Baja's East Cape marlin are plentiful but stubborn, and also finicky

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/outposts/2009/05/bajas-east-...

May 11, 2009

Every now and then, an angler will hook into a fish that seems possessed. My brother Scott can attest to this: The striped marlin he baited, during a trip last week to Baja California Sur's East Cape region, rendered his left arm useless during a fight that lasted more than an hour.

In fact, he passed the marlin off to me and I tried for 20 minutes to get the beast to leader, then passed the rod to another angler in our group, whose relentless teasing ceased when he, too, failed to gain headway.

When a fourth angler finally got the striper to leader -- to our credit, the gear on our boat was not up for the task -- our deckhand estimated its weight at 210 pounds, and said that for some reason the marlin have been especially strong this early season.

They're also incredibly abundant; on one day alone we spotted more than 30 leaping marlin. But they're also line-shy, perhaps because there's so much natural prey in the southern Sea of Cortez.

So a typical offshore agenda is to try to bait sunning or leaping marlin, while searching for floating objects, which attract dorado, or mahi-mahi. If you're first to discover a floating object, chances are you'll have discovered a dorado bonanza.

Our pot of gold, two days after we caught and released the stubborn marlin, was a remote shark buoy, 20 miles beyond Hotel Palmas de Cortez. I got two small dorado. Don Ashley, an angler on our boat, caught one of similar size, while my brother landed the alpha bull: a specimen weighing at least 35 pounds (pictured below).

But the bite shut down quickly and our renewed search led us to a floating sea lion carcass, and at least 12 other boats. Dorado, with their neon blue-and-golden hues, darted and leaped about. But so much boat pressure made them line-shy. We could not pluck a single fish from this area so we headed back to shore with our four meager fish, which became the night's dinner.

Moral of this story: Don't believe any reports that claim fishing is wide open; that's rarely the case. Even though the East Cape boasts some of the finest sportfishing opportunities in the world, you generally have to work hard for your fish. This is especially true now, as the prime season gets underway. Good luck to anyone planning a visit.

-- Pete Thomas

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