Golden Gate, 11.50 spot, 95 spot, 13 miles off of San Jose, Punta Gorda
September 2nd to September 8th, 2005

WEATHER CONDITIONS: Hot, daytime temps in the high 90’s. Skies clear, seas calm.
AVERAGE WATER TEMP: 86 F.
BEST LURES: Live bait, guacamaya, purple/black, brown/orange.

BILLFISH
Fishing is right on track for September, though we would like to see a higher overall catch success rate – this week it was seventy-two percent for all species combined; which means quite a few boats got “skunked”. Nearly all charters, even if they didn’t catch fish, saw or hooked something, but just couldn’t get a hook up to stay. There were more billfish than anything else caught with a mixture of blue marlin, striped marlin and sailfish – sixty-eight percent of boats got to play one or more of these big fish. Striped marlin were the number one catch, with fish in the 130 to 200 lb class, closely followed by sailfish, the species with the biggest increase this week. Blue marlin catches were about half of those previously mentioned with weights mid-range from 150 to 300 lbs. Boats started out the week on the Pacific concentrating at the Golden Gate, but then switched to the Cortez side, namely, the 95 and 11.50 spot and then graduated to Gordo Banks. “Rebecca” was lucky for Willie Mayes & Jonathan Ogletrer, from Texas, releasing two sailfish and catching a 200 lb blue on September 2nd. This same day “Valerie” had a blue close to 300 lbs for Michael Murray from Indiana. Next day “Rebecca” fished a little further up the Sea of Cortez in front of San Jose and managed to release three sailfish, a striped marlin and a blue marlin, for Theresa Jones and friends, who turned out be the anglers of the week. There were several boats that had triple striped marlin days, or two stripes and a sail. Pisces anglers caught a total of 74 billfish these week, consisting of 33 striped marlin, 29 sailfish and 12 blue marlin, 64 fish were released.

OTHER SPECIES:
Tuna and dorado catches are much slower than we expect for this time of year. We did have a couple of decent tuna days, but overall only twelve percent of charters caught fish in the15 to 40 lb class. The Iman bank located just two miles offshore close to San Jose proved to be a good spot for yellowfin, with huge fish spotted, but seldom caught. It was the smaller school fish that provide most action. On September 8th Phillip and William Adams from Lafayette, Ca. had a great time aboard “Adriana”, landing nine yellowfin from 15 to 25 lbs and releasing a sailfish. “La Brisa” fishing the same location managed to catch eight, plus two dorado.

These were the best catches for us, otherwise tuna caught were those picked up whilst trolling earlier in the week on the Pacific side. Dorado catches were a little better with nineteen percent of boats hooking fish in the 15 to 30 lb class. Catches were usually just one or two fish, but they were over a wide area and a nice bonus, when looking for billfish. No wahoo for us this week. Inshore pangas caught triggerfish and the some dorado.