Z Fish Report (3/6/10)

Shelby Unger

        The blue water fishing has been slow this week, with the inshore action being the best bet. The full moon period caused the normal slow down in the blue water, but with the earthquake down in Chile, it really shut down. It was way to far for us to feel the quake here, but the small tsunami which came through acted like several major shock waves to the sailfish.

        The recorded tsunami was only about 3 feet high, and did not go much higher than our normal high tide line. When the tsunami came through, I was guiding with Cheva on the panga Dos Hermanos II, and fly fisherman Steve Mara of Seattle. We were in touch with the Port Captain's office, which was in touch with the entire coast on Mexico. We didn't feel or see a thing, but we didn't get any fish either.
        The sensitive lateral lines on a sailfish can pick up a school of bait fish a half mile away. The tsunami comes in by a series of shock waves, and it must really put a scare into the fish.
        A couple of days after the quake, Adolfo on the panga Dos Hermanos was doing so well he called me on his cell phone. He was into a very large school of jack crevalle, and they were huge. He was down at the Valentine river mouth, with the hard fighting jacks being an astonishing the 25 to 30 pound average.
  On Wed, Ken Unger of Calgary, Canada fished with Santiago on the panga Gitana. They didn't get a strike on a sailfish, but found a floating grass patch. They managed to pull a couple of smaller dorado and one nice dorado of about 30 pounds off it. Ken's 13 year old daughter, Shelby, had the honors to bring in the dinner. They had it cooked up at Lety's, which is probably the best seafood restaurant here, and very economical.
         Then, Ken and Shelby fished with Cheva and I on the panga Dos Hermanos II up on the Buena Vista Beach area. Ken was fly fishing, with Cheva throwing a surface popper or lure out 75 to 100 yards, and then handing off the caught fish to Shelby. She darned near got worn out. We did manage to raise a few roosters, and caught a jack crevalle. Plus, we found our own dorado hotel in the form of a huge patch of floating grass. We pulled 8 dorado off it. Nothing was big, but it was a fun. And, I got to take dorado home tonight for my wife Rebecca to cook up.

Ed Kunze