Sept 28 Gray Trout and Bluefish

Stan and Nancy were out for the kill, but this morning a smoking longshore current running West to East backed by 15 knot SW wind made the Ocean real bumpy and the Shoals at Cape Lookout were out of the question. These are the days that I hate because I'm an Ocean fisherman at heart! Anyway, we made our way to a serene, secluded little pass inside Beaufort Inlet and found enough fish to make a day. When it was over, we had 10 Gray Trout up to 18" in the box and released several more. We also had 3 Bluefish up to 2 pounds and released several more. We also caught Lizardfish, Oy Toads, and a Hogfish.

Sept 27 Dock Flounders

Went down to a dock on Taylor's Creek this morning and caught 3 Flounders in 5 minutes. These Flounders were 21", 19", and 17". Unfortunately, I fished another hour and all I got was a Lizardfish. If we only knew when to quit!

Sept 26 Action Packed Day

Howard and Tom: If y'all see this, Steve and Sandra put it on y'all today! A Red Drums at 26", Flounders up to 19", Spanish Mackerel up to 17", and all the Bluefish you can imagine up to legit 4 pounders. Plus they released 3 Albacores up to 12 pounds. All of this during a half day trip. Needless to say, Fall Fishing is heating up. We also passed up several shots at 100+ Pound Sharks cruising in 2 feet of crystal clear water.

Sept 18-24 Hatteras Flounders and Grass

Way to much grass and a terrible tide cycle hurt my fishing efforts this week. The highlights of the week were 4 Gray Trout up to 19", 8 Black Sea Bass up to 12", and my 22" Flounder. The big story was the Flounder my shipmate, Tina caught with my assistance. Her's was a 25" Citation winner. We each caught our Flounders on the last trip of the last night. Two more last second miracles!

Sept.16 Windy Drums and Flounders

Matt and Joel had a great day considering how hard the wind was blowing. It was tough fishing, but they quickly adjusted to the conditions and caught 5 Nice Red Drums that measured out at 26", 28", 28", 30" and 31". They also caught 5 nice Flounders up to 19", a 19" Gray Trout, and a mixed bag of Black Sea Bass, Gag Grouper, Bluefish, Oyster Toadfish, Blacktip Sharks, and Lizardfish.

Sept 14 Red Drum Fishing

Brent Davis and his crew had a good early bite on Red Drums catching 5 before dark. We were ready for a big night. However, once it got dark we only got 2 more bites and only caught one of them. All together we were 6 releases in 7 bites. Plus 2 Bluefish. The Drum ranged from 42 pounds to 32 pounds and everybody got to catch 2 each. Not bad on a windy afternoon/night, with rain all around us.

Sept 13 Dock Drums and Flounders

Today I made 3 trips down to the Dock and caught 10 Red Drum up to 27" and 4 Flounders up to 22". Marcus Rouse joined me for the last session and he caught a Drum, a Flounder, a Gag Grouper, a Bluefish, and a Rock Sea Bass. I didn't have my camera earlier in the day, so the pictures are of Marc's 5 spotted Drum and his Rock Sea Bass.

Sep 4-10 Hatteras Fishing

A variety of problems stopped my fishing dead in it's tracks. I did manage a great catch of Black Sea Bass from 11" to 12". I also caught 11 Flounders in total with a big fish at 4 lb. 8 oz. I also caught Bluefish, Jumping Mullets, Hogfish, Pinfish, Sea Bream, and Silver Perch.

Sept 3 Shake Down Cruise

Took the Downeaster for a ride today and since this is a Fishing Report, here's what we found. Up at Cape Lookout, we found the biggest school of Jumping Mullets that I've seen in 15 years. It was a monster. Headed to the west and made up of Mullets from 1-3 pounds. They gathered around my boat at one point and the entire school was very nervous and agitated. I can just imagine the predators that were lurking nearby.

Sept 2 Great Spanish Mackerel Fishing

Brant and I found great casting action on Spanish Mackerel today. It was "every cast" fishing and when we were finally tired of catching these Mackerel, we had 30 on ice and had released 40 more. These Mackerel ranged from 11" to 16". We moved on to Shark Fishing and found the Sharks to be just as ready! In less than 1 hour, we released 4 Blacknose Sharks from 25 to 40 pounds and a stud 85 pound Blacktip Shark. The Blacktip put on a great aerial show and one of our Blacknoses was sporting a tag from NMFS Apex Predator Program. Cool. No camera on the Boat this morning, all pictures from the "Cleaning Table"

Sept 1 Flounders

In a quick strike to the Beaufort Waterfront I caught 6 Southern Flounders from 16" to 18" and lost 2 more and caught 2 Inshore Lizardfish. I only fished for 30 minutes and caught all my fish in the first 15 minutes. Not bad!

Aug 30 Red Drums

NOT GOOD! With a persistent NE wind blowing, I thought I was doing the right thing by calling off a Charter group that was going to drive in from Raleigh to fish for Drum out of Cedar Island. 8 hours of driving. Wouldn't you know that the wind fell out 3 hours later! With my boat all ready down there and 30 lb.s of bait on ice, I regretfully called up 2 friends and we went fishing. The fishing was okay. We had 7 bites and released 6 fish from 25 to 40 pounds. Marc did catch one on a bottom rig on the spinning rod while trying to catch a Bluefish.

Aug 29 Dock Flounders

Clifford and I were supposed to go to Cedar Island and catch Red Drum, but too much NE wind blew us back to Beaufort where we hit the Docks and caught 5 Flounders and a Speckled Trout.

Hatteras Citation Flounder and Sheepshead

Fishing a little bit everyday from Aug 21 until 27 I managed to catch 14 Flounders, including a 25" that weighed 6 lb. 8 oz, and 2 Sheepsheads that weighed 11 lb 8 oz and 7 lb. I also caught a number of Black Sea Bass.

Aug 20 Bft Waterfront Drums and Flounders

I spent a couple of hours on the docks this morning cleaning fish and Red Drums up to 25" and Flounders up to 18" kept interfering. When it was over I had caught 5 Flounders and 4 Red Drum on live Finger Mullet. I lost a Citation Flounder (5-6 pounder) and pulled off 2 more Drums. Back to Hatteras tonight for me!

Aug 19 Flounders and Drum

I had the boat to myself today and I was very disappointed in the catch. With a live well full of perfect bait, I really expected a "monster" Flounder day! What I got was 8 Flounder, with 5 legal sized, and I kept 3 at 18" and 2 at 16". The Red Drum saved the day though. I caught 6 from 27" to 32" and released 5 that were out of the slot. I kept a 7 pounder that measured out at 27". I also caught 2 Spanish Mackerel throwing metal and turned them into Blacktip Sharks inside the Inlet. I went 4 out of 6 on very light tackle. The 4 I released were 50 to 60 pounders.

Aug 16 46 Pound Red Drum

Slow night of Fishing but I made my bite count and released a 46 pound Red Drum. The Rouser had 1, maybe 2, bites and failed to connect. There will be better nights at Cedar Island.

Aug 15 Sharks, Kings, and Cudas

Today was a great day for small Kings and giant Sharks. Barracuda fishing was good too. My clients were from Ohio and 2 of them were 8 year old boys. What do 8 year old boys want? Sharks and Barracudas! First off we had a decent King Mackerel bite and caught 8 and released several. We also caught 3 nice Spanish Mackerel. Then we caught 3 Barracuda. Then we went King Fishing again and caught 3 in 10 minutes. King Fishing was smoking all day, most of the fish were 22" to 25", but we did have a couple that were larger. Finally we ended up Shark Fishing and it was "Game On". In 90 minutes we caught 5 Blacktip Sharks and 1 Dusky Shark. The Dusky was a beautiful 60 pounder. The Blacktips were huge. We had 4 over 80 pounds and the big one was 170. The biggest Blacktip ever landed on Top Water Charters. There was so much action, I don't even remember who caught it!!

10 Pound Sheepshead

I got my second Citation Sheepshead of the summer on Aug 7. This one weighed 10 pounds 4 ounces.

Aug 4 Every Cast Bluefishing

Landon, Fulton, Brant, and I slayed the Bluefish on the Shoals today. My first cast was met immediately by a 2 pounder and when I reeled him in, in came 200 of his friends! For the next hour, every cast was intercepted by a 1-3 pound Bluefish. We ended up boxing 20 and released just as many. We definitely "left them biting" and headed back to Cape Lookout for an afternoon swim.

August 3 Slow Dolphins, Cudas, and Kings

Howard, Tom, and I were met by a Black Wall of Rain Squalls this morning that kept us several miles from where we wanted to be, but I'm not sure that our catch would've been much better.

At the end of the day, both guys had their first Dolphins, and they each caught a Barracuda and a King Mackerel. Tom's King was intercepted beside the boat by a 35 lb. Barracuda that took a nice bite and was gone in a flash.

Aug1 Red Drum and Spanish Mackerel

Brant Ballou fished with me today and we did well early this morning on Spanish Mackerel. We caught over 20 in an hour of casting metal lures. These Mackerel were 1-2 pounds each. Next stop was on a school of 6-12 pound Red Drum. Brant and I caught 3 each, with Brant getting the biggest at 31". We kept 2 in the slot at 27" and 25". These 2 fish weighed 6 and 8 pounds each. We also caught Flounder and Black Sea Bass. Finally, we ended up Shark Fishing and we each caught 20 pound Blacknose Sharks and Brant pulled the hook on a sweet Hammerhead Shark. Brant also caught 2 So. Stingrays.

Hatteras Fishing

This week fishing was slow and I was basically unlucky. I was fishing for 1 fish, a 10 pound Sheepshead, and he managed to evade me all week. For the week, I caught 2 Sheepsheads and 3 Striped Bass.

July 22 and 23 Red Hot Red Drum

I fished without charters the last 2 days and smashed the Red Drum. In 2 days, Me and a buddy probably released 40 Red Drum, with the majority over 30". We kept 3 in the slot, all at the upper extreme at 26" to 27". These fish are stacked up in 1 spot and nobody knows about them but me! I have fished them 3 days in a row, in plain sight of dozens of other boats and nobody has noticed!