Daily Fishing Reports

A person was telling me the other day how much he enjoyed my fishing reports. He said "I can tell the real ones" I laughed and said OKAY and pretended not to hear what he just said. What the hell? For the Record, all my reports are real. I'm a numbers cruncher and my memory is sharp, when it involves fishing. I can tell you off the top of my head that on July 28, 1988 I caught exactly 84 Spanish Mackerel casting a stingsilver on the Cape Lookout Shoals. I am sorry for being so thorough in MY REPORTS on MY WEBSITE. Perhaps some guys don't get numbers worth bragging about, so they accuse me of making up numbers just to make their failures more tolerable.

My Fishing Reports are not the generic, run of the mill fishing reports that are so common on the internet. My reports tell exactly what happened to me, my clients, or my friends on that particular day. Good or Bad. Hopefully, all the days that I should've been working, but I was fishing instead (thousands of these days through the 80's, 90's, and up to 2009) will lead me to more successful days on the water than unsuccessful ones. All my reports are "on the money" and at least 90% have pictures to back me up. Every once in a while I drop my camera overboard or simply forget it.

If the fishing sucks, I can blame it on something, but I'm going to report it as "SUCKS". See June 12. See September 28. If the fishing sucks, the numbers are going to suck! If the fishing is good, I'm going to throw out some good numbers, period. I agree, It aint about numbers, it's about having a good time. Or meeting expectations. Or taking advantage of every opportunity. Or whatever. Regardless of that, I keep count. Always have and I always will. I know for a fact that I caught 1807 fish in 1988. I wrote down every single one and I still got the notepad. If you don't believe in MY NUMBERS, come take a ride on my Boat and count 'em yourself. If you don't believe my Fishing Reports, don't read them. Go home and sit on your toilet and read your Salt Water Sportsman and pretend you're a fisherman.

2386 FISH so far in 2009. Yes I've tried to count every single fish. The Bluefish days with 2-3 guys catching them on every cast is a challenge, but I bet that my margin of error is very small.

Nov 22 Fair Speckled Trout Fishing

Two things were easy today. First, the 2+ lb Speckled Trouts, on 4 straight casts that I caught before another Boat dropped it's anchor right on top of them. Thanks alot. Second thing was, the first Albacore I caught after I decided to chase Albacores. Everything else was a struggle. Trying to catch a 10-fish limit of Speckled Trout proved to be impossible for me. After my 4 quick ones, I had to cross the Jetty and fish back into the wind. That is difficult fishing with a live Shrimp on a Bobber. I scratched out 5 more Speckled Trout before my bait gave out. My Speckled Trout ranged from 15" to 20" and 7 weighed over 2 pounds. The guys that showed up late with fresh live Shrimp were doing okay this afternoon. I couldn't get that last Trout, but that was okay. So I decided to go Albacore Fishing. One cast got me one Albacore. It was a pretty big battle on the 6# trout rod. I should've quit. The second Albacore probably took 30 casts and 5 gallons of fuel. Know when to quit....Total Catch for the Day: 9 Speckled Trout, 2 Albacore, 2 Summer Flounder, 1 Sheepshead, 4 Northern Puffer, 1 Hogfish, 6 Pinfish and 5 Clearnosed Skate

Nov 20 Good Speckled Trout Fishing

Finally Trout fishing! Clifford, Heber and I left the dock at 4am this morning to get the jump on the Speckled Seeking Hordes that we knew were going to go fishing today regardless of the weather. Our first stop was a "secret spot" that apparently aint so secret anymore. We had blacked-out boats approach us in the dark and dark, shadowy figures crawling around on the shoreline. It was pretty funny, but the fishing sucked. I released 3 small Speckled Trout and that was it, so we joined the race to the East. To the Rock Jetty! Here I got lucky. I dropped my anchor in a spot that produced 7 Gray Trout in a matter of minutes. The biggest Gray Trout was 3 lb 8 oz. The others were all 1-2 pounders. Nobody else was doing much so everybody came "our way". About that time, the wind shifted from N to NW and picked up and suddenly we weren't in the right spot anymore. Neither were all the boats that had surrounded us. We already our fish dinner covered so the pressure was off. We made the decision to jump the Rocks and go way inshore to chill out for a while. As soon as we got anchored up Clifford's bobber went down. Good sign. Ninety minutes later, we had 17 Speckled Trout from 15" to 2+ pounds on ice, a few 12" to 15"releases, and a smattering of Bluefish, Pinfish, and Sheepshead. I also got a 6 lb Black Drum that really showed his stuff on a 6# Trout Rod. With a nice box of meat we headed in early and stopped long enough for Clifford to catch an Albacore on a 8# Trout Rod. Total Catch for the Day: 25 Speckled Trout, 7 Gray Trout, 1 Albacore, 10 Bluefish, 5 Pinfish, 1 Sheepshead and 1 Black Drum

Nov 18 More Great Albacore Fishing

This morning, at my first stop looking for Speckled Trout, I caught 15 Bluefish. On my way to my second stop, I saw an few Albacore bust on the surface. That was it for the Speckled Trout Fishing. For starters, I chased wide-ranging schools of fast moving Albacore. A little later, they settled down on Bait Balls and it was "every cast" fishing. Then it got even better. How can it be any better than "every cast"? I guess it can't, but here's the deal. I found an area where there was nothing showing on the surface, the bottom was covered with bait, and the colorscope showed large marks at 30 feet. Anything I dropped it the water and let sink got hammered by an Albacore. Sting-silvers, gulps, green grubs, white grubs, red grubs, black grups, halo shrimp and a speck rig. The speck rig actually caught me double header of 8 pound Albacores. I figured those 2 needed to be removed from the gene pool for being stupid and I might need some Tilefish bait anyway. This melee went on for hours. It was the best Albacore Fishing that I've seen since 1995 when I was hooking them on sting-silvers off the rodtip. Wiggle-wiggle. I also caught a few by simply sticking the landing net into the water beside the boat and wait for the thud. Anyway, this afternoon I'd drop 3 lines in the water and hook 3 Albacores. I love chaos. Anybody who wants to go Albacore Fishing, I'd say regardless of the weather, it aint going to get any better. IT CAN NOT GET ANY BETTER. Total Catch for the Day: 30 Albacore and 15 Bluefish

The STORM of 2009

I'm sure everybody has seen a thousand pictures from the Outer Banks. At Hatteras Inlet, the storm was pretty un-spectacular. It was pretty much a Flood Event with very little problems caused by wave action. Highway 12 on Ocracoke was smacked by the Ocean pretty good. Nothing like what happened North of Buxton though. My picture taking was pretty much confined by the Flood Waters. These pictures are (top 2) Ocracoke Island. Hatteras Inlet. The bottom picture is Hatteras right in front of Teach's Lair.

Nov 12 Squid Fishing at Hatteras

Thursday was a Beautiful Night in Hatteras Village, even as the Beaches were being battered to the South (Hwy 12 in Ocracoke) and to the North (Buxton to Chesapeake Bay) during the high tides. The calm winds and clear water allowed me an opportunity to go out and make a few casts and catch something before everything got blown away! Fishing around the Ferry Docks and Oden's Dock wasn't great but it was interesting and there was enough action to keep me going for a couple of hours. The highlight of the night was a 28" TL Squid (counting the whips) that I caught in the Ferry Basin. I had missed 5 strikes on a Gulp in the same exact spot and I was convinced that it was a baby Flounder laying on the bottom under the lights. After bites 6 and 7, I thought "No way a Flounder is that stupid" I went over to my truck and tied on a Squid Jig. As soon as the Jig hit the water I was hooked up! Seconds later the water turned black with ink and my Squid was jetting across the surface. There's nothing like a big Squid on light spinning tackle! When I finally lifted this Squid out of the water his last blast of water shot 10 feet in the air. The power of the water jets! After that, the fishing was just good enough to keep me going even though I never found the schools of Squid I expected. I ended up with 2 more smaller Squid and had enough calamari for a 4 man snack the next day. There were also a few Flounders and other things biting the Gulps. All the Flounders were too small or borderline 15". Regardless, they were all released. Total Catch for the Night: 3 Squid, 4 Southern Flounder and 1 Inshore Lizardfish

Nov 8 Blueline Tilefish and Sandbar Sharks

I ventured into new territory armed with Butterfish for chunking Tuna and plenty of Metal Jigs as Chris and I headed SE out of Oregon Inlet and headed to The Point. Our Tuna plans died pretty quickly. The Trolling bite was pretty much a steady pick for the Hatteras Fleet and we never found what we were looking for to effectively start chunking. We tried it any way and it was a waste of time. The Oregon Inlet Fleet was somewhere to the North and that's we where we probably should have been. Oh well, there was still plenty of action to be had on the Metal Jigs. Some good, some bad, but it was all very interesting and made for some sore muscles today. One problem we had jigging was Sharks. I'm talking numbers and size. Our boat was pretty much surrounded by 5-15 Sandbar Sharks at every stop. These Sharks were 100-200 pounders and they liked Tilefish, Sea Bass, Metal Jigs and Pork Chop Biscuits! Chris and I each caught several and lost several more. One thing is for sure, reeling in a 150 pound Shark on a Jigging Combo from the bottom in 320 feet of water is a tough proposition. We each got a few Tilefish to the boat. I also picked up a 17 lb King Mackerel on a jig and a 10 lb Albacore on a Top Water Plug. I pulled the hooks on a decent Blackfin Tuna right beside the Boat. Total Catch for the Day: 8 Blueline Tilefish, 2 Black Sea Bass, 1 Albacore, 1 King Mackerel and 6 Sandbar Sharks up to 150 pounds

An Original Top Water Charters Graphic Design from 2003

Nov 5 Albacore, Flounder and Red Drum

A beautiful day, but not quite as fishy as I had hoped. Maybe I just gave up too quickly. The weather was getting prettier all the time and conditions were getting right for exploring farther to the East (where I love to fish!) when I came home at 2pm. Here's how the day went. Albacore fishing was good, not great. The fish were not staying up very long at all. It took a little luck and a lot of moving around this morning to stay on the fish. My first cast of the day connected on a 10 lb Albacore. I also caught a 8 lb Albacore on my 3 wt Fly Rod. The best fish of the day came on my Trout Rod with 6# test. I was searching the Shackleford Beach for Red Drum when I saw 5 Albacore cruising right up in the surf. I made a good cast and the race was ON! The fastest Albacore got there first and got released 10 minutes later. In between those 3 fish came a lot of casting and 3 other Albacore. I think the better Albacore Fishing was to the West, but like the variety that I normally find to the East! The most interesting thing of the day was the incredible numbers of Summer Flounder that are in the Shackleford Surf. In about an hour of effort I released 20 Summer Flounders and found 3 keepers at 15" each. I was casting a 5" White Jerk Bait right up on the sand to get strikes from these fish. Hook one and sometimes 2 or 3 others would follow it to the Boat! Finally, I got a tip on a school of Red Drum and I went and found them. One small group of maybe 15 Red Drum in the surf at Rough Point. My first and only cast connected on a fiesty 24" Red Drum. That's it! Total Catch for the Day: 6 Albacore, 23 Summer Flounder and 1 Red Drum **2235 Total Fish in 2009**

Albacore Markings---No Two Fish Are Alike

No two markings are alike. Like Finger Prints and Snow Flakes

Nov 4 Great Albacore Fishing

Today was a good one for me. I went by myself and Albacore Fishing was great. My Fisherman today (ME) had no problem fishing for what was the obvious #1 target. Here's how it went. My first cast after leaving the boat ramp got slammed by an Albacore east of Bft Inlet in Back Sound. Then I ran to the west and caught 6 Albacore between the Sheraton and Salter Path. All these fish came off small, fast moving pods that were smashing schools of bait in 20 feet of water. I also caught an oddball 15" Sea Mullet on a gulp right up against a Stop Net. Then I ran back up to Cape Lookout and found the best fishing of the morning. The Albacore inside the Bight were tearing it up and staying in one place for 30+ seconds. This makes for great fishing. In about 75 minutes, I caught 10 Albacore on 10# spin and 8# spin. I also caught 3 Albacore on a 9wt flyrod including a 34" NC Citation Albacore that bottomed out my 15# Bogagrip. My next cast hooked a bigger Albacore, but my fly line got tangled in my motor and I was unable to clear my line. I held on to the fly line for 45 seconds as the Giant Albacore bulldozed in circles under my stern. Finally, he popped the leader. Damn! After that I moved out front and caught 3 more Albacore on my trout rod with 6# test. Very testy battles and great fun. These Albacores weighed from 8 pounds to an estimated 18 pounds. Total Catch for the Day: 23 Albacore and 1 Gulf Sea Mullet

Hatteras Halloween Cast Netting

I never put a hook in the water, so this aint much of a Fishing Report. I was only up there for 4 days, but I did miss a golden opportunity on Thursday Night. When I drove by the Avon Pier around 11pm, I had no idea that Capt Pat Bracher (http://www.fishovertime.com/) and Capt Arch Bracher (http://www.fishthepelican.com/) were on the end of the pier releasing over 40 Giant Red Drum. I don't give high praise out for fishermen very often, but without a doubt in my mind, these 2 brothers are among the Best in the World at what they do. Anybody who disputes this comment is an IDIOT. As for me, all I did was make 2 throws with a 10 ft Cast Net. I throw caught a single 3 lb Jumping Mullet. My other throw caught 13 Jumping Mullets, including 3 Grown Ones that weighed 5 lb.s each By the way, the picture is of a Permit that found it's way into Frank's Cast Net.