Oct 31 Citation Trout

This morning we had 1 Speckled Trout bite. Steve made it count with a big one, a 5+ pounder. Other than that, it was tough. We caught a mess of Spanish Mackerel, Bluefish, Sheepshead, and Hogfish. We also threw back Pinfish, Sea Bass, Flounders, Tomtates, Ringtails, Groupers, and a Ribbonfish. Lots of variety, I'm sure I forgot something

Oct 30 No Trout, No Drum, Albacore Fishing

I needed some help today. My apologies to Dean, my angler. Everything I tried, failed. We fished the Rocks and despite of seeing a fair number of Speckled Trout caught, we didn't catch any. We searched hard for Red Drum and couldn't find any. Finally after a long ride, we found a few Albacores and released 2. I had my shot at being a Hero today and couldn't get it done. While sitting on Anchor at the Rock Jetty, I saw a brown shape approaching our boat from a long ways off. Thinking Cownose Ray, I did nothing but sit there. As the fish came closer, it suddenly became clear that this was NO RAY. This was a Cobia and it was an 80+ Pounder. As it turned and swam down the port of my boat, 20 feet away, all I could do was cast a Gulp Bait on 6 lb. test on the trout rod. Saving me some embarrassment, the huge Cobia ignored my bait and sunk into the depths. I'm not sure if this fish would've hit a livebait or not, but I surely wasn't prepared for this golden opportunity.

Oct 27 Rain and Wind

Bob and John braved the rain and wind (dirty water and extreme tides too) this morning and we were hoping the fishing would improve. Maybe it did, but not by much. John had the highlight--an Albacore hooked up for 10 seconds until the hook pulled. We looked around briefly in 4-6 foot seas and driving rain and said, "Enough!" Other than that, the guys caught 20*Gray Trout, 20*Hogfish, 25*Croaker, 5 Spots, 3 Lizardfish, 3 Black Sea Bass, and a Bluefish and a Flounder. Everything was released to fight another day.

Oct 26 Slow and Wet Day

I knew it was going to be a struggle against the conditions, but I didn't know it would be this bad. We rode from Beaufort to Cape Lookout to the Shoals back to Beaufort Inlet then 5 miles west of Beaufort Inlet and finally fished inside from the MHC Port to Lennoxville. We got wet early and stayed wet all day. We tried dead bait, live bait, and artificial. In the end we caught 1 Cobia, 1 Shark, 2 Bluefish, 2 Stingrays, and a mixed bag of Pinfish, Hogfish, and a Sea Robin.

Wind and Rain

Come on now, it's October and it's time to go fishing. Looks like the weather will be very unsettled until early next week. I believe the fishing will get very good very quickly after all this bad weather blows through here.

In the meantime, I will be running long and hard in search of good fishing in very challenging conditions the next couple of days. Stay tuned to see what we can come up with against a small craft advisery and heavy rains.

Today I caught a pair of 29" Red Drums in Taylor's Creek while gathering bait for tommorrow's fishing trip. It was nice to see the larger class of fish back in Town.

Get Ready for Fishing!

I'm home for 21 days and will be looking to fish at least 15 of them! Last night while cleaning a big catch of Hatteras Jumping Mullets, I caught 4 baby Red Drums in the 14" range and several Croakers.

Oct 15 Red Hot Mackerel Bite

Chris and I went out for a 3 hour Mackerel fishing trip and it was a great bite. When it was over we had caught 10 King Mackerel and 4 Spanish Mackerel. We released 7 of the Kings that we could unhook without damage and we kept the rest. These Kings ranged from 28" to 11 pounds. Not big, but plenty fiesty on the light spinning tackle we were using.

October 13 Amberjacks and Albacores and Mackerels

Brant Ballou wanted his first Amberjack today. He ended with his first Amberjacks, his first Albacores, and his first King Mackerel. Amberjack fishing was outstanding for numbers, but we could not locate any 40+ pound fish. Between the 2 of us, we finished up with 10 Amberjack releases, 7 Albacore releases, 1 King Mackerel, and 3 Spanish Mackerel. We also caught a wide open Bluefish bite in the Inlet and filled our livewell with 1-2 pounders.

October 12 King Mackerel Chewing

Dan, Mark, Scott, and Gerald nailed the Kings this morning. The Kings were flying high and we never went more than 5 minutes without a strike, until the bottom fisherman pushed us off our spot. Everybody kept 1 King and we released the rest. Mark and Scott also caught nice Spanish Mackerel. A couple of our Kings were real nice ones and we turned the big ones loose to fight another day!

October 10 and 11 Taylor's Creek Red Drum

The Dock has been alive. Unfortunately, it ain't been that good. On the 10th, as I was cleaning fish, I caught 5 Red Drum in the 14" range. On the 11th, I caught 3 more 14" Red Drum, but was fustrated by large Lizardfish and huge schools of marauding Pinfish. Adult Pinfish in the 10"+ range. great Grouper and Amberjack bait. Come on WIND, quit blowing! It's October and the days are blowing by, literally.....

Tagged Shark Info

I just got back some information on the Tagged Blacknose Shark that Brant Ballou caught with me on Sept 2, 2007. Amazingly, this Shark was tagged on Sept 3, 2006 only 8/10s of a mile from where Brant caught it. On the same shoal, just at the other end. All tag returns are fascinating. Sometimes they show great migrations, in this case it shows that these Blacknose Sharks return to the same places every summer. It will continue to be a great fishery as long as we take care of these Sharks. My last tag return for a Blacknose Shark was last summer and this Shark had been tagged in Bull's Bay, SC and had been "on the loose" for 8 years.

October 9 Dolphins and a Wahoo

My group never showed so I bit the bullet and went by myself. It was a slow morning until I found a palm log floating in a vertical position. Easy to miss, I'm glad I found it. Using nothing but spinning tackle, I caught all the Dolphins that I could stand from 8 to 15 pounds. As the Dolphin ranks thinned, Wahoos started to dart around the boat. I quickly got 3 Wahoo bites! Unfortunately, I only landed one Wahoo, a 30 pounder, I also pulled one off and one bit off.

Oct 2-8 Hatteras Fishing

Grass killed the fishing again. I resorted to jigging with a sabiki rig and caught hundreds of fish of 25 different varieties. Unfortunately, nearly all of them weighed less than 4 ounces each. The exceptions were 6 nice Lookdowns. I also caught many juvenile tropical species that better not stay around much longer or the cold weather will kill them.

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.