EAST CAPE FISHING IS VARIABLE IN SHIFTING WATER TEMPERATURES THIS WEEK

June 26, 2005, Russ Fritz, La Ribera, East Cape, Mexico fishing:

This week the fishing at East Cape was fantastic, until yesterday when the bite shut down.

On Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, the marlin were thick close to shore, from the lighthouse to Rancho Leonero, and all around Punta Pescadero.

On Thursday, my son Dan Fritz got a nice birthday marlin of about 140-150 pounds, which he released, and 3 more "run-outs" that didn't stick.

Water temperatures in the East Cape fishing area have fluctuated in front of La Ribera all week. It's on a warming trend now, but still only 76 degrees near shore yesterday. Odd that it was 84 by Punta Colorado, only 3 miles to the south.

Air temperatures have finally broken into the 90's and we now know it is really summer. Winds of 10 to 15 m.p.h. came out of the east four days in a row at the beginning of this week, making for lots of chop at midday, and some bumpy rides home in the afternoon.

A local fisherman, Leonardo, caught a 12-foot thresher shark yesterday while bottom fishing off Punta Colorada, and Juan Castro of Cabo Pulmo told me last evening that he has been seeing "mucho tiburones" while commercial fishing. This information, coupled with multiple recent sightings of young mako sharks jumping, makes me think that the shark population here is on the rise. A recently placed string of nine shark buoys off Punta Colorada, lends some credence to my suspicions.