ROUGH SEAS OFF CABO SAN LUCAS RAISE THE
SPORTFISHING SKUNK RATE FOR FLEET CHARTER BOATS

Sept. 3-9, 2004, Tracy Ehrenberg, Pisces Fleet, Cabo San Lucas fishing, Baja California Sur, Mexico:

BILLFISH: Hurricane Howard zipping by us out in the Pacific last weekend, did not come to Cabo San Lucas, but still gave us some much needed rain and made the seas choppy for a couple of days.

The "skunk" rate was pretty high this week at Cabo San Lucas, not necessarily because fish weren't around but rather the seas were rougher than most people expected and they preferred to turn back. Those that did tough out, on the whole, were successful; also many Cabo San Lucas fishing boats reported seeing both sails and blue marlin, even getting strikes, but not having anything stick.

Our overall catch success rate this week was seventy-one percent for all species combined. Not high by Cabo San Lucas standards. Seventy-one percent of charters were fortunate to catch billfish, with sailfish being the number one species. As we mentioned a couple of weeks ago, 2004 is shaping up to be one of the best years for this type of fish in close to a decade.

Gary Thorne, out on "Tracy Ann" on September 4th, toughed out the seas to release three sailfish.

Next day out Daria Durden from Lewisville, Texas, was kind to release a fair size Cabo San Lucas blue marlin five miles before San Jaime on the Pacific - strangely this fish took a red feather.

Daniel Ryan and Edward de Li Pena, both from Amenia, New York, were pleased with their second Cabo San Lucas fishing day out (they drew a blank the first day) aboard "Andrea", releasing both a striped marlin and a sailfish, boating two dorados and releasing eleven skipjacks.

Basically when Cabo San Lucas fishing boats did well, it was usually with a billfish and a couple of smaller game fish, which is really what we expect in September a variety of fish being caught on the same day.

Pisces anglers caught a total of 34 billfish all released, consisting of 24 sailfish, 9 striped marlin and 1 blue marlin.

OTHER SPECIES: One of the "smaller" game species, caught this week, was actually larger than many of the "big" game fish taken.

David Sims from Katy, Texas was fishing aboard "Catch n Carey" with Captain Cain when they hooked a monster yellowfin just one and a half miles from Cabo San Lucas by Los Arcos. The tuna took a blue and pink lure intended for marlin and took a fair while to muscle up to the boat, where it was landed and weighed at 256 lbs. This crew also landed another six fish starting at 20 - 50 lbs.

This was encouraging news, but still only eighteen percent of boats caught tuna, with most of the catches coming towards the close of this report. "Tracy Ann" had five in the 30-45 lb class, this same day, as well as releasing a striped marlin for Keith Marraccinni from Chicago.

Cabo San Lucas Dorado catches were more frequent, resulting in a thirty percent catch rate - with catches of one or two fish per boat, found over a widespread area whilst trolling. Weights were from 20 to 55 lbs.

Just a couple of wahoo all week, smallish at 30-50 lbs. Inshore still some decent roosters around as well as lots of skipjack.

WEATHER CONDITIONS: Some heavy downpours of rain, over the weekend, however Cabo San Lucas fishing boats went out every day. The port was closed for a short while on Friday afternoon, even though the boats had gone out fishing in the morning. Skies partly cloudy, Cabo San Lucas seas now calm.

LOCATION: 95 spot on the Cortez side, then switching mostly to the Pacifica, around Land's End, 7- 20 miles off of the Old Lighthouse, back to Chileno/Cabo Real 10-12 miles out, also still at Lighthouse and Land's End.

AVERAGE WATER TEMP: 86 F

BEST LURES: Live bait, pinks, red/black, feathers, guacamaya.