options for anglers, often having to fish closer to shore in sheltered spots. There were good supplies of sardinas available, with limited pressure this made finding the live bait easy and plentiful.
Local San Jose del Cabo fleets were spending most of their efforts fishing the spots from Punta Gorda, Cardon, La Fortuna and when the weather allowed, the Iman Bank. Despite not so ideal conditions, anglers found a wide variety of small to medium sized species. There were red crabs being encountered on the surface, but it was kind of a crap shoot as to when and where these pelagic crabs could be found. When obtained, anglers were able to use these small crabs as bait for red snapper, which were weighing in the 2 to 10 pound range, these were the true huachinango snapper, prized eating, with high commercial value. A bit tricky fishing these light baits, the snapper take the bait very delicately, hard to detect at times, strong fighters on sporting tackle.
Other common catches were yellowtail, sizes up to 15 pounds, most of them about 5 pounds, striking on various baits and jigs, most often off the bottom rock plies, but at times being encountered closer to shore mixed in with schools of sierra. Also a mix of yellow snapper, cabrilla, triggerfish, bonito, as well as an occasional small dorado. Small sized roosterfish were plentiful along the beach stretches north of La Playita to Punta Gorda, good area for sierra as well.
The Iman Bank has still been holding some yellowfin tuna, 10 to 40 pounds, though the inclement conditions have not been favorable in recent days for this spot. Hopefully the weather will scatter the sea lions which have taken up residence on these banks and have turned into a real nuisance.
The combined panga fleets launching out of La Playita/Puerto Los Cabos sent out approximately 44 charters for the week, with anglers reporting a fish count of:8 yellowfin tuna, 16 bonito, 4 amberjack, 17 cabrilla, 92 pargo, 21 dorado, 34 roosterfish, 91 yellowtail and 112 sierra.
Good Fishing, Eric
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