Added on Monday, September 1, 2025  Fish Poster

Tidelines – September 2025

By late August, kids go back in school, as do I, and that week before school starts is the perfect time to fit in a couple of “last hoorah” fishing trips. 

To get in some end-of-summer fishing time with my wife Leslie, I called on Capt. Tim Disano, of Tideline Charters out of Ocean Isle Beach, and then my 13-year-old Ethan and I traveled to New Bern to meet up with Capt. Brad Smith of Gunny B Outdoors.

The inshore waters surrounding Ocean Isle are some of the fishiest along North Carolina’s coast, and knowing that Tim is a gracious host that loves to instruct while putting clients on fish made him an easy decision for getting Leslie on the water. On our day, the low tide wasn’t really low, the high tide was way high, and the offshore swell and wind took the Little River jetties out of play, but Tim’s plan to mix up our target species and keep on the move gave me confidence that Leslie had a great chance of pulling in a potential mix of red drum, trout, and flounder.

Our first stop coincided with the tide just starting to rise, and Tim used spot lock to hold us in place just up current from an oyster bar that began along a grassline before extending out into the creek. Leslie sent a live finger mullet to a small eddy at the start of the oyster rocks, I placed my finger mullet along the grass leading up to the oysters, and Tim put a third bait along the submerged oysters that extended out away from the bank. 

Leslie’s (of course) was the first rod to bend over.

There was one big initial run that was followed by several smaller runs once the upper-slot redfish got close to the boat, and then her fish began targeting the trolling motor and the engine prop. Leslie, with just a little instruction from Tim, kept the rod tip up and steady pressure on the fish, guided the fish when she could, stayed patient, and soon the copper-colored redfish went into Tim’s landing net.

After a few more redfish on finger mullet, we tried drifting a live shrimp under a slip rig. The current may have been too slow to pick up a trout, but two flounder (what would be keeper flounder in less than two weeks) liked the slow drift.

Next, Tim wanted to show us an area in the ICW where he often has success with the reds. In the early morning before the boat traffic picks up, he can often find these fish feeding and pushing water, but in the mid-afternoon, he simply picked a section of the bank where he had found them before.

Tim chose correctly, and soon Leslie was once again fighting several upper-slot red drum to the boat. The bites came in quick succession, and all on more finger mullet, so when the bite slowed, instead of trying to find out which way down the ICW the fish had migrated, we headed to some deeper water to try and check speckled trout off the list.

Now that the tide was moving more quickly, the shrimp found specks instead of flatfish. We also attracted pinfish and croakers, because that’s what pinfish and croakers do in the summertime. With our inshore slam complete, we headed back to Calabash Marina, where Tim docks his boat and meets clients.

The next day was Ethan’s turn, and Capt. Brad Smith met us at the Lawson Creek boat ramp in the early afternoon to head out on the Neuse River looking for redfish. We headed in the direction of the ferry line, and Ethan and I immediately noticed the amount of bird activity on the west side of the Neuse. Birds were everywhere, and numerous boats were lining the shoreline with them. Brad, though, was unimpressed.

Where Ethan and I saw birds flying around, Brad saw birds that were unorganized and not working. In addition, he pointed out that almost as many birds were sitting on the water’s surface. 

We kept cruising until arriving at the mouth of a creek where he had found fish in the previous days. Here we saw way less birds, but the birds we saw were tight together and darting up and down over a feeding frenzy created by a school of bluefish.

The trolling motor was deployed, not because Brad was worried about disrupting the bluefish, but because we didn’t want to bother any of the red drum that were hopefully following these feeding bluefish.

Ethan was handed a rod with a big swimbait, and I got the big spoon. Once within range, we started casting toward the fracas but not in the fracas, but the bluefish were first to the baits anyway. 

Big bluefish can be a blessing and a curse. Being hooked to a 6-10 lb. bluefish provides clients with strong pulls, quick drag runs, surface splashing, and aerials. It’s the stuff that makes fun memories and can save a trip when the target species isn’t cooperating.

On the negative side would be that we were hooking bluefish after bluefish instead of the red drum we hoped were in the area.

It may have taken about a dozen big blues to get there, but Brad’s strategy of following the bluefish paid off. On the tail end of a retrieve where Ethan had several bluefish pull at his swimbait, he got a bite that felt different. This one pulled longer and heavier and stayed low in the water column.

While Ethan moved around the boat with the hooked fish, Brad gave coaching, when necessary, and soon Ethan’s drum was over the gunnels. After a couple of quick photos, Brad successfully released our fish.

The rest of our afternoon together played out much the same way. We would look for active schools, and once we found activity, we would try to get our baits close to the action without being too close. For my 13-year-old, bluefish and red drum bites are both exciting, and we celebrated a successful, fun day with Chick-fil-A milkshakes on the drive back to Wilmington.

Late summer in North Carolina often means red drum fishing, with assorted species such as trout, flounder, and bluefish as daily complements. If you’re trying to decide between Capt. Tim Disano in Ocean Isle or Capt. Brad Smith in New Bern, then I bet you can guess what I’ll offer as an easy decision.

Book a trip with both, and after each trip, go with Cookies & Cream. Winner winner.