WEATHER We had a very pleasing change in the weather this past week. The clouds moved in, a slight breeze was with us almost every day and our nighttime lows dropped to the mid 70's. Almost every morning we had 75 degrees on the thermometer and in the afternoons we were seeing low 90's. The humidity was up, the cloud cover worked that out for us, but all in all the weather was about as good as you could wish for this time of year.

WATER: At the end of the week the water on both sides of the Cape was almost glassy. I golfed Sunday morning and we could see the horizon in the distance with just a light riffle on it, closer to shore it was like a mirror. Earlier in the week the wind was from the northwest but it was a light wind. With the wind letting up and the currents being light, we started to receive warmer water in our area. On the Cortez side of the Cape we had water that was in the 80-84 degree range to the north of us, closer to home it was in the high 70's. Unfortunately the water was still slightly off color, it had a definite green tinge to it. On the Pacific side it has warmed up as well and we were marking a lot of water to the south of the San Jaime Bank in the 76-77 degree range but the water was a nice blue color. To the north of the San Jaime the water was cooler and still had a green tinge to it.

BAIT: Caballito were the bait of the week with a few Mullet in the mix. The price on these larger baits was $3 per bait. For inshore fishing Sardinas were available at $25 a scoop from the bait boats around the Palmilla area.

FISHING:

BILLFISH: This was almost a repeat of last weeks report on Marlin. It was a spotty week for Striped Marlin, a few boats were able to get releases on one or two fish each, but many boats had trouble finding fish that were willing to eat. The best results were had along the color change to the south of us, and artificial lures seemed to do a bit better than the live Caballito did. I know of one boat that managed to catch a Blue Marlin the ended up weighing #350 on the API scales. The fish would have been released except that it died about 10 minutes into the fight. The fish ended up being hand lined in for the last hour as a dead weight. A few other Blues were seen in the patterns in the same area, up outside the Punta Gorda area.

YELLOWFIN TUNA: Once again there were Yellowfin found, but not in large numbers and not close to home. Most of the fish were in the 25-40 pound range and bit on live bait dropped in front of the moving schools, but a few decent fish were caught with lures alongside the schools. The best colors were darker, in the black, blue and brown hues. Not many boats brought in Yellowfin, as it was a long run to get where they were, but if you managed to get into them, they were good quality fish.

DORADO The Dorado bite is beginning to pick up as the warm water returns to our area. Most boats were able to get a strike or two on good quality fish ranging between 15-30 pounds with a few big girls in the 40-50 pound range. Hopefully soon we will start to see more of the big ones. Best lures on the Dorado have been bright colored straight runners run off of the outriggers, or a stinger lure in bright colors with a rigged bait inside, run back about 150 feet or more. This lure and position also resulted in some nice Striped Marlin as well.

WAHOO: I did not hear of any Wahoo being caught this week, but I am sure there were a few given the warmth of the water and the areas being fished.

INSHORE: Roosterfish were the inshore surface fish of the week this week with quality fish in the 20 pound class being caught with Sardinas on the Cortez side of the Cape. We had a couple of fly-fishermen work inshore on Friday and they managed to release 6 of these fish on fly, and several others on conventional gear. Grouper were still biting for angler seeking good eating fish, and the tips of the rocky points in water between 250 and 300 feet deep produced some of the nice fish. Smaller live baits really helped get the quality fish here.

NOTES: Things are picking up and looking better every day. Fingers crossed and the creek doesn't rise, we should see steady improvement in all the species over the next several months. Until you get a chance to get down here and fish, keep your lines tight at home and keep dreaming of the big suckers here, one of these Blue Marlin or big Tuna just might have your name in its dreams! Until next week, have a great time!