Names like Los Sueños, Quepos, and the Osa Peninsula ring out in our collective angler imagining as the sportfishing destinations of fantasy. Reports filter back to the U.S. with stories of 50-sailfish days, multiple blue, black and striped marlin… billfish action that seems too good to be true on Costa Rica’s Pacific coast.
Well, those reports are most likely true. Costa Rica is one of the world’s best billfish destinations. But not everyone is into spending long days trolling offshore. For some anglers, casting a line or working a bait is as much a part of the fun as fighting a fish. That’s where Costa Rica’s exotic and astoundingly good inshore fisheries step in.
Year-round, just off the coast of Costa Rica, huge snook, big cubera snapper and giant roosterfish hunt the gorgeous beaches, rocks and reefs. Any number of species is subject to find the end of your line, but the chief target for anglers has to be the roosterfish.
With its tall Mohawk of a dorsal fin and multi-hued stripes, the roosterfish’s oddball appearance is enough of a reason to try and catch one. Its aggressive nature and powerful runs would make it a target for anglers even it wasn’t so beautiful.
Most places they are found, roosterfish are commonly known as denizens of the surf. In Costa Rica, they are in the surf and everywhere else. Midway down the spit of land that is Central America, Costa Rica is in the heart of the roosterfish range, which spans the Pacific from Peru to the Baja California Peninsula. The average fish caught probably weighs less than 20 pounds pounds, but it takes one weighing 60 or 70 pounds to really raise eyebrows.
They are plentiful, big and powerful, and half the fun of catching them is fishing for them. Sure, the most consistent way to catch them is trolling or drifting live baits. But we’re talking about a fish that will cream a topwater lure. There is not much in fishing more exciting than a topwater take, so when it is possible one might as well take advantage of it.
With roosterfish, the preferred surface presentation is ripping a popper across the top with as much splashy commotion as possible. It’s not a finesse technique. When a fish homes in on the bait, it will chase, often hitting several times before it finds the hook.
It’s this kind of explosive action that makes Costa Rica worth the trip for inshore action alone. And of course there’s also all those marlin, sailfish, and tuna.