WINDS CALM AND YELLOWTAIL FISHING PICKS UP AT END OF THE WEEK

Jan. 30, 2005, Rick Barber, Mulege, Mexico Fishing Report:

Suffice it to say that the first half of the Mulege fishing week blew like Hell and the second half we caught fish. A lot of fish at Isla San Marcos, Punta Chivato, Santa Inez, Punta Concepción, etc., including yellowtail, cabrilla, leopard grouper, triggerfish, barracuda and sierra. Now what's wrong with that?

This week Mulege was a bit blustery at times, but the water temperature was a nice, for the yellowtails, 61-63 degrees, and the boats that did or could go out caught fish...BIG TIME!

Tom and Patti Higgenbotham did an overnight fishing trip from Mulege to Isla San Marcos on Monday and Tuesday. They caught 2 very nice yellowtail on Monday and 4 more on Tuesday. The largest yellowtail weighed in at 42 lbs.! Nice catch, Tom!

Tom Leach and John Haberman, from Mulege, also went fishing at Isla San Marcos. On Monday, they pulled a 32-pound yellowtail from 180-200 feet of water while yo-yoing. Returning on Tuesday with live bait, they hooked 4 fish but couldn't land one. Tom is looking for larger hooks. The 5/0 he's been using just aren't doing the job especially considering the large Spanish Mackerel that we've been using for bait lately.

Bait is still very plentiful at the northern end of the cliffs between San Lucas and Santa Rosalia. Look in about 160 feet of water and drop to the bottom.

Marty Robinson, also of Mulege, went fishing six days in a row. He said that he got a bit wet at times but also scored on some big-time yellowtail. On most of his trips, he fished just north of the point at Punta Chivato and trolled MirrOlures. They saw some fish working bait at the surface on Wednesday but it was too rough to chase them. Thursday had better conditions and they pulled 7 yellowtail from the water, all in the 30-pound class with the largest weighing in at 36 pounds. Marty said that they had to do a lot of running. He figures that the yellowtail were chasing a smaller bunch of bait and it didn't take them long to scatter all over creation. After bunching back up, the yellowtail hit again at a different location. The chase is on!

The commercial guys are scoring yellowtail at Isla San Marcos, Punta Chivato and Punta Concepción as well. Boat loads of 25-35 fish a night are being brought in and they're all nice fish in the 25-40 pound range. For those of you who like triggerfish, and I'm one, my father-in-law regularly hauls in a load of triggers that fillet out to 10-15 kilos of fish. One day he got 26 kilos of fillets! Triggerfish, IMHO, make the best fish tacos and 26 kilos will make a lot of tacos folks!

Saturday turned out to be a fair day to go fishing at Mulege and a few of the locals tried their luck at pinto bass, and 240 feet of water off "the Mine" yielded a nice bunch for Don Kemp. Most of the bass are smaller, but they make nice eating and you get more practice honing, pardon the pun, your skills with a fillet knife, right?

That's about it for this week for Mulege fishing. The Mulege weather outlook for next week is dismal with swells in the 5-8 foot range predicted until Thursday. Not fun! See you on the water when it calms down.

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