chokoloskee Fishing Report 2024

Mike Pritchard called in to wrap of the fishing day for the Tribute. "All-in-all a pretty good fishing day. We started off with Bluefin. We ended up catching 21 Bluefin and went on to fish some kelps later in the day. On the kelps we caught 54 Yellowtail, 4 Dorado and 5 Skipjack. The weather has been very nice. We just finished up our day around 5:00 o'clock.

"We'll be out on another 1.5 Day trip tonight. There is still room on Sunday night's 1.5 trip, just give Seaforth Sportfishing a call at 619-224-3383.

Mike Pritchard called in to wrap up results of the Tribute's 1 Day Charter. "Good fishing here today. We had very, very good Yellowtail fishing. We caught 131 Yellowtail, 14 Dorado, and 16 of that nice grade Yellowfin, from 18 to 30 lbs. We'll be out here on another 1 Day trip tonight. We'll let you know what happens tomorrow."

Skipper Drew Henderson docked the Polaris Supreme June 17 after a five-day trip to the mid-Baja islands, on the Pacific side, of course.

"It was windy until the day we came home," he remarked. His 18 anglers managed a good catch of yellowtail and rockfish, however.

George Farnsworth of Kenwood won first place for a 27.6-pound yellowtail. He said it bit on a sardine pin ned to a 3/0 Gamakatsu hook. He used 30-pound Yo-Zuri line on a Saltiga 30 reel and a Calstar 870 M rod to beat the fish in 12 minutes.

"We had a great crew," he stated. "And that made a great trip."

Regular long ranger Joe Beck of San Pedro won second place, for a 27-pound yellow. Michael Robbins of Santa Cruz, one of three generations of family members on the trip, won third place, for a 25.4-pound yellowtail.

9 Bluefin, 6 Yellowtail, 1 Yellowfin and 1 Yellowtail for our 14 Angler’s today. Not too shabby, we go again tonight with a light load.

Very similar to last week with the exception of a big yellowtail day. The potential for a big yellowtail score is definitely out there but several things must come together. On Friday I thought we were going to get our shot. We stopped at a spot and instantly had 8 yellowtail hooked and we were seeing a big school around us. While we were fighting our first 8 fish the motherlode of big bull seal ions came in to ruin our fun. When the dust settled we had only landed 3 and the big school was scared away by the cute cuddly seal ions. Water conditions are about as nice as they could be with temperatures ranging from 67-70 degrees and very clean. The calico bass fishing has been good on the days we get anchovies and the barracuda continue to bite very well at times. All and all we had a very enjoyable week catching surface fish in very nice weather. Hot and sunny in flat calm seas catching gamefish describes our current conditions perfectly. Tackle to bring out remains the same. A 15 or 20 lb. rod to fish anchovies a 25 or 30 lb. rod to fish sardines a 40 lb. jig stick and an assortment of hooks (2's and 2/0's) and small egg or rubber core sinkers (1/8-1/2 oz.) will have you covered.

See you on the water!

Capt. Ryan

We had excellent fishing on the smaller grade yellowtail. We only kept 49 of the bigger ones and the rest were released. We looked for wahoo but they weren't around. But we weren't done. We got into a fantastic bite with marlin. We released them all but it sure was fun. We had carne asada for lunch and and a good old fashion roasted turkey with all the trimmings for dinner. The weather is kinda choppy but we are going south and our ride is good. When all was said and done we had a fun day of fishing but didn't keep much.

We didn't have to go too far to get some good action on the albacore. Everyone hooked and landed some. Weather is good. We will head into blue fin territory tomorrow. Thanks for checking in.

~~Sep. 16
 Yesterday morning I was looking at the positions and forecasts of positions and conditions of hurricane Odile and it sure looked to me like we'd be able to go around it that night.  So after consulting with Tommy, he did some research and he agreed.  And by dark yesterday I was 95 percent sure we could do it.  Not enough.  We need 100 percent out here.  So we headed straight west most of the night until I got an update on the storm at 2:00 am which made me 100 percent sure we could easily make it around the storm.  So we hung a left and we've been traveling all day heading for Alijos Rocks.  We had some choppy weather this morning but we couldn't tell by our ride because we were going with it.  Down swell = a good ride.  The weather is nice now that I write this and we're expecting the same the next few days at least.

 We usually expect a couple travel days on an 8 day trip and today was one of ours.  We did try really hard though to find a nice big dorado kelp but we were unsuccessful.  The only kelps we found weren't big enough to hold a school of mahi.  So we'll have to do it tomorrow or the next day.  Or the next, OK.  We'll be concentrating on wahoo first thing tomorrow. We'll be saying our wahoo prayers tonight.  I'll check back later.