WEATHER:???? We are keeping true to having rain at least once a week again as the week started out with quite the lightning storm on Monday morning.?? I thought that we might just have a lot of noise and then the rain let loose on us.?? Not quite gully-washers but scattered times with real heavy downpours for about ten minutes at a time.?? It was heavy enough to wash a lot of dirt into the roads, later in the week it was dusty in town as things dried off.?? We had partly sunny skies for the rest of the week, enough cloud cover to keep the warm air trapped so out nighttime lows didn't get lower than the low 60's and the daytime highs were in the low 80's.

WATER:?? Surface conditions were good except for the start of the week.?? The lightning and rain worked the sea on the Pacific side up pretty good, lots of wind to go with the rain.?? A few days later it was great everywhere.?? The water within 15 miles of the cape has been a steady 74 degrees.?? Farther offshore on the Pacific, past the Golden Gate and the San Jaime Banks, it dropped to 69 degrees.?? On the Cortez side offshore it was 72 degrees, but close in it was 74 degrees.?? Water color has remained a decent blue across the Banks on the Pacific side, the warm water closer to home has been a bit off-color, and up around the Punta Gorda area the water had a strong greenish tinge.

BAIT: ??Once again there was a pretty good mix of bait with both Mackerel and Caballito available.?? The Mackerel were large ones and many boats opted to catch their own smaller ones if they were going to be fishing the banks on the Pacific side.?? The prices from the bait boats remained the same at $2 per bait.?? Sardinas were available later in the week from bait boast up in the Palmilla area at the usual $25 per scoop.

BILLFISH:?? The Striped Marlin bite has remained wide open on the Finger Bank on the Pacific side, but it is such a long run for the fleet boats that very few have been going.?? The average there has been in the double-digit area in numbers of releases.?? The bite that had been happening on the Golden Gate dropped off to practically a standstill as the bait moved off the bank and in toward shore.?? The fish moved with them and now the close to home bite is within three miles of the beach on the Pacific side and extending down to just outside the lighthouse.?? Slow trolled or drifted live baits have been the best producer but a lot of luck is being had by boats pulling lures as well, dropping back live bait to fish that appear in the spread.?? One of the problems we see occasionally is lots of fish on the surface that don't want to eat, and one way to get them excited is to troll lures at a faster speed.?? A few boats had luck doing that during the middle of the week, finding that lures pulled at ten and eleven knots got those fish to bite.

YELLOWFIN TUNA:???? A scattering of football fish showed up again just to the north of the Gorda Banks on the Cortez side of the cape but there were also scattered fish on the Pacific, just no big numbers or consistently large sizes yet.?? The football Yellowfin were 10-15 pounds with an occasional 20-pound fish and Sardinas were the way to go.?? Chumming heavily with both live and dead Sardinas would bring the fish up, then a live one pinned on a small #2 silver hook on 20-pound floura-carbon leader would get bit quickly, heavier leader did not produce as well.

DORADO:???? There were a few scattered fish, but the numbers were smaller than last week.?? As the water cools these will become an exception in the catch rather than a targeted fish.?? Most of the ones that were found were on the Sea of Cortez up around the Punta Gorda area, but a few fish shoed up in the warm water on the Pacific as well.?? The best lures were smaller ones in bright colors, bright feathers worked for many boats.?? Small Dorado were found mixed with the football Tuna as well and readily ate Sardinas presented for Tuna.

WAHOO:?? I saw no Wahoo flags this week that were for Wahoo, I did see quite a few that were flown for Sierra.

INSHORE:?? Sierra were the fish of the week for the inshore fishermen and they were consistently on the feed off of the Solmar-Finesterra beach early in the morning.?? They seemed to move up to the north later in the day.?? Yellowtail continued to produce scattered action off of the rocky points on the Cortez side with some decent fish being taken off of Gray Rock and the drop at Chileno.

NOTES: The air temperature continues to slowly drop and I have started to wear a jacket in the evenings and the mornings, now I am starting to think about long pants as well.?? Slippers in the house to keep my toes warm too!?? It is cool to me but then I have lived in the tropics for the past 22 years, most of you would consider it balmy here.???? This weeks report was written while listening to selections from several different albums by one of my favorite musicians, Marl Knopfler. Until next week, have a great Christmas and I hope Santa keeps your line tight!