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Fishing Report for San Jose del Cabo, Baja
Capt. Eric Brictson
October 13, 2002
San Jose del Cabo - Saltwater Fishing Report
Anglers -
October 13, 2002
The fall tournament season is now upon us, with the grand daddy of all scheduled this week, Bisbee's Black and Blue. Millions of dollars in prize money will be at stake and we anticipate that the participants will find world class action. The weather is now ideal, slight breezes, with the high around 90 degrees and lows of 65 degrees. Lots of warm sunshine, mostly calm ocean conditions and water temperatures in the 80 to 85 degree range, this makes it now prime time to visit Southern Baja. With the major billfish and tuna tournaments, as well as the APEC meetings, all in the coming weeks, this area will most certainly be very crowded. It is wise to plan ahead and have advance reservations for all of your planned activities.
Sportfishing fleets found action spread out throughout the area, on both the Pacific and Sea of Cortez side of the Peninsula. There were limited supplies of live bait, due to the heavy crowds, with mullet, sardinas and caballito the most common choices. The week started off with anglers catching good numbers of yellowfin tuna and dorado, in areas such as Gray Rock, Santa Maria, Red Hill and Punta Gorda, with most fish weighing in the 8 to 15 pound class. The best bite was found when the boats congregated close together and utilized the maximum amount of chum to entice the tuna into a feeding frenzy. Dorado could be found in sizable schools, lots of them in the 5 to15 pound range, could be located by trolling lures, but once located the best bite was with bait. One monster yellowfin tuna was caught off a Palmilla boat early in the week, estimated to weigh between 200 to 250 pounds, the tuna hit a larger live bait that was rigged for marlin.
For the panga fleets out of San Jose del Cabo the big talk was the wahoo action that developed off of Red Hill, as well as the Gordo Banks. Boats accounted for an average of 1 to 2 wahoo, with others landing as many as 5, everyone was talking about other lost strikes as well. The fish were striking on trolled lures such as rapalas, marauders and squid skirted lead or jet-heads, and average weight was from 20 to 40 pounds. The main area for this wahoo activity was off of Red Hill, within a mile of shore, but once the word spread, crowds of boats gathered and made the bite that much more difficult. Anglers trolling the Inner Gordo Bank at first day light, took wahoo, these were not as numerous, but it is encouraging news to have wahoo appearing in different areas.
There was one big black marlin lost after a seven-hour battle off a cruiser launching from Palmilla. The group of several anglers, led by Julio Zumaya battled the black marlin on stout one hundred pound class tackle and after realizing they were not making any headway, opted to cut the line, rather than spend the whole night fighting this beast. If that fish were hooked during one of the tournaments it would have definitely been worth the extra effort.
Not much going on off the beach for surf anglers, a few sierras, small pompano and a couple snook reported. One snook weighed in the 50-pound range, caught by local Nathan Brown off the Estuary mouth on a fish trap lure.
Good Fishing, Eric
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