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Rooster fishing in Loreto
My introduction to Roosterfishing happened during my 2010 Loreto trip when there were very few Dorado and billfish, and also a scarcity of sardines. My guide at the time was the late Jose Lino, and he suggested we try going after Roosterfish with bait. That was a good business decision on his part because we were frustrated and wanted to go home, but I was skeptical at first.
He suggested we get some ‘big eye” which are local bait fish about 8-10 inches long and very hardy, so after getting the bait, we fixed our fly rods up with a straight leader and a big bait hook connected to the skull and proceeded to troll these outfits around all the shores and land points on the islands. We started catching these fish right off the bat. They would grab the bait hard then run with it, and as soon as they went maybe 30 feet you would set the hook as hard as you dared. Man, did they pull a lot of string and run maybe a couple hundred yards and drag you way out to sea! Well, the big ones did, anyway. The small ones won’t take you as far but they still put up a good fight.
We were there long enough to figure out where the Roosters hung out and what they liked in terms of bait presentation and direction. I was surprised at how much fun it was catching these big brutes and started thinking about ways to entice them by casting flies.
In the following years we had good success with Dorado and billfish and mostly forgot about the Roosters, but not entirely. Loreto in 2016 was a very lean year with no Dorado, no Sailfish and very little bait. We went four or five days with no action no matter what we tried, then I remembered a place about an hour and a half away that had tons of small Roosters, a “honey hole” if you will. Our guide was happy to oblige and we made plans to venture out the next morning.
We set out early as planned and revisited one of our Rooster hot spots and tried out some casting setups. We used 9-wt. rods strung up and rigged with a twisted leader for the first two sections, tied in a small swivel, then tied in a 30-inch piece of fluorocarbon tippet in 20-pound test. We used 3-inch airheads, mine in tan and white and my boat partner used olive and white. Our guide began by throwing a few sardines out in front of the boat while we were cruising along, and the fish would come up and eat them a small distance behind the boat, then we would cast to the places we saw them jump. That system was OK, but we discovered a better way. After the sardine toss we would blind cast maybe 60 feet out, tuck our reels under our arms and strip in. We would feel a lot of grabs where they actually stopped the fly, sometimes 5-6 grabs per cast, and sometimes they just clobbered it. It’s very important to note that the sardines don’t do “herky-jerkey” movements when they swim, they swim in a straight line to try and get away as fast as possible, but occasionally, one might break water and pop up right before it gets eaten, but our goal is to imitate what happens most of the time. I think the best retrieve is trying to match the speed of the sardines we spot swimming back to the boat. They don’t swim back at 100 mph, however they do go at a smooth, fast clip.
The retrieve is very important more so with the larger ones. The smaller ones are dumb and hungry. While the larger ones are also dumb and hungry, they seem to inspect the fly more closely before they close the deal, however sometimes a big one will fly out of nowhere and just demolish the fly so they can be outsmarted on occasion. I try to stay with whatever system works best most of the time and let the chips fall where they may.
Finding the big brutes involves going to areas we know are less populated and tossing out a few sardines and waiting for them to show themselves. Sometimes they show way out of casting distance, so we try to dial them in closer by tossing sardines closer to where they are hanging out. We might stop the boat and toss some out, or not toss any sardines and just blind cast if we know they are in the area and looking for free chum. Sometimes we are right and sometimes they eat the sardines and laugh at us, but not always.
One time a few years after that we were cruising along about 50 feet or so offshore while our guide was throwing out a few sardines. We were talking and looking around for big horn sheep and not really paying attention to what we were doing, when suddenly the guide started screaming at us that a giant Roosterfish was trying to eat my fly. I looked back and here was this monster fish splashing around behind my fly, and I felt the tug and set up. He was on for maybe 10 seconds when he dropped my fly, rushed over and grabbed my boat partner’s fly, and my buddy entered into a 30-minute battle after which he landed this very impressive fish that I guess didn’t feel the need to “inspect” either of our flies.
Another time on that same trip the guide noticed my buddy’s fly was leaving a wake in the water and mine wasn’t. He was using a full floating line and I had on my sink tip and I couldn’t buy a fish while my partner was out-catching me by a mile. As soon as I switched over to a floater my luck changed and it turned out to be a great day for me as well.
This last summer it was just the opposite. I was killing it with my clear tip, but my friend couldn’t get a bite until he switched over from his floater, and then he was right back in the game. Sometimes the best strategy is to be observant, flexible and equipped to change setups quickly in order to entice the fish that are in your vicinity on any given day. It’s also important to make a mental note of the places where you’ve found Roosterfish so that on the next trip, you can return to that hangout and fish with a lot more confidence. Even if we get into a good group, we try not to hit them for too long because you can move to another hole and probably get a bunch more. And, we always use barbless hooks so we don’t damage them or beat them up unnecessarily.
I’m looking forward to my next trip to Loreto this summer because Roosterfishing has been the most consistent over the last several years as the fishing landscape has changed so much in our hemisphere. The very real possibility of repeating many days of catching 70-100 fish a day can keep you occupied with some great action if the Dorado and billfish happen to be scarce at whatever time you happen to be in Loreto.
