Puerto Penasco fleet killing the Sea of Cortez

jerry

Well Known Member
4 Sardine trawlers off Santo Towas last week grinding aw as reported in April by Jungle Jim. "Hit the beach at Santo Tomas last Saturday afternoon. Made a right turn, went 100 feet and saw a dead sea turtle in the surf. It was an adult Olive Ridley with no obvious injuries. Went another 200 feet saw two dead sea turtles in the surf. They were one adult and one juvenile about two feet long Olive Ridley's with do obvious injuries. We started a tally sheet then stopped counting dead sea turtles at two miles of driving with eleven dead. At our turn around point we estimated at least one dead turtle every quarter mile. We drove about twenty miles up the beach that day, which means at least eighty dead turtles. We did not count the dead Sea Lions or Dolphins, but there were plenty. No animal of that size and lifespan can withstand losses of breeding adults at that level. I believe those turtles had all drowned in gill nets and trawl nets."
Some officials came down a few days and were really pissed about all the death these sea grinders have left in their wake image.jpeg
 

jerry

Well Known Member
So the story is bad for Lobos too...the Cartel controls the shrimp poaching down here and has ordered the camps to head toward Lobos....they set up there shrimp meets and are long longing in larger numbers for Grouper on the side....
 

Jungle Jim

Well Known Member
Hey Jerry..........

I stopped logging my death reports last summer when I was BANNED from this site as I seemed to upset the PC Correct Head-In-Sand Ostriches who always question my "drinking habits"???? WTF?? don't they know that I am a Koran spanking Muzzie? We doan ebber do no alkee haul.

Last month we did a Jeepin' beach comb along the shores of Bahia San Gorge. Didn't even bother to count the dead turtles. There were plenty. And again, lots of sea lions and dolphins. I did manage to find and get home two beautiful bleached Olive Ridley skulls that now adorn my bathroom vanity cabinet here in Yuma.

Whatever rebound that had been happening for the Olive Ridleys, with the enforcement of sea turtles killed for meat has now just been blown to sheet with the new netting methods. The fishermen know better than to keep one to take home for la familia, so they just get dumped overboard.

I'm heading down tomorrow for another Salinas Point run in my newly refurbed red Wrangler TJ. Maybe we'll meet on some deserted beach in Mex-I-Ko.

JJ
 

Mexico Joe

Cholla Bay 4 Life
So the story is bad for Lobos too...the Cartel controls the shrimp poaching down here and has ordered the camps to head toward Lobos....they set up there shrimp meets and are long longing in larger numbers for Grouper on the side....

With all of that action down there, is it safe to be going to Lobos right now? Relatively of course...
 

jerry

Well Known Member
Hey Jerry..........

I stopped logging my death reports last summer when I was BANNED from this site as I seemed to upset the PC Correct Head-In-Sand Ostriches who always question my "drinking habits"???? WTF?? don't they know that I am a Koran spanking Muzzie? We doan ebber do no alkee haul.

Last month we did a Jeepin' beach comb along the shores of Bahia San Gorge. Didn't even bother to count the dead turtles. There were plenty. And again, lots of sea lions and dolphins. I did manage to find and get home two beautiful bleached Olive Ridley skulls that now adorn my bathroom vanity cabinet here in Yuma.

Whatever rebound that had been happening for the Olive Ridleys, with the enforcement of sea turtles killed for meat has now just been blown to sheet with the new netting methods. The fishermen know better than to keep one to take home for la familia, so they just get dumped overboard.

I'm heading down tomorrow for another Salinas Point run in my newly refurbed red Wrangler TJ. Maybe we'll meet on some deserted beach in Mex-I-Ko.

JJ
Jim a side benefit from hell of the dead turtles up and down the coast is we have a pack of wild dogs that eat them and chase and try to bite passing atv's. Some would say good but would not like to be 10 years old or walking with city dogs when these guys show up
 

Belgianboy

Active Member
Jim a side benefit from hell of the dead turtles up and down the coast is we have a pack of wild dogs that eat them and chase and try to bite passing atv's. Some would say good but would not like to be 10 years old or walking with city dogs when these guys show up
ouch :(
 

Jungle Jim

Well Known Member
Jerry,

I see a lot of greasy Coyote's along the beaches down that way now. They look skinny and black. It's from them crawling inside Sea Lion and Dolphin carcasses to feed. Of course they get saturated with the melting blubber. Last summer I saw two female Ridleys dead, high above the tide line that had been digging nesting holes, both had been mauled to death by dogs or Coyotes. Good luck on trying to rebuilt the population of that animal. If they aren't killed at sea, they get ripped to shreds on the beach. I saw a young Coyote a few months ago with something fairly large and dark in it's mouth. We ran him down the beach with the Jeep until he dropped it. It was a front flipper from a Ridley in pretty good shape, I almost considered bringing it home for some Cayuama Asada. Also, South of El Golfo I found a huge Leatherback Sea Turtle dead on the beach. It must have been seven or eight feet long and probably weighed in at five hundred pounds. I chopped off a chunk of the shell just as proof that they too aren't allowed to exist in the Gulf any longer.

Maybe see ya this weekend?

JJ
 

jerry

Well Known Member
Jerry,

I see a lot of greasy Coyote's along the beaches down that way now. They look skinny and black. It's from them crawling inside Sea Lion and Dolphin carcasses to feed. Of course they get saturated with the melting blubber. Last summer I saw two female Ridleys dead, high above the tide line that had been digging nesting holes, both had been mauled to death by dogs or Coyotes. Good luck on trying to rebuilt the population of that animal. If they aren't killed at sea, they get ripped to shreds on the beach. I saw a young Coyote a few months ago with something fairly large and dark in it's mouth. We ran him down the beach with the Jeep until he dropped it. It was a front flipper from a Ridley in pretty good shape, I almost considered bringing it home for some Cayuama Asada. Also, South of El Golfo I found a huge Leatherback Sea Turtle dead on the beach. It must have been seven or eight feet long and probably weighed in at five hundred pounds. I chopped off a chunk of the shell just as proof that they too aren't allowed to exist in the Gulf any longer.

Maybe see ya this weekend?

JJ
Sorry headed home Saturday morning....hauling a guys Atv that spent the night in the sea down 6 miles south of Desemboque....quite the drama it seems played out between the couple that lost it ,the owner and a Mexican guy saying it was his via salvage rights.....tonight or tomorrow morning will be interesting...
 

Mexico Joe

Cholla Bay 4 Life
I think it is ok....if you are a local or fisherman maybe not but Americans just don't get messed with unless they deserve it if you follow the best practices list ...

Jerry, I generally agree but then again, Lobos is way down there... no too many stray gringos down in Lobos besides the few sport guys that live there.
 

jerry

Well Known Member
Again the bummer is the long lining for grouper is increasing as the northern fish camps are working there. shrimping and long lining when time is available.....place is safe.....
 

Mexico Joe

Cholla Bay 4 Life
Again the bummer is the long lining for grouper is increasing as the northern fish camps are working there. shrimping and long lining when time is available.....place is safe.....

So basically I can go there but I'm not going to catch sh!t... and possibly piss off the wrong person... Corruption is cancerous
 

jerry

Well Known Member
So basically I can go there but I'm not going to catch sh!t... and possibly piss off the wrong person... Corruption is cancerous
No......fishing is ok....Scott caught a flounder that was so big it was hard to believe at ST.....the fishermen are headed to Lobos because the new marine intercepted at Bird Islan is a friggin beast....fastest boat on the water I bet....
 

Jungle Jim

Well Known Member
Turtle Times...............................

Beautiful day last Sunday 1 May 2016. Took off early, headed South to the "Y". Did a recon of facilities to include fuel and last minute essentials. The old Pemex was open but "no hay gasolina". Took the short run East to the New Pemex. They have everything to include diesel and a wine rack. Turned back West to Desemboque, pulled off the highway right to Santo Tomas and headed to La Playa. Contrary to what the Real Estate banditos say, the road is NOT fit for a car unless you have bullet proof tires and snow skis for the sand, not to mention the chuck holes on the highway that could easily swallow a burro. BS'd the guard at the Santo Tomas gate, he let us in and we went to Scottie's place to check out his fishing operation. Man alive does he have that scene tuned in. I can only HIGHLY recommend dealing with him if particularly if you are boatless and wanna kill BIG fish close to shore. Jerry was not available due to some obscure rescue operation somewhere further South on the beach.

Hit the beach in my newly refurbed Wrangler TJ, made a right turn and began our planned photodoc to be titled "Death on the Beach". So folks here is the preview:

New World Heritage Destination: "El Cementerio de los Caguamas de Sonora" (The Sea Turtle Graveyard of Sonora).

We drove six (6) miles North that afternoon from Santo Tomas to the light house and panga camp at the light house El Jaguey. We located and photographed thirty three (33) Olive Ridley Sea Turtles in the surf and on the beach in that six miles of beach. That folks, is 5.5 dead turtles per mile of beach. Multiply that by the miles back North to PP means more than five hundred (500) dead Ridley's along that short span of Sonora coastline. Now if you recall may last post of our March trip along Bahia San Jorge where we spotted a dead turtle every few hundred feet, I can only say that these are dark days for the Sonora population of Ridley's.

We did not document the dead Humpback Whale, California Sea Lions and Dolphins of two species. We did photograph an Electric Ray (my first ever) and many Bat Rays dead on La Playa.

The most disturbing thing we did encounter was an adult, five foot plus (5'+) PACIFIC LEATHERBACK SEA TURTLE, the second I have ever seen in my life. You might like to do the research and find out that there are less than 2500 of them left on earth. This animal has lived unchanged since T-Rex roamed the beaches and probably feasted on them just like the Zopilotes and Coyotes are today. To me, this is an unspeakable shame, all for the unquenchable quest for camarones.

Most of the dead still had monofilament gill net wrapped around their heads and flippers. These animals are taking a beating that they can not ever recover from. On a good day fishing we might spot one turtle off shore, but thousands dead on the beaches?

I must not omit though, it's surely a windfall for the Coyotes, Turkey Vultures, Ravens, Gulls and maggots. We saw migrating swallows hawking low at four or five inches altitude feasting on the death flies. Almost every carcass had it's contengency of Fringe Toed San Lizards, a big macho male and his har-rum of girlies feasting and guarding the stinking piles.

Oh well,

Tomorrow will be another day.

JJ
 

Mexico Joe

Cholla Bay 4 Life
Turtle Times...............................

Beautiful day last Sunday 1 May 2016. Took off early, headed South to the "Y". Did a recon of facilities to include fuel and last minute essentials. The old Pemex was open but "no hay gasolina". Took the short run East to the New Pemex. They have everything to include diesel and a wine rack. Turned back West to Desemboque, pulled off the highway right to Santo Tomas and headed to La Playa. Contrary to what the Real Estate banditos say, the road is NOT fit for a car unless you have bullet proof tires and snow skis for the sand, not to mention the chuck holes on the highway that could easily swallow a burro. BS'd the guard at the Santo Tomas gate, he let us in and we went to Scottie's place to check out his fishing operation. Man alive does he have that scene tuned in. I can only HIGHLY recommend dealing with him if particularly if you are boatless and wanna kill BIG fish close to shore. Jerry was not available due to some obscure rescue operation somewhere further South on the beach.

Hit the beach in my newly refurbed Wrangler TJ, made a right turn and began our planned photodoc to be titled "Death on the Beach". So folks here is the preview:

New World Heritage Destination: "El Cementerio de los Caguamas de Sonora" (The Sea Turtle Graveyard of Sonora).

We drove six (6) miles North that afternoon from Santo Tomas to the light house and panga camp at the light house El Jaguey. We located and photographed thirty three (33) Olive Ridley Sea Turtles in the surf and on the beach in that six miles of beach. That folks, is 5.5 dead turtles per mile of beach. Multiply that by the miles back North to PP means more than five hundred (500) dead Ridley's along that short span of Sonora coastline. Now if you recall may last post of our March trip along Bahia San Jorge where we spotted a dead turtle every few hundred feet, I can only say that these are dark days for the Sonora population of Ridley's.

We did not document the dead Humpback Whale, California Sea Lions and Dolphins of two species. We did photograph an Electric Ray (my first ever) and many Bat Rays dead on La Playa.

The most disturbing thing we did encounter was an adult, five foot plus (5'+) PACIFIC LEATHERBACK SEA TURTLE, the second I have ever seen in my life. You might like to do the research and find out that there are less than 2500 of them left on earth. This animal has lived unchanged since T-Rex roamed the beaches and probably feasted on them just like the Zopilotes and Coyotes are today. To me, this is an unspeakable shame, all for the unquenchable quest for camarones.

Most of the dead still had monofilament gill net wrapped around their heads and flippers. These animals are taking a beating that they can not ever recover from. On a good day fishing we might spot one turtle off shore, but thousands dead on the beaches?

I must not omit though, it's surely a windfall for the Coyotes, Turkey Vultures, Ravens, Gulls and maggots. We saw migrating swallows hawking low at four or five inches altitude feasting on the death flies. Almost every carcass had it's contengency of Fringe Toed San Lizards, a big macho male and his har-rum of girlies feasting and guarding the stinking piles.

Oh well,

Tomorrow will be another day.

JJ

Pics or it didnt happen
 

capt. k

Junior Member
Jim, nice to meet you and thanks for documenting all the marine carnage that is happening down there. If you want some help putting together a pitch for CEDO or PESCA/CONAPESCA let me know. I am quite passionate about preserving the beautiful Sea of Cortez.
sk
 
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