Carolina Beach September 29, 2005
Capt. Dave Tilley, of FryingPanTower.com, reports that offshore the water is pretty churned up, and the real key right now to finding fish is finding clean water. Straight out, the water is pretty dirty. To the north, there are some nice kings coming from the 23 Mile Rock area. Dolphin are around the WR-2 area. They’re not plentiful, but they are present. Overall, the water temps are still real hot for this time of year.
Inshore, it’s the same story-dirty water. The spanish have moved out to about the 5-7 mile range. Once again, look for the clear water. A few flounder are on the bottom, but other than that the bite has been pretty slow.
As for offshore bottom fishing, the gags are hard to find right now. They should be around the 20-mile mark. The only real good catches of grouper lately have come from the 30 plus area. They were all reds. Squid, cut bait, and cigar minnows should do the trick.
Overall, the storm put a damper on the fishing. It should return to normal very soon.
Robbie, at Seagull Bait and Tackle, reports that since the hurricane there’s been a great puppy drum bite in the surf. Most of the fish are between 16-18″, and they’re hitting cut bait and mullet minnows. The action has been both during the day and at night. You can see reds chasing the mullet minnows on the incoming and outgoing tides.
There’s also been lots of pompano caught in the surf, and a few mullet and spots. The best surf fishing action overall has been from the north end.
The flounder bite this past week has been average to slow. There have been a couple weighed in up to 6 lbs. and several in the 3-4 pound class, but overall the flounder fishing has been average.
In the river, the puppy drum have also been active. They’ve been running a little bigger in the river, with most going from legal size up to 30″.
Behind Bald Head Island there’s been a good speckled trout bite.
As for bait, it’s been in good supply since the storm.
Kelly, at Cape Fear Marine and Tackle, reports that big flounder have come recently from Snow’s Cut. The heaviest they weighed was 12 lbs., but there’s also been several in the 3-5 pound range caught.
Gray trout are now on the wrecks, and they’re running 16-20 inches. The Cape Fear River is producing all three: flounder, drum, and speckled trout. Try working the backsides of the islands on the river channel side.
Offshore, plenty of reports of wahoo and sailfish came in over the past week. The smallest wahoo weighed 30 lbs.
