Costa Rica Fishing Reports

David and Kim from Holland joined us today and though i had forwarned David that the billfishing had been very slow, he stuck to his guns and wouldn’t be persuaded to fish for wahoo, tuna and dorado though that bite was hot. He was determined to catch his first billfish, so i decided to make a long run to find some schools of bonito and do some lilvebait fishing.

We found good bait and right away had plenty and with 5 live bonitos behind the boat we crept around for all of about ten minutes before we hooked up a beauty of a blue marlin that was in the 425 pound class…on a TLD 15!!! Needless to say, we were outmatched on the light tackle, but thanks to some crackerjack boat handling and a cooperative fish, we had the beast leadered 3 hours and 7 miles later.

A short run back to the bait and we were almost immediately rewarded with a double hookup of sailfish. We ended up pulling the hook on one and released the other sailfish. The rods went back in and were quickly hammered by a pair of big jacks, of which one got off and the other was released. Bait was getting tougher to catch and we missed a couple more bites before calling this one a day and heading home with a very, very happy fisherman.

Offshore for a half day with a couple gals from California and the target was wahoo. The day started with a double of dink hoo’s just as soon as we got the lures in the water, but they must have been the only ones around because after that everything was 40 pounds or better. The girls held tough as fish up to 60 pounds screamed drag and managed to get 7 fish to the boat including 2 doubles, throw in a small yellowfin tuna and these girls were in sushi heaven tonight.

The wahoo have moved in with some heavy fish around and we were out to get a few this weekend with good buddy and many time repeat client, Jack and a friend of his who was out for the first time with the Kinembe II.

The bite, while not on fire, was good enough to put 6 nice wahoo in the boat with the larger fish around 50+ pounds. On top of the six that we managed to boat, there were 3 more pulled hooks, one broken line, 3 lures stolen and 2 cut leaders when using live bait…overall enough action to keep us happy plus 1 yellowfin tuna into the cooler.

Ran offshore this full moon morning thinking about how often the moon throws tough sailfishing at us but also thinking about how many marlin I catch on the full moon. Once we started fishing, we were hooked up almost immidiately and released Nicks first sailfish.

The next bite came almost right away but was a much bigger fish…a 500 pound blue marlin which Linda and Katherine took turns battling for over 2 hours before i leadered the beast.

A few missed hits and we were quickly into a tripple on sailfish and while one came unbuttoned, we released the other two to finish off the day with 3 sails and a big blue.

We still can’t complain about the fishing this year, even though there has been a few dull days, the overall action has been a big improvement over last year. Sailfish numbers have been excelent with boats releasing double digits frequently and a sporatic dorado or tuna thrown in.

Inshore has been slow for a few days due to a big swell, but should pick up over the next week. Lots of bait have the fish in good numbers and the snook spawn coming up next month should produce some heavy snook.

Took the Costa del Mar guys offshore today for a rod bending session. The sailfish bite was hot and though we only managed to release 9 sails, we had a ton of fun with nonstop action. We spent a little time bottom fishing, but were only rewarded with a couple of missed bites and we quickly got back to the sailfishing and even put a nice dorado in the cooler for dinner.

Offshore bite was decent today, nothing special, but decent. We ran about 20 miles and put out the baits and were almost imediately fighting our first sail. We trolled around all day and managed to hook 7 sails, but only released 4.

Another dreary day in the rainy season and we are hard pressed to put together a catch of a nice roosterfish, a large cubera and a big corvina with Lee today.

Today we were inshore with Ray and hoping for some roosterfish action. The day started slow, and stayed pretty much that way all day. We managed a couple fish including this great snapper and Ray’s first rooster fish.

Today’s half day was with a fellow from Montana who had fished for roosterfish here in Costa Rica on around 7 different occasions and was still looking to land his first. I assured him that he had found the right man this time and that he wasn’t long from boating his first roosterfish.

The first fish hit like a freight train and then once he realized he was hooked, made a tremendous run of close to 100 yards in water that was 20-40 feet deep and spotted with large submerged rocks. Wally fought this fish for over a half hour and we leadered him 3 times and twice I had my hands on the fish, but as green as he was and as big, he wrestled free both times leaving me with a face full of water each time.

The big rooster eventually made a quick run beneath the boat and with the angler in the chair and at an angular disadvantage, was able to clip the super taught line on the hull and pop himself free. This was a sad sight, to watch such a giant swim away without having landed him…this was a big fish.

We kept on working this and another area through the morning and did manage to get another three roosters in the 25-35 pound range IN the boat for photos along with a nice jack of about 25 pounds, but nothing as giant as ‘the one that got away‘.