Originally Published the Week of Oct. 10, 2020 in Western Outdoor Publications.
I was chatting online with long-time outdoor writer and fellow life-long Baja rat, Bill Karr, a few days ago.
Long story short…Bill was lamenting the generally poor fishing this year up and down the Sea of Cortez compared to other years. He reminisced about the “good old days” when schools of gamefish freely and plentifully migrated up and down the sea lanes.
I remember those as well.
Bill commented that it HAD to be the commercial guys tearing up the schools again. The big mother-ships from the Mexican mainland were devastating the sportfishing everywhere.
Blaming the commercial guys.
I have plenty of bones to pick with them. No love lost on them from my perspective.
And, indeed the Mexican commercial fishers are a common scapegoat for poor showings of fish. They are easy to pick on and you’ll rarely get anyone arguing with you.
It’s one of those few things in this world that it seems everyone can point to and blame and say, “Yup…it’s THOSE rat bastard commercial guys!”
The universal boogie-men.
Bill wanted to know why no one was writing or reporting any stories about this and indirectly, how come I hadn’t addressed it.
My honest answer to him was that I could only speak specifically about our area around La Paz. That’s where we live. That’s where we have our business and our sportfishing fleet.
Understandably, that’s where our attention is focused.
About the other areas, I could only speak in generalities.
What I posed to him was that this probably wasn’t the best year to gauge the fishing…anywhere!
On every level, this is a weird year. I don’t think any further elaboration is needed. Few would argue that 2020 is anything but “NORMAL.”
In that regard, you can’t really be accurate about fishing this year. Throw out all supposition. Put an asterisk next to fishing in 2020.
It’s like college football…major league baseball…or the NBA. Nothing is normal.
The first 6 or 7 months of the year, there wasn’t much fishing going on. Most operations (even the commercial guys) were shut down and prohibited from fishing because of Covid-19 restrictions.
Even after some of the restrictions were lifted, tourism, and ergo fishing activities, were curtailed by uber-amounts of cancelations. When only 10% of the fleet is going out fishing on a given day, it’s hard to put a barometer on the fishing.
I use our own Tailhunter Fleet in La Paz as an example.
In a normal year, I’ve got a lot more pangas out on the water. So do the other outfitters.
We’re fanned out all over the ocean.
We all fish. All day. Every day. Our area gets scouted pretty well.
If the tuna are biting to the north, we know about it because someone found the schools. If the dorado or wahoo are on the chew, we know that as well.
If the fish move, we can figure that out. Or someone finds them.
We share common knowledge.
Even if we’re from competing outfitters, all the captains are friends and related family members. Information is shared between good-natured competitors.
It’s tough to keep secrets. Even though it’s a big big ocean.
When there’s only a fraction of boats on the water, it’s a sportfishing crapshoot.
Anglers could complain that the tuna just didn’t bite or they couldn’t find the dorado or marlin.
But, that comes from a pool of limited knowledge.
The tuna schools COULD be just a mile away, but no one is out there fishing on that given day or that particular week. The dorado COULD be under a floating current line just on the other side of that beach…but no one is checking that out.
A single fishing boat can only do so much. A single fishing boat can only cover a certain-amount of area. There’s alot of water to cover!
The fish could be here, but we would never know about it. Simple math… there’s not enough numbers of boats and fishermen out there fanning out all over the ocean.
So…just throw out all conceptions about fishing this year.
Straight up? I honestly do NOT know how the fishing is.
Bottom line is that fishing is fishing. This year, it is what it is.
Come fish! And tell us what you catch and where you caught it…if you don’t mind sharing. It’s still Baja. It’s still fishing!
That’s my story!
Jonathan
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Jonathan Roldan has been writing the Baja Column in Western Outdoor News since 2004. Along with his wife and fishing buddy, Jilly, they own and run the Tailhunter International Fishing Fleet in La Paz, Baja, Mexico www.tailhunter.com.
They also run their Tailhunter Restaurant Bar on the famous La Paz malecon waterfront. If you’d like to contact him directly, his e-mail is: jonathan@tailhunter.com
Or drop by the restaurant to say hi. It’s right on the La Paz waterfront!
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Jonathan Roldan’s
Tailhunter International
Website:
www.tailhunter-international.com
Mexico Office: Tailhunter International, 755 Paseo Obregon, La Paz, Baja Sur, Mexico
U.S. Mailing Address: Tailhunter International, 8030 La Mesa Blvd. #178, La Mesa CA 91942
Phones:
from USA : 626-638-3383
from Mexico: 044-612-14-17863
.
Tailhunter Weekly Fishing Report: http://fishreport.jonathanroldan.com/
Tailhunter YouTube Video Channel:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBLvdHL_p4-OAu3HfiVzW0g
“When your life finally flashes before your eyes, you will have only moments to regret all the things in life you never had the courage to try.”
That's My Story 
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