Cabrillo seamount, Punta Gorda, 95 spot, Jaime Bank, Golden Gate, 11.50 spot, Chileno, Migrino
October 7th to October 13th, 2005

WEATHER CONDITIONS: Seas rough and lots of wind at the start of this report, now breathtakingly beautiful, clear sunny skies, seas calm and perfect temperatures.
AVERAGE WATER TEMP: 82 F.
BEST LURES: Lots of boats are fishing live bait, either cast to stripers or slow trolled to try and attract really big fish, plastics – petrolero, guacamaya and green/white.

BILLFISH
As we write this report, the Los Cabos Billfish Tournament is into their third and final day, with the awards to be announced on Saturday night. The tournament had a total of 60 entries and so far four qualifying fish have been weighed in as follows:

Cazador with a 465 lb blue, Phoenix with a 406 lb blue, Eagle with a 368 lb blue and No Problem with a 304 lb blue. Top release boat so far for fish less than 300 lbs is Light Speed with five fish released. Leading two tuna are aboard Tournament Hunter with two fish at 277 and 166 lbs respectively. The biggest wahoo so far was taken aboard Karma, 43.7 lbs and the biggest dorado is 43.7 lbs aboard Fish Cabo. However, the water looks really good today so we will probably see more fish being weighed in which could change the standings. So far they have sixty-two legitimate releases which have been photographed for the tournament overall.

In regular fishing news we had a respectable overall catch success rate for all species combined of eighty-three percent, with forty-seven percent of charters catching billfish. The first few days of this report, we experienced windy weather and rough seas, causing many anglers to turn around. Those that stuck it out generally did well though. Mike Miller, from California was aboard “Ensueno” on September 9th and was thrilled to release a 400 lb black marlin at the 95 spot. This same day Thomas Mincher form Greensboro, N.C did well to release both a blue and a striped marlin aboard “La Brisa”, a little further away at the 11.50 spot. Next day out it was the “Rebecca’s” turn with three striped marlin and a sailfish released for Norm and Mary Johnson from Portand, Oregon. On October 11th, Stan Jensen, Keith Bouma and Dave Vanderhock, all from Washington State, were our top anglers, aboard “Karina” for three striped marlin released and five dorado from 20 to 40 lbs boated. This same day “Yahoo” did well to release two striped marlin and a sailfish for a group we had from New Zealand and Australia, (Nick Hulme, Jamie Hodglasen and J. Shetz). Overall a good week, with the exception of rough weather on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. Pisces anglers caught a total of sixty-six billfish this week consisting of 44 striped marlin, 8 blues, 1 black and 12 sails, all but four fish were released.

OTHER SPECIES:
After marlin, dorado were the most widely caught sportfish, with thirty-eight percent of boats landing between one and twelve fish, weights were from 20 to 50 lbs. They were found both on the Pacific and Cortez sides and took both bait and lures. Yellowfin tuna catches were not as high with just sixteen percent of charters locating this species; however there were some really big fish, such as those mentioned above, as well as two very large fish caught by Scott Bricker from Malibu, California. Scott fished on the 7th and 9th of October, aboard his favorite panga, skippered by Nino Rochin, out of Palmilla. Scott has fished with Nino for over 15 years and it has obviously paid off. On the 7th, they were fishing at the outer Gordo using live bonitas, when they hooked up to a large fish in very rough seas, 2 hours and 40 minutes later, they were able to boat the monster, whilst narrowly avoided sinking the boat, having taken on about a foot of water; back on shore the fish taped out to 270 lbs. A glutton for punishment, Scott went back to the same spot on the 10th and had a repeat performance, though thankfully in calmer seas, this time it only took him 1 hour and 20 minutes to land his second tuna, which turned out to be even larger at 300 lbs. This bodes well for the upcoming tuna tournament on November 3rd and 4th. Other tuna catches were not quite as spectacular and were from four to twelve fish weighing from 25 to 80 lbs in diverse locations, but more were on the Cortez side. Inshore we are starting to see quite a few roosters in the 25 to 30 lb class and pangas are even catching a few stray striped marlin. Skipjacks also being found inshore. A 60 lb bull shark was also released.