For most anglers who venture to Guatemala’s Casa Vieja Lodge, dorado is not likely the target species. The superior power and size of blue and black marlin, striped marlin, and sailfish—combined with high encounter rates—make those species the goal. For me, however, dorado is the research subject—not because I don’t enjoy catching marlin and sails, but because dorado is one of the most poorly understood and documented fish species in our oceans, especially off the coast of Guatemala.
In a recent search of dorado landings associated with the Food and Agricultural Organization’s global landings database, which is the global source for quantifying annual landings of virtually any finfish or shellfish species, the government of Guatemala recorded only 1 metric ton