LORETO DORADO--Josh Schwartz' group fished two days out of Loreto with Arturo's Sportfishing and caught plenty of pargo, grouper, and cabrilla, plus three dorado of 18, 20, and 35 pounds. Photo courtesy Josh Schwartz.

FISHING WITH ARTURO'S FLEET'S CAPT. RAMON

July 15, 2005, Josh Schwartz, Loreto, Mexico Fishing Trip Report:

I fished at Loreto this past week with my wife Melissa, and friends Jeff Grande and Courtney Stolis. We fished out of Arturo's with Capt. Ramon. We fished on Tuesday about 30 miles straight out of Loreto.

The fishing started slow. However a couple hours before it was time to head in, we had 2 double live bait jig strikes of Dorado and one single. We lost one during the fight and one at the gaff. The leader was in hand though, so it was more of a unintentional release. We boated 3 good size, 20, 35, and 18 pound dorado.

We saw 3 large marlin, which appeared to be blacks, although we couldn't get them interested in feeding.

The next day was more of a relaxing day on the leeward side of Isla Carmen. We caught all the Pargo, Cabrilla, and grouper we could handle.

Our total catch for the two days were 4 Dorado, kept 3, 6 pargo, 6 grouper, and 5 cabrilla.

One Loreto fishing boat brought in 3 nice 30-35 pound yellowfin. A couple others landed one per boat, and one boat had one 45+ pound giant roosterfish and a couple other 35+.

The rest of the boats were catching 2 to 3 sailfish per day and maybe a marlin mixed in.

A few Loreto fishing boats besides us landed a dorado, but I didn't see or hear of anyone getting more than one other than us.

The weather was unusually mild, with air in the low 90's with high humidity. The water was also cool for this time of year at high 70's to 80 degrees, with maybe a few warmer patches. The seas outside of the islands were rough for the Sea of Cortez. The strong breeze never really let up except for a little in the late evening, but the constant breeze made for choppy seas, not really windy, just annoyingly breezy. Made it tough to spot finning or feeding fish. As always, everyone was friendly and helpful. We fished Tuesday and Wednesday. Overall the consensus is a very, very, very, slow start to the summer fishing.

(See "Mexico Fishing News" online for current fishing reports, photos, weather, and water temperatures from Loreto and other major Mexican sportfishing areas. Vacation travel articles, fishing maps and seasonal calendars, and fishing related information for Loreto may be found at Mexfish.com's main Loreto page.