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Fishing Report for San Jose del Cabo, Baja
Capt. Eric Brictson
March 4, 2001
San Jose del Cabo - Saltwater Fishing Report
Anglers - March 4, 2001
The month of March started out with a bang, on Thursday, the Los Cabos area was drenched by steady rainfall for the entire day. It does not usually rain during the winter in Southern Baja and especially uncommon to have a storm leave as much as two or more inches. Another rare event was the reports of a hail storm near Punta Gorda on Friday afternoon, definitely wintry conditions. The winds that did create rough seas last week resided and for the most part seas are now calm. The water temperature was being reported as a cool 64 to 68 degrees and was off colored, greenish in most parts, though blue water was found further offshore.
Panga fleets were fishing in areas from Punta Gorda to Iman, generally within a few miles of the shoreline. The overall fish counts have included catches of yellowfin tuna, dorado, sierra, roosterfish, skipjack, pargo, cabrilla, bonita and triggerfish. Most everyone is catching fish and if anglers do not go out with too high of expectations for landing monster sized fish during the late winter season, then they are having a great time tackling the variety of smaller gamefish on lighter tackle. There were still live sardinas available but on some days they were harder to find, particularly due to early morning low tides. The bait was worth waiting for because that is what the surface fish preferred. Along the beaches anglers had success trolling small mackerel colored rapalas for sierra in the 2 to 6 pound range and an occasional small roosterfish. Trolling with live bait produced more strikes and larger fish, including a couple of 20 pound class roosters that were released. The beaches from La Laguna to La Playita were very productive for smaller sized roosterfish and good news is that some of the larger ones are now showing.
The action for yellowfin tuna became very spotty, though they were still being seen on the fishing grounds, but were difficult to hook. Some of the more fortunate anglers had as many as 7 yellowfin tuna in a day, while most of the other charters averaged maybe one tuna mixed in their overall catch. The average tuna was about 15 pounds, though there were several of the larger 50 to 60 pound yellowfin caught on chunk bait off of the Inner Gordo Bank, one late morning when one panga happened to be at the right place as a pack of hungry tuna moved through. Dorado were actually being caught more frequently than were the tuna in recent days. Most of them being found while trolling live bait closer to shore, with Punta Gorda being a hot spot. It was lucky if you did land three or four dorado, but most all boats were catching one or two of them per outing. They were nice sized fish for this time of year, many in the 15 to 20 pound range.
With the lack of consistent surface action many pangeros are working different bottom spots, jigging iron lures off of the rock piles and catching a variety of grouper and pargo. Most of them under 10 pounds but several of the grouper were over 30 pounds. Amberjack also would hit the yo-yo jigs, but were not abundant, as were skipjack, that at times became a nuisance, especially when trying to chum the yellowfin tuna up.
The reports of striped marlin were few, as the cool water conditions has temporarily put the billfish into hibernation. Many of the larger boats are now opting to troll along the shoreline and bottomfish in order to find some action for their clients. This should be the on and off pattern for the rest of the month, until the warmer days of springtime arrive. The fishing is great now if you like to target smaller inshore species on light equipment and bottomfish with iron jigs, but if you are after tuna, dorado or marlin you might want to wait until the water warms in the next couple months.
Good Fishing, Eric
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