October Fishing Report
by Todd Staley Fishing Director,
Crocodile Bay Resort
Puerto Jimenez, Costa Rica
There is a reason Crocodile Bay Resort closes every year in October. One is because we need to do some deep cleaning on the boats, bottom paint and do a tune up on the motors. The other reason is why I am writing this under an umbrella. October is our rainiest month.
Just before the rain started, Crocodile Bay used their open schedule to invite a group of 14 kids from the local high school out to explore the gulf on two Strike Yachts. The kids got a chance to see pods of dolphins and three humpback whales! (see the full photo series on our Facebook page) The young crew returned to the Crocodile Bay pier with smiles on their faces and a new perspective on ocean life.
By the first of November we are starting to move into the dry season and the days are sunny and if the rain falls, it is usually at night. Dorado move in offshore and hungry marlin who love to slurp down dorado and football sized tuna also move in.
Dorado Photos by Capt. Alan Smith
Dorado Photos by Capt. Alan Smith
Dorado Photos by Capt. Alan Smith
Crocodile Bay July Fishing Report
by Todd Staley
Inshore has been the ticket to the action, while offshore it’s been a hunting game. Lots of roosterfish, jacks, mackerel, and snapper have been biting along the beach and over the reefs, while offshore the game is patience. There are some marlin around but finding them is not always easy.
Otto Guevara (pictured above) and daughter show off a nice roosterfish during a family fishing trip in July to Crocodile Bay Resort. Otto was a presidential candidate in Costa Rica's 2010 elections.
This time of year we don’t have as many eyes on the water because most of our guests like to escape the cold and we are much busier then. There is plenty of football size yellowfin tuna, the mainstay of a marlin’s diet around and also the best eating size, so the number of marlin are steady increasing.
Some decent size amberjack have been fooled by those willing to put in the work that deep jigging requires and a few silk snapper have also come up from those depths.
The big news around here is the locals may have accidentally stumbled on a tarpon hatchery.
The scientific name of tarpon is Megalops Atlanticus. As the name implies they are an Atlantic species, not indigenous to Pacific waters. The Caribbean side of Costa Rica is world famous for its tarpon fishery.
The first time I encountered a tarpon in Pacific waters was in 1995, fishing in the Golfo Dulce. I was fishing up near Rio Esquinas when I saw one roll on the surface near the boat. Then another and then another. I thought I was going crazy. I asked some of the locals and they suggested I may have seen a school of milkfish. Milkfish look strikingly similar to a tarpon, in fact the Spanish term for milkfish is sabalo falso or false tarpon. They average around 40 inches and the fish I saw were much bigger.
About six years ago one of my captains brought a fish that weighed 37 lbs into the dock that caused quite a stir. He had never seen one before and said it jumped like crazy when the customer hooked it. I took one look at it and laughed. I thought to myself, a decade ago I wasn’t really crazy after all. My theory was that that tarpon had passed through the Panama Canal and somehow made their way up into the Pacific side of Costa Rica.
The Panama Canal almost didn’t get built. There was a big controversy as whether sea snakes from the Pacific would be able to pass through the canal and set up residence in Caribbean waters. A study finally showed they couldn’t make the passage through the canal because they do not enter freshwater and the canal was constructed. The same doesn’t hold true for varies types of fish. Snapper, snook, certain types of jacks and tarpon enter freshwater at will. Tarpon often travel from the Caribbean Sea all the way up the Rio San Juan and make camp in Lake Nicaragua.
Over the last few years my customers hook a few tarpon every year and have caught them over 125 lbs. My captains now know to release them if the angler is lucky enough to keep a hook in them long enough to get them boatside. It wasn’t until recently when locals starting catching small tarpon that I thought that there is no way these little guys are swimming all the way up here from the Canal Zone. They must be breeding in the Pacific as well.
I contacted Didiher Chacon, a marine biologist and President of Wider Caribbean Sea Turtle Network (Widecast) in Costa Rica. Chacon did an extensive study on tarpon on the Caribbean side of the Costa Rica twenty years ago.
There are very few baby tarpon in the most popular fishing areas of the Caribbean side. The habitat is not available for juveniles. Down near the Panama border in the wetland estuaries he did find tarpon as small as two inches. He said the Pejeperro Lagoon is suitable habitat for juvenile tarpon. Tarpon larvae make their way from the ocean in to the mangrove estuary where they develop.
“The chance that someone carried those tarpon across the country and placed them in the lagoon is very slim.” He explained. “It is quite possible tarpon on breeding in the Pacific but it would take genetic sampling to be absolutely sure where they originated.” He went on to say the fish could be originally from the Costa Rica, Panama, or even the Venezuelan populations.
Wherever they’re from, it is exciting news.
Crocodile Bay's famous Maria Soto and friends went 7 of 9 on Yellowfin Tuna and lost a close one to the sharp teeth of a wahoo. So, the next time Maria is a little slow with your Sushi order the reason could be that she's still on the boat CATCHING IT! Never underestimate our staff. Here are some photos from Maria's trip!
Will Briegel, Thomas Fees, Daniel Soto and First Mate Anthony Lee Santos bringing in a nice haul of Yellowfin Tuna Tuesday July 26th, 2011.
Todd Staley
Fishing Director
Crocodile Bay Resort
Puerto Jimenez, Costa Rica
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Inshore fishing as of late has been good with roosterfish along the beach cooperating very well. Dorado made a show this week and several were taken during the tournament but not counting as points. Yesterday 88 year old Richard Schrader fulfilled a lifelong dream and took his first sailfish on a fly. What’s left I asked him as he got on the boat this morning. His reply was said matter of factly, “Do it again.”
Todd Staley
Fishing Director
Crocodile Bay Resort, Costa Rica
Two days before the devastating quake in Japan, I went to the pier expecting another day like the previous, which was 12 to 18 fish in the teasers per boat. Boat after boat arrived at the pier and nothing, zip, nada. The fish were gone. I always thought that the words in Robert Redford’s line in the move “Havana” based on the studies of Edward Lorenz over fifty years ago were quite prolific. “A butterfly can flutter its wings over a flower in China and cause a hurricane in the Caribbean”.
My redneck heritage makes me a lot less astute than Edward Lorenz but I have made some of my own observations in my two decades here. When I ran Archie Fields Rio Colorado Lodge twenty years ago we had a small zoo before having animals in pens was considered not politically correct. My favorite was a 400 pound tapir named Baby Doll that was as tame as could be and use to visit guests in the bar every night. Anyway, all the animals would start acting really freaky before an earthquake, long before the ground began to shake. My theory is fish can do the same.
Mike Pizzi shows off a 66lb amberjack at Crocodile Bay
The tsunami that that traveled half way around the globe had severe effects in the United States, Mexico, and here in Costa Rica. There was a big fish kill in California. In Mexico mackerel and sardines huddled together next to the beach that from the air looked like an oil slick. The wave that hit Costa Rica cut a famous landmark you see from the air on the flight to the Crocodile Bay in half. The “whale tail” was a peninsula just up the coast named after its shape. And the billfish disappeared for a solid week.
