Old Posts vs. New Posts and Conditions

[Tony Buzolich]

This last post caught my eye but then I realized it was almost ten years old. I used to go to Loreto regularly with the guys from Fly Fishing Specialties when Stan Helickson still owed it. Good ol' days and lots of dorado and sardinas.

Now, seeing this old post from Pam Bolles got me thinking about the recent posts from Carl Blackledge and his trips there this year. Carl had said some of the same things that Pam said a long time ago about lack of dorado and the abundance of roosterfish.

Nothing wrong with roosterfish, they're great fun too. But I think most folks that head to Baja are looking to catch a few dorado as well as what ever else is around when they are there.

But, that's fishing. Sometimes they're there and sometimes they're not. But if you're going, you do your research ahead of time and plan accordingly. Recent posts are always helpful for that. What about the weather and time of year? What about seasonal migrations? You go with certain expectations and still hope for the best, which is not always a guarantee.

I'd still like to go back to Loreto, even if the sardinas are gone for this season.
Tony

[Carl Blackledge]

Tony,

The lack of Sardines isn't a problem at all, You have to troll a big 12 inch fly like my "Chicken fly", And of course you have to know where to troll to increase your odds, there might be 200 Dorado around perhaps 20 feet deep and you won't even know they are there till one of the pack comes over and eats the fly and as you pull that one in, of course there are lots of his buddies with him trying to steal his food (think french fries and sea gulls) You hand off the trolling rod to the guide and grab your 12 wt with a full floater on it and start casting away, Now here you are 15 miles away from everybody and about 200 hungry Dorado at your feet, While your trolling your watching the birds, looking for Sargasso and keeping a keen lookout for bill fish. That has been the plan for the last 25 years,. Now when it's really slow we troll around for a few hours and get tired of trolling with no action I tell the guide OK I had enough of this trolling lets go get the roosters and have some fun. We know where the big roosters live and where the smaller ones are, it would depend where we are when we switch over to hunt for roosters which ones we go after.

Remember the cost of Loreto fishing is the cheapest of just about anything you can do now a days. The guides in Loreto charge on average about $250 per day for two people per day and for my brand new place I stay 300 feet from the harbor the owner charges me $40.00 per day each. Another cool thing is that most of the restaurants (the good ones) are all within a few blocks of our new house.

The airlines both Alaska and AA service Loreto from many parts of the country. On average plane fare from the Bay area is about $300 each way. Now you know what I know.

Carl Blackledge

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

Thanks Carl.

Carl will help you get connected so you can have a good trip down there.

The only thing Carl gets out of it is making more friends and selling a lot of his excellent flies.


Carl has gone down there for 6 weeks, every year, for many decades.


Baja is still one of the best deals in saltwater fly fishing.

[Carl Blackledge]

Bill,

Another great advantage I have is experimenting with many new flies and different set ups and lots of different striping speeds, also different sizes of flies. I took the air head bass fly and tweaked it many different ways and it developed into the best Rooster fly in Baja, bar none, I might post pictures of my giant air head fly (7-8 inches) that worked great last year for the giant roosters. Perhaps go back and look at some of my pictures and see that fly in lots of roosters mouth- LOL

I just posted my big 10/0 fly and a 2/0 fly...absolute killers...if interested email me

Carl Blackledge