Weather: Maybe things have stabilized as our temperatures this past week were the same as the week before. Or morning lows were in the low 60's while the afternoon highs reached the low 90's. Still no rain, but we did have a couple of days with some light cloud cover.

Water: This week showed no change in where the temperature break was but we did have an overall drop in the water temperature by several degrees. At the end of the week we had a solid 75-76 degrees (79-80 degrees last week) everywhere you looked except for the Pacific side out past the San Jaime and the Golden Gate Banks. Once you got about 5 miles past them, the water temps dropped to 67-68 degrees instead of the 70-71 degrees from last week. That cooler water also had a slight green tinge to it, but not so bad that we did not fish there.

Bait: Caballito and Mullet with an occasional scoop of Sardinas pretty much covered the bases for live bait this week. The normal $3 each for the larger baits and $25 a scoop for Sardinas. There has been some brined and frozen ballyhoo at a rather expensive $4 each in the large "horse" size.

FISHING
Billfish: The lowering in the water temps seems to have brought more Striped Marlin into the area, but the moon phase (maybe) has had the effect of keeping their mouths from opening on most bait and lures. Boats are seeing several dozen fish a day but are lucky to get three or four bites, releasing one or two fish a day. Almost all the action has been on the Pacific side of the Cape just off the beach near drop-offs that concentrate what bait has been out there. There have been plenty of fish offshore as well, but not concentrated in any one area. The lowering temps have pretty much shut off the Blue and Black Marlin bite, but there are always a few fish around, even though I did not hear of any caught this week.

Yellowfin Tuna:There have been quite a few scattered schools of football size Yellowfin Tuna this week, with the fish ranging in size from 8 to 25 pounds and a few larger fish to 80 pounds on the outside of the schools. While much more common than they have been, it is still not wide open by any means, but when you do get into the fish there are multiple hook-ups. Hootchies, Sardinas, cedar plugs and small feather have all worked well. The fish have been found from near the shore to 30 miles off the beach and most of them have been to the south and west. Larger fish have been found near the temperature break outside the 1,000 fathom line to the west of us.

Dorado: Cooling water slowed down the Dorado bite for us close to home, but reports from the Punta Gorda area have been that the fishing for Dorado in their area has picked up, and all the way to the East Cape, even though the water is cool, the fishing has been fair to good for these great eating fish. In our area, the water near shore on the Cortez side has produced some decent fish to 25 pounds, and the same depth of water on the Pacific side has produced a few more fish, but in smaller sizes.

Wahoo: I thought that the Wahoo bite was over, but the past two days seemed to have proved me wrong as friends of mine caught 6 yesterday and 2 the day before. Working near shore and trolling slow with rigged dead baits they have been catching Wahoo ranging in size from 25 to 40 pounds. Other boats have been getting one or two here and there, but the fish are still around.

Inshore: A repeat of last week, small Roosterfish, the occasional Yellowtail, some decent Sierra and an occasional Amberjack rounded up the normal inshore catch this week. A few Pangas got into some grouper and snapper, and a few focused on the Dorado, but the mainstay was small Roosters and Sierra. Both sides of the Cape produced, but the Sierra were more concentrated on the Pacific side. The numbers of Yellowfin Tuna have proven to be a big draw and quite a few Pangas are venturing a bit farther offshore in search of the fish.

Notes: If you are getting your own fishing licenses, you must have pesos. The people that sell the licenses around the marina can no longer take dollars from anyone. Get pesos the day before. No one has change for your US $100 at 6AM.