Baja Bytes – November 23, 2021
What a day for Pisces 66′ Viking Friday Bank. Angler Malia Evans told us about her day, “We had three generations of family aboard. We caught seven dorado and one marlin released! Plus, one of the dorado had a baby turtle in its mouth when we caught it. We were able to revive the baby turtle and release it, and it swam off strong.”
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Below the Border
At the Bull Ring, there have been fair catches of legal-sized calico bass. Small sardines, flylined and fished with a sinker, are working as well as some are scoring with the plastics.
Coronado Islands / Rockpile
There are a few yellowtail, though they do not seem eager. Unfortunately, it requires a lot of chum to get their attention making these yellows not very private-boat-friendly.
They are scattered all over in small numbers – the ridge along the weather side of North Island is holding, some are on the flats outside of the Middle Grounds, and some are in the rockfish area SW of South Island.
These are deepwater yellows from 150 to 175-deep, but some are as deep as 250 feet. None are less than 100 feet. Even these deep fish seem to respond to chum at times. That being the case, some yellows are caught on fly line and others on sliding sinker rigs. However, a dropper loop or the yoyo iron seems to be the most productive.
The private boater’s best option is slow trolling live mackerel using a lot of lead. One to three pounds should work.
Keep a yoyo rod ready to drop on any sonar signals you find. You typically don’t have long to drop on these schools when it’s this style of fishing, so being ready is vital.
There has been good fishing for whitefish around North Island, and there are a fairnumber of little bonito scattered all over the Islands. …Fish Dope
Ensenada
Excellent bottom fishing for few anglers fishing. ..Mara’s Sportfishing
Bahía de la Ascensión
Something’s fishy! Guests had a great day on the calm Pacific today, bringing home a 50-pound yellowtail, broom tail grouper, sheepshead, calicos, bonito, and big smiles! …Shari Bondy
Gonzaga Bay
Baja Sur
Punta Chivato
Loreto
Not much change to the fishing scene this past week, which is a nice positive. The local short-range enthusiasts continue to have great success in the battles with sierra, dorado, and roosterfish along the coastline. When this cools off, the boats will join the few boats working the closer to town high sports.
Candeleros and San Bruno Reef are good spots to pick up yellowtail and red snapper. The average sizes are in the small to medium range, with the biggest yellows hitting 12 pounds. Lobo and La Cholla are seeing bigger fish, although the catch numbers aren’t luring many boats. Pulpito and the reefs around Almejas Bay produced the boats’ biggest fish.
Mackerel and sardina are in good supply. Iron chuckers are hooking almost as consistently as live bait. Trolling lures have provided solid fun with some of the toughest bonito and toro for the few anglers seeking dorado.
The weather has been good, and the clearest water of the entire year has made for some jaw-dropping scuba diving! Winter in Baja is just around the corner! …Rick Hill, Pinchy Sportfishing
Lopez Mateos (Magdalena Bay)
Hi Gary, We fished Lopez Mateos six miles outside the Boca and got this one but can’t find it in any book. Any ideas? Also got grouper inside the bay. Good trip! Wind outside. Mag Bay Outfitters. …Craig and Theresa Cove
Anyone have idea what the fish is please email me thatbajaguy@gmail.com
Well, we just wrapped up a nice three-day fishing trip in Mag Bay. One video of gray whales, one of coyotes on the beach on an island in the bay, and one picture of tuna! We caught lots of tuna one day, dorado and wahoo another day, and grouper another day! Bill Boyce, Craig Lightner, Allen O’Brian, Jim Holmes, Tod Kenny, Mike Owens, Eduardo – a guy’s trip full of good fishing, good eats, lots of laughs! Just good times with good friends! …Brian Solomon. Solomon’s Landing
La Paz
MEXICAN MINUTE LA PAZ FISHING REPORT from Tailhunter Sportfishing for Week of Nov. 11-17, 2021
East Cape
Water- 80-degrees, flat and clear most of the week.
It has been pleasant, fall weather with cool mornings, clear skies, and warming to the low 80s mid-day.
A wide-open striped marlin and sailfish bite for the past two weeks. All boats are enjoying multiple releases, mostly stripers with quite a few sails mixed in. The dorado have been biting consistently with limits of nice-sized fish to 30 pounds caught daily. Anglers are taking advantage of a late roosterfish bite along most beaches. Plenty of nice big sardina available. Overall good fishing!
Boats targeting billfish are enjoying multiple releases, with two or three a day typical – mostly, they are stripers mixed with a few sails, and most of the fish are released between the Light House and Punta Colorado, two to five miles off the beach.
Slow-trolled ballyhoo have been the ticket with a few taken on lures.
Dorado have provided consistent fishing for the past couple of weeks. Limits from 5 to 30 pounds for most boats daily taken from the Lighthouse South to Rincon, one to five miles off the beach. The larger fish are mixed in with the billfish and are biting the ballyhoo. Drift fishing with big sardina are the bait of choice.
The roosterfish have been smaller fish from 3 to 15 pounds, with a few gorillas in the 40 to 50-pound class mixed in. Moving up and down the Palmas Bay beaches, they mostly take big sardina, with a few on the fly.
This has been the best fishing I can recall in November. …John Ireland Rancho Leonero
Puerto Los Cabos
Even with Thanksgiving week coming up, lots of vacationers are taking advantage of the ideal climate. We are still seeing good numbers of anglers arriving. However, after this coming week, we usually see a bit of slack as people start planning for holidays, Christmas, etc. The all-around weather is almost perfect now, lows down in the lower 60s and mostly clear sunny skies and highs close to 85 degrees. The breeze has picked up from the north late each morning.
The bait supplies have remained plentiful for caballito and ballyhoo, with chihuil and slabs of squid another option. Unfortunately, we have not heard of any sardina around; usually, they begin to rebound later this month. Off of the San Jose del Cabo Hotel zone, there have been reports of the spotting of the season’s first mackerel and sardineta– nothing consistent. As water temperatures cool, more of these bait schools should begin to show. Ocean temperatures have remained in the 80 to 83-degree range.
This week we saw a strong showing of striped marlin, mainly straight offshore from San Jose del Cabo, anywhere from 2 to 5 miles out; even anglers fishing from kayaks got in on the action. The marlin were readily striking on lures and bait, and most of the fish were in the 60 to 80-pound size, a few topping 100 pounds. In addition, there was one black marlin brought in mid-week by a local commercial pangero, estimated to weigh close to 500 pounds. Also, quite a few sailfish were scattered throughout the zone.
Wahoo action picked up for a few days before the word spread, and everyone congregated on the same area near Cardon, not a very large spot. These fish became weary with so much boat traffic and even more spooky with all of the spearfishermen chasing them around. Spear anglers are not supposed to be within 200 yards of any boats with conventional rod and reel anglers. We hope that something might finally be done and rules might be enforced because this area cannot sustain this pressure from above and below the water.
Wahoo ranged in size from the smaller juvenile six-pound fish up to 50 pounds. They were striking on slow-trolled bait, Rapalas, ballyhoo, and cast jigs. Mid-week some charters accounted for up to six fish. But overall, anglers were fortunate to land one of two. Dorado were spread out on these same grounds, some days more than others. The average size for these fish was in the 5 to 15-pound class. Still, no yellowfin tuna were found on local grounds; we heard of some tuna encountered associated with moving porpoise some 30 to 40 miles outside of Cabo San Lucas. Still, that action was very hit or miss.
Inshore there were some sierra and roosterfish, smaller in size. Off the bottom, there were more triggerfish than anything else, a handful of deepwater baqueta grouper, Pacific tilefish, a few cabrilla, yellow snapper, and barred pargo, and even a handful of smaller-sized dogtooth snapper and some of the Mexican bonito.
We continually see more whales throughout the area; peak season will be soon for these migrating mammals. …Eric Brictson, Gordo Banks Pangas
Cabo San Lucas
There were 237 billfish released this week, including sailfish, striped marlin, and blue marlin. We had a day of a double hookup on sails plus a striped marlin released aboard the Pisces 28′ Andrea.
“I don’t know, tuna fishing’s pretty slow… and then we caught a bunch!” our angler says. So, leave it to Captain Jaime and Mate Luis to find ’em! Running 30 miles out – 12 yellowfin on Pisces 42′ Caliente yesterday!
What a day for Pisces 66′ Viking Friday Bank. Angler Malia Evans told us about her day, “We had three generations of family aboard. We caught seven dorado and one marlin released! Plus, one of the dorado had a baby turtle in its mouth when we caught it. We were able to revive the baby turtle and release it, and it swam off strong.”
Memories to last a lifetime; that’s what it’s all about.
LOCATION: The best fishing locations have been La Palmira de Nicolas, Los Arcos/Margaritas, Cerro del Golden Gate, Migrino, Pozo Cota, Fuera Lighthouse, San Jaime, Cerro’s de Arena, 34 miles 180 degrees.
WEATHER CONDITIONS: The sea temps have been from 74 to 78 degrees, clear and calm with two-to-three-foot swells and calm winds. The air temps have been from 70 to 81-degrees.
BEST LURES: The best bait has been alive or dead caballito, mackerel, ballyhoo, sardina, and cedar plugs. Trolled lures of all colors, pushers, plastic squid, and Rapala-style lures. …Pisces Sportfishing Fleet
That Baja Guy-Gary Graham
Baja Bytes Sportfishing 