"No doubt this is dorado season," wrote Jonathan Roldan for his weekly report August 19, "in full-color and full-turbo right now and we're grateful because the mahi provide all the things you want from a sport fish: eager to bite, swarming schools, great colorful action, can be big and mean and taste great on the table!

"Although our Tailhunter La Paz fleet had the better and most solid catches all week of dorado, our Tailhunter Las Arenas fleet also provided steady action. Both sides had fish that were generally schoolie-sized in the 10-15 pound class, with some larger bulls in the 25-30 pound class and the largest fish of the week around 40-ish pounds.

"One of the good things about the bite at Las Arenas is that the fish are closer now. In previous weeks the schools have ranged pretty far (relatively speaking for us!) for what we are used to. The last week or so the fish are inshore or as close as the nearby commercial buoy lines.

"Even for our La Paz fleet, there were schools of dorado as far out as the channel to San Francisquito as well as the Charo Bank, but as close as even finding some schools of dorado right in the bay...right outside Balandra which is a stone's throw north of town better know for a place to go swimming than for fishing! However, breaking schools of dorado were located under bait balls right there just outside Balandra.

"We did hook some nice tuna. Everyone wants a big tuna! But you have to be careful for what you ask for. At Las Arenas, there's been a rise of the giant squid that I had mentioned before. When the squid come up from the deep trenches, often the tuna come up as well. Sure enough, we had some of the bigger tuna with some muscle show up.

"'Bonefish Bill' Richmond spent four days whacking dorado with us, but on this particular day after climbing off the panga, he was casting his fly rod from shore and caught and released this nice dorado just a few yards off the beach!"