That's My Story

PHOTO 1: I guess you could say that Norm Clayton from Escondido CA had a pretty good day. He was with his wife Noni and Captain Eddy Carballo. It’s a pretty good day anytime you get a wahoo, one of the most sought-after fish in our waters. Well, Norm got his 60 pounder. What a slug of a fish! Well, he turned right around and gave the whole thing to his captain. He didn’t want it! Why? Well, Norm didn’t get ONE wahoo. HE GOT SIX WAHOO in what has to be one of the most epic wahoo days ever down here! In fact, it was so good, he gave 3 fish to his captain. He didn’t have any more room! The day before he slammed tuna and dorado and now had to figure out what to do with SIX WAHOO from 40 to 60 pounds! Oh…it was also his birthday!!! Some guys have all the luck!

WHAT FULL MOON? WAHOO EXPLODE OFF NORTH CERRALVO IN BEST BITE OF SEASON. TUNA TEAR UP THE BEACHES AT LAS ARENAS IN A BLOODY WEEK OF FISHING PANDEMONIUM!

La Paz / Las Arenas Fishing Report for September 30, 2007

PHOTO 2: Just another day of dorado fishing! While tuna and wahool hogged the spotlight this week, there was no shortage of dorado no matter where you fished. Larger bulls up to 40 or more pounds finally started to show up but limits or near limits of the mahi were available as long as the other species didn’t “distract” you. Overall, the dorado have been much smaller this year perhaps due to the water temps being off, but anyone who wanted dorado got dorado.

PHOTO 3: Here’s a nice mix of fish! Scott O’Connor and Glenn Delmendo, both police officers from the Los Angeles area show off a great day of fishing with tuna, dorado and a sailfish that really added some adventure to the day. After fighting the fish on light tackle, they got it near the boat. Attempting to gaff the fish forwarad, the fish turned and instead the gaff stuff in the tail. The fish went ballistic again and took off with the reel screaming; the fish dancing across the water and the wooden gaff still stuck in the body! It almost pulled Glenn overboard when it took off again.

PHOTO 4: It’s not all surface fish right now! Some of the best fishing is inshore for cabrilla and pargo. Mike Recchia holds up a nice pargo mullato (barred pargo) he pulled out of the rocks.

PHOTO 5: Mike La Torre and Mike Recchia hold up some nice dorado from fishing north of town. Dorado continued to be the main target for our boats fishing out’ve La Paz. The nice thing is that the fish seemed to have moved close, right off the S. end of Espiritu Santo Island near Bonanza Beach which was such a hot spot last year. Live bait, lures and trolled slabs of bait al worked well. Good to see some larger bulls finally showing up too!

PHOTO 6: Carrie Shilyansky was so excited about the possibility of catching her first ocean fish! She had never done anyting like this at all. On her first day she simply slammed the fish and after that…it was all over! Carrie had the “bug.” Great to see someone get “turned onto” fishing. Here she’s holding a good sized Las Arenas dorado!

PHOTO 7: That’s popular captain Jorge with his arms crossed and that’s Robert and Nick Venezia from Los Angeles smiling and struggling with yellowfin tuna just off Las Arenas beach. Their first two days were s0-so. They decided to come back for a 3rd day and third time was the charm. They tore up the fish! I rarely saw a time when at least one of them did not have a tuna hooked up. Note how close they are to the beach. The cool thing about the tuna bite at Las Arenas is how close we are to the beach! No long boat rids!

PHOTO 8: Paul Scheuring from Los Angeles is the head writer and creater of the popular TV show “Prison Break.: The show is in its third season and it is Fox’s second most successful TV show (behind “24”). Paul was down for his bachelor party and took a day out fishing. Can’t ask for me…a striped marlin and a dorado. Captain Juan Chuy looks on.

PHOTO 9: Fernando Sucre from Palo Alto strikes the pose for the camera to hold up his dorado. Dorado bite has been solid all week. The hard part is not getting discouraged if the fishing is slow. You can go all day with nothing, but then come up on the spot and one bait in the water can turn into hours of pandemonium with fish from 5-50 pounds.

THE FISHING REPORT!

A full moon and even a late week tropica storm (Julliette) couldn’t stop the bite this past week. There were a few bumps here and there. You could hit a slow spot but overall, if you just check the photos, there was some nice fish to be caught and no one who wet a line went home with an empty chest.

In some respects, the fishing this week was just short of phenomenal!

Let’s begin with the wahoo bite north of La Paz at La Reyna. Listen…we just don’t hang that many of the speedy skinnies on the La Paz side. However, about mid-week kicked off by Norm and Noni Clayton’s 6 wahoo bonanza, other boats cashed in and fish up to 70 pounds were caught. Purple rapalas were the hot rig and double hook-ups were no uncommon. But this bite was unbelievable. We simply don’t hang that many hoo’s out of La Paz. Ninety-nine out’ve 100 wahoo come from our Las Arenas fleet! However, all of a sudden north Cerralvo Island simply exploded.

If you were fishing our La Paz fleet and didn’t get a wahoo, no biggie. More and larger dorado showed up this week as well with fish between 25 and 40 pounds more evident everyday! Willing to hit the live baits, slow trolled slabs of mackerel and bright colored feathers were all effective.

The second hot spots was over at Las Arenas. Where did all these tuna come from? After several years of scratchy tuna fishing, suddenly the area between the lighhouse and Punta Perrico…literally 100 yards from shore…has become the tuna battleground!

I’m not kidding, limits or near limits of 10-25 pound tuna every single day. The fish are foaming!!! Will this last? I don’t know, but imagine pulling up on the spot literally a jig throw from the beach, dropping a bait and in seconds foaming fish and a bent rod! Some boats were getting so plugged with tuna so early, they were coming back to clean fish by 11 a.m. on the beach!!!

I fished several times this week. The first time I was out to goof with Randall Lee who brought 20 of the Catholic Big Brothers Big Sisters group with him. By 11:30, both of us had hammered so many tuna without barely moving a spot, that we told our skipper to pull over to the Giggling Marlin Restaurant in Muertos Bay. For the next 90 minutes, we “hid” and had a great lunch before driving back to where the other boats were cleaning fish no one the wiser that we had only fished a few hours.

That was topped later in the week when Tropical Storm Juliet was playing games with us. Folks…it was more than a little rough. We had to wait at Las Arenas beach for the waters to calm so we could push off the beach. Well, it was so rough that the bait guys couldn’t get enough bait. I started the day with abou t 15 pieces. Not much, you say?

Well, an hour later, 10 yellowfin tuna and still had 4 pieces left! The othe boats were also similarly plugged with limits. 25 to 40 pound outfits or even lighter is ideal for this kind of fishing. Some flurocarbon leader is a bonus, but this was as simple a a hook and a small rubbercore sinker then HOLD ON!!

Dorado would breeze through the tuna schools as well and along the beaches we still have schools of roosters and jacks!

That’s my story!

Jonathan

Jonathan Roldan’s

Tailhunter International

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