BajaNomad

The Witch Doctor

vseasport - 12-12-2011 at 07:42 PM

THE WITCH-DOCTOR
Mark Rayor owner of Jen Wren Sportfishing bringing you an East Cape NON-fish report. The wind has blown so hard this week it has not been fishable most of the week.

I'm happy to say our timing was good and we were able to use the last calm day to get Jen Wren III out of the water. It is sad but our season is over and we won't resume charter fishing until March.

I do want to share an experience we had while fishing last week along with some pretty cool photos. One of our last days out there slow trolling for marlin with skipjack for bait we were not having any luck. I decided to try putting out a Witch-Doctor teaser. It is a rather large mirrored thing that rocks back and forth while being trolled and reflects sun light. In the right conditions it looks like a strobe going off in the water behind the boat.

We were fishing with a group of about a half dozen boats on the La Ribera high spot. After a short period of time a pod of orcas cruised by. Apparently our teaser caught one of the whales eyes and the pod came a bit closer. Before we knew it the whole pod was in our pattern nudging our baits and checking us out. One whale even came up almost to our swim step and gently pushed on the Witch-Doctor. If it attracted the orcas this has to be an effective tool to attract marlin as well.

Now that we are not charter fishing and have our cruisers in dry dock for the winter I will still try to get out on calm days. I can use one of our small tenders and fish the shoreline for sierra and a little further off shore when the weather allows. I'll do my best to try and continue to post reports as to what fishing conditions are like on the East Cape.

Yesterday the seas starting to calm and it looks like we might get a break for a day or two before the wind ramps up again. Sierra fishing was good up and down the beach today for tin boaters and beach fisherman.



One day all is calm



The next day it is not



The folks at Cabo Yachts had their doubts that we would be able to pull our 35 Flybridge out over the sand.



Curious orcas. It is not every day but not unusual to sight them in the Sea of Cortez



You can tell this is the male by the larger dorsal fin. Most of the time we only see one male with a pod of females. The male always stands off while the females play. I want to come back as a male killer whale in my next life time ... top of the food chain traveling around with a harem of beautiful ladies. Sign me up!



They slowly came closer



Yes, that is a frightened skipjack we were trolling jumping out of the water



They hung around our boat for a good 15 minutes



On this day we didn't have any trouble with sea lions taking our bait or catch



Sea lion? Make my day







Finally one nudged the Witch-Doctor



As fast as they arrived they disappeared.

Mark Rayor
http://markrayor.blogspot.com
www.teamjenwren.com

Iflyfish - 12-13-2011 at 08:42 AM

Wow, how cool!! Great story and pics.

I use dto fish Marlin out of Barre de Navidad on the Pacific Coast and my buddy, who held the record Marlin for that port, used to hook up a live boletta (sp?) with an O ring behind the boat, much as you use that flasher, and he always landed more and bigger Marlin than anyone! I imagine that the flasher is even more effective.

Keep your tip up!

Iflyfish

chumlee57 - 12-13-2011 at 08:51 AM

Very cool pics, always something new to view in the cortez

TheColoradoDude - 12-13-2011 at 09:01 AM

Increible! Also your blog has to be one of the most informative and entertaining blogs in the fishing world. The articles and pictures are fantastic.

24baja - 12-13-2011 at 03:52 PM

Fantastic photos, it is amazing how each trip to the Sea of Cortes is different from the last. Thank you so very much for sharing your little bit of heaven!!

Udo - 12-14-2011 at 09:23 AM

Marvelous photos, vseasport. I'm sure you made Osprey's day with your post.