Quepos Fishing Reports
Quepos Fishing Reports New Home:
While these fishing reports will remain here, future posts of my fishing reports have moved and can now be seen at www.kinembe2.com/blog, please check them out.
August 24 2007 Quepos Fishing Report
Today inshore today with Glen started out ok with a missed hookup, a couple jacks and this really nice roosterfish, but would get a little slower as the morning went on. After working hard trying to catch another roosterfish, we changed up and went looking for snook. We found some sardines and headed for the mouth of the Savagre river for some extreme rivermouth snook fishing and hooked up a decent fish on the second cast, but after a few minutes fighting and another series of jumps, the fish came unbuttoned. We went after more sardines and this time to the mouth of Rio Naranjo but found the bite slow here as well.
We made another another move and tucked ourselves between some rocky upcroppings and found some good action with the snappers as we pulled a mangrove, a mullet and 2 rock snappers out and lost a handful of others. We tried a little while longer for the roosters, but other that a couple missed bites, we didn't do much.
Quepos Fishing Report August 10 2007
Offshore with some Texans and Mike (Moon) looking for his first billfish, preferably a marlin. The day was really sloppy with a large swell chopped up by the wind and an uncomfortable ride to the grounds was endured by all as we ran right into it.
In my mind was that even though a little uncomfortable, days like this often produce great fishing, I was hoping that was the case as we slowed to trolling speed. After putting the lures out, it was only a couple minutes before we had a dorado jumping all over the shotgun, a chain of blue squid behind a small bird and a larger squid trailing with a hook, but this feeder hit everything in the chain except the hook. About another 15 minutes and we had Moon's first sailfish jumping behind the boat and then a clean release. Next we put a Yellowfin tuna and a couple wahoo into the cooler, a few more missed hits and a wahoo strike on a planer which cut the line just above the planer costing the planer and lure that was behind it.
We stopped to drop some live bait on a few rocks and though the snapper bite was slow, we managed a nice Amberjack and missed ALOT of other bites. We also had all the jacks we wanted attacking the diamond jig that I was throwing. We got back on the troll for a little while looking for another sail, but were unsuccessful and with a 6 hour drive ahead of them the clients decided to call it a short day and get back to dock.
August 2 2007 Fishing Report
Phil and Michelle had met Jorge from a (see below) on the beach in Jaco while he was doing some fly fishing in the surf and Jorge who had fished with me the day before gave a strong enough recommendation that Phil was willing to drive from los Suenos to fish on the Kinembe II. They would not regret it.
Sometimes being the first boat to the fish results in catching more fish and Phil was up for this and was on the Quepos pier at 6:05 am ready to get started. I assured him that we'd have fish in the boat before the rest of the boats had even left dock, and we did. In fact, by the time the first of the boats that would show up after us had arrived, we had already put five nice wahoo on ice and pulled the hook on a big bull dorado.
It was time to try something else so we put out a couple live baits and caught a couple yellowtail snapper and missed some bigger fish that ate but just were not hooked and threw some jigs at the wahoo and though they followed every cast right back to the boat, they would not eat so we moved on again. We started targeting some of the floating logs and trees in a nearby current and were able to get into a few more dorado by casting live bait to them then got back on the troll for a few more wahoo, rose one sail that didn't want to eat and pulled in the lures and headed inshore for some afternoon roosterfish action.
After running back inshore, it didn't take us long before Phil had released his first rooster fish. Though the fishing was not on fire, we had a couple missed bites and released a nice jack before calling this one a day.
July 27 2007 Quepos Fishing Report
Inshore today and looking for rooster fish with Jorge and Alex. The guys showed up from los Suenos a little behind schedule, but what can you do, we won't let it be a problem. We arrive at the grounds and get our baits in and it isn't long before we were into our first fish. Then our second and after fish after fish, we found ourselves with clean releases on five roosters and 3 big jacks.
By the time we got off the roosterfish, the tide had changed and we found ourselves fighting the ocean more than fishing as we tried to get Jorge hooked up on the fly. The sky was getting a little ugly and the fishing had treated us very well earlier in the day so the anglers decided to cut this one a little short and get back on the road, they had left their wives in los Suenos to come fish aboard the Kinembe II and were more than anxious to share the stories with them.
Read the angler's posts and see photos on Florida Sportsman Forum.
Quepos Fishing Report - July 7 '07
- So a buddy of mine, an ex-captain for Crocodile Bay and then student of mine in Montana when I was training guides for Orvis, brings his boy to yours truly for the boys first Costa Rica fishing experience with the hopes of some first time catches for his son Brandon.
We ran offshore the first day in hopes of feeding the large group of Costa Rican in-laws that were traveling with Bobbert and we were not disappointed. Right off the bat we had a junior wahoo on the line for our junior angler...the boys first wahoo in the box. Then we worked our way through blasts of dogtooth tuna with multiple hook-ups until we put Brandon's first Yellow-fin Tuna in the cooler.
- Now it was time for some live bait fishing. We stopped on a small rock about 25 miles from Quepos and put out a live dogtooth and a live goggle eye. It wasn't but about two minutes into the drift and right as the machine marked the fish that I felt my goggle eye swimming for his life, then he was nailed! I let a little slack then locked up as I pulled away from the rock. My line came tight and started taking drag as Bobbert said that he was getting hit. His fish ate, but when he came tight, the line gave way. Upon checking the clean cut just above where the hook used to be told the story of the wahoo that had his way with Bobberts bait and then some. The fish on my line turned out to be a medium size amberjack that Bobbert beat within a few minutes. We worked some other rocks and eventually were able to get Brandon a manageable sized amberjack into the cooler among a handful of others with the best of the day being the one in this post.
It wasn't until the ride in when I spotted a drifting tree trunk and we could really hope for a chance of catching another addition to the dinner. We stopped well off from the tree and I rigged a small goggle eye on a light spinning rod and had ol' Bobbert get ready to cast it. We slid up to within casting distance and made the toss. The bait no sooner hit the water than was airborne again in a mad escape dash from what was below but he had to land and enter the water again and that would be it for this little guy. The dorado left a wake as he darted towards the goggle eye and then engulfed it. After a few seconds to eat, Bobbert came tight and this slob mahi came blasting through the surface and we had Brandon at the reel fighting his first dorado.
The second day was to get Brandon his first Roosterfish and that we did. We caught a few roosters before switching up and catching Brandon's first snapper and missing a few more good bites.
First charters with new Kinembe II post - HOT!!!
New Fishing Reports June 29 - July 1 2007
- Well, it's obvious that the new Kinembe II is a fish slayer. I did my first 3 charters this past weekend and the boat ran great, fished well, and caught fish.
Friday the 30th was tough inshore with the full moon on the following day, but we managed to release a couple rooster fish and a handful of jacks.
Saturday was the maiden voyage offshore and once we put the lures in, we started catching fish almost immediately, with 4 wahoo a dorado and a handful of dogtooth tuna in the cooler within the first hour or so of trolling, not to mention the ones that got away.
Then after a couple hours of trolling, I started seeing signs of a marlin around, so We caught about an eight pound dogtooth and bridled it up live on a 50 and put it out to swim. We slow trolled it around the rock where the marlin was obviously doing his hunting that morning and after about 20 minutes, we saw the first signs that he was interested when our bait started acting up.
The big marlin boiled once on our bait and missed it and then submerged to grab it again and this time he had it and we let him eat plenty before locking up on him. The line came tight and the fish was on. As live bait marlin tend to do it took him a minute to realize he had been hooked and then he came crashing through the surface and started his dance. After a series of jumps and runs and 40 minutes of stand up no fighting belt battle, we had the leader of Jack's first marlin, a grand Black of around 450 pounds and were swimming him along side of the boat...Happy 1st anniversary.
We finished up the day catching some Yellowtail Snappers and headed home early for some fresh wahoo sushi rolls
Sunday was a half day inshore and the past few days had been tough, Friday we had only released 2 roosterfish and reports from other boats on Saturday made Sunday's prediction pretty slim.
After about 15 minutes running we put out our first baits and after about 10 minutes, Laura was on to the days first rooster, and though it worked it hard, she brought it to the boat for photos and the clean release of a great rooster of about 45 pounds. We worked the area a little more without any luck and made another 10 minute run before putting some new baits in the water.
Again we were on right away this time with Ron on the rod and another released roosterfish. I think more time was spent fighting fish than actually fishing for them this morning and with 4 roosterfish over 40 pounds released by 11:00 am Ron had had enough rooster fishing and asked if we could troll for awhile, so we put out some plugs and worked some spots on the way back home with no more than a bite or two before making our way back to dock about 12:30.
What a great morning of catching Rooster Fish!! And a great first few charters on the Kinembe II - More reports soon!
May 7 2007 Quepos Fishing Report
- The first week of May this year brought with it a full moon, a red tide, repeat clientele and some tough inshore fishing.
Having fished with me before, Joe is accustomed to catching fish under any circumstances and I was determined not to let the fact of everything being against us break tradition so we loaded up early on sardines and went to pick up Joe and Chas, who were already showing the effects that a Costa Rica vacation has on ones system.
- With the tide on the high end and about to spend the next 6 hours going out, I figured the only water that would be unaffected by the red tide would be that flowing from the local river mouths and while this time of year that water has its own chocolate consistency, it also finds the mud loving snook nearby. And so would we.
While the conditions did play their part in the overall picture, they did not prevent us from putting two beautiful Snook in the cooler. We caught a snapper or two in the river mouths as well, but didn't really bent the rods hard until later in the afternoon when some trolling plugs would hardly let us get 2 rods in the water before the double and triple (if we managed a third rod) hookups started. We were unable to put a roosterfish in the boat today.
We're looking forward to seeing Joe again this winter so check back just before Christmas for the post.
April 29 2007 Quepos Fishing Report
- Late April inshore with good friend Jack and some of his family that he brought to give Costa Rica a whirl started off with a bang and a cut as the jacks and large mackerel sliced and diced each bait as soon as we put it in the water. This was some great excitement for everybody especially the newbies! We literally had fish after fish chompin' at the baits but were not able to get past the jacks and mackerel to the roosters. Bait was plentiful as were the new hooks we were burning through so we spent some extra time trying to connect with a rooster near the river mouth, but eventually had to put on steel leaders and put a few of the toothy mackerel in the cooler before leaving the area to fish some rocks.
- And boy if those scissor mouths didn't follow us just about everywhere we went cutting leaders and stealing hooks like they were going out of style, but what's up with the roosters? Oops, there they are! we had a few missed bites before finally connecting with this champ. Just minutes after boating the first rooster we had a double attack our baits but only managed to get a hook into one of them and after a fight that lasted a little longer than the first, we released another rooster not quite as big as the first, but I'm sure Warren wouldn't have had it any other way.
Jack is back to fish again in late May so check back in about a month for a follow up to this post and see what we put the hook to next.
April 21 2007 Quepos Fishing Report
- So some guys from Florida show up to do battle and let me tell you, these guys battled indeed. I'm not going to put numbers to this post as I just don't remember, but these guys not only caught big numbers of fish, they caught big numbers of types of fish. We spent one day offshore fishing some rock piles with live goggle eyes and butterfly jigs and we laid into all sorts of stuff like this nice Amberjack that worked Bob over pretty good for quite some time before he finally subdued the beast and brought it to gaff and the dinner table. A little trolling put a dorado on the table and hen back to more AJ's and snappers. I think we put 5 or 6 Amberjacks in the boat, 3 or 4 on the jigs, a couple of snappers, 2 or 3 blue jacks, the dorado and whatever else I failed to list here.
- The inshore fishing did not by any means suffer by comparison to the offshore, as we worked our way through the day with bite after bite from this and that. We even managed to put a handful of various fish in the boat. We caught snappers, roosters, jacks and grouper. Joes rooster pictured here was the largest of the trip and really displayed its bad attitude as it was screaming drag and jumping around behind the boat and putting on a show to a couple dolphin tour boats full of excited bystanders taking pictures and even videos of the whole fiasco. (if you happen to read this, I would like copies)
- Some of the trips highlights came from Bob and Joes pretty work with the jigs. Offshore they worked over snappers and amberjacks with the deadly metal, but my favorite was this broomtail that Bob yanked off of a little known rock less than a mile from shore. It was a real pleasure having these guys throw jigs around at every rock I showed them and a bigger pleasure watching them take fish after fish off of them.
- And let's get one more photo in here because you just don't see Bluefin Trevally every day and although they are such a beautiful fish, they fight like a bull and we had a great time with the ones we managed to get to the boat. We had a few other fish, I think we had some rainbow runners and maybe a needlefish or two, but don't hold me to that. The surf kept us out of the river mouths and away from looking for snook, but all in all I think a good time was had by all especially around the dinner table as these guys put fresh fish in our bellies for days to come.
March 27 2007 Quepos Fishing Report
- We were inshore with some light tackle and the day had started out ok with a few rooster and pargo bites, but we were unable to connect with any. The radio reported about the same news coming from all directions, so we decided to load up on sardines (I'll spare the baitwell photos) and headed for the Savegre River mouth to look for dinner. It wasn't long before we had the first Snook in the boat, but missed numerous bites in the swell. All said and done, we left the river with 4 Snook in the cooler, a few jumped off, one broken line and a Penn spinning outfit that had been completely spooled, ya just never know when fishing the exact location that holds the current world record for Snook!
- Lunch time found us running toward some rooster areas, but they still didn't want to cooperate, so we worked some rocky islands with some live sardines and found the action provided by snappers, small grouper, blue jacks and some other unidentified swimmers was more than on, but we still needed a couple roosters!
We worked our way back towards Quepos to hit some submerged rocks only to have the bigger roosters have their way with us, but did manage to get a couple releases before the days end.
Check back next March after the English invade Quepos' shores again for a 3 boat 6 day no holds barred inshore fish-off!
March 19 2007 Quepos Fishing Report
- Offshore started kinda slow for sails, so we made a few stops to fish a couple rocks throughout the morning. The Pargo action was hot and heavy with a mix of Red Snapper, Cubera and Mullet Snapper fighting over every bait we could get down. The bait of choice was live bonitos, and amidst the many pulled hooks and missed bites, we managed to land about a half dozen fish sporadically stopping and picking up a fish or two between our sailfish hunt.
- It wasn't until about 1 o'clock when the sails gave us a break, with the first coming undone after a few jumps. Baits back in the water and we were into another one right away, this one after about ten minutes did the same, but not too worry, we had yet another hungry customer chompin' at the live tuna I had reeled to within a few yards of the boat. Determined not to let this fish get away, I fed him a little extra and then dropped the hammer. About 20 minutes later we released Ricks first sail. With 3 livies left and a worn out angler we decided to hit the Pargos for one last round and this time we won with 3 baits producing yet another 3 clean releases.
Rick was feeding a party of 11, so we put 3 fish in the box and sent him home with a Cubera, a Colorado and a Mullet Snapper to get a taste of each and a 8x10 glossy of a beauty of a sailfish.
Fishing Reports New Home:
While these reports will remain here, future posts of my fishing reports have moved and can now be seen at www.kinembe2.com/blog, please check them out.