Coastal River Charters

Its official, summer is here! We’ve been fortunate most days early morning cloud coverage has spared the brunt of the impact. That said fishing is still best early morning or late afternoon. During the early afternoon heat catching fish is possible just not as likely or as comfortable. One fish that does not seem to mind the summer heat is the flounder. Flounder fishing has been good! A couple of days ago while fishing for seatrout we landed a flounder that weighed over six pounds! Those targeting flounder can do well! Finger mullet, mud minnow and soft white curl tail plastics are all great baits for flounder. Most fishermen target this fish on the lower tide stages. This fish can like sheepshead can be targeted on higher water. It just a manner of fishing the fish. Likely spots on higher water are pockets where bait is pinned in or the mouth of a gully on a outgoing or incoming tide.

The not only is air temperature hot so is the seatrout bite! Lots of undersized seatrout as well as plenty of legal fish! Lots of small fish abound so when fishing live bait take plenty of bait. Seatrout love current so look for rips. The hot spot is usually where the rip begins to form but fish could be anywhere along the rip. If you can’t seem to find seatrout during the day, you might try your luck at night fishing. One fisherman reported catching three fish over 23 inches on live shrimp on a bream buster pole fishing around dock lights. Some of the best summer catches are by fishermen fishing at night. Areas that seem void of life during the day can be literally lit up at night! Some fishermen last week struggled to find fish while others caught large roe seatrout. Don’t get discouraged just keep trying and you’ll likely find fish!

Reports of cobia on near shore structure and as well a few in the sounds. A favorite bait is menhaden. Lots of newly birthed black tip sharks in the sounds. These fish are around 12 inches long. One fishermen said they these fish are so recently birthed their heads are translucent. Big schools of atlantic sharp nose shark have temporarily moved into deeper water. Plenty of larger sharks to tussle with so be prepared to fish stout tackle!

Afternoon tides this week are building and will be subsiding as of Thursday June 25th , 2009. This week tides were unusually high. Higher than predicted tides seems to be more of rule than an exception. What is the reason? Not sure. Despite high tides and lots of off colored water fishing has been good. In general the best places for summer fishing is close the sound. Fishermen can often catch a breeze and water coming in off the ocean is usually clean. The whiting bite is slowing down as shark bite heats up. Although those targeting whiting should be able to catch a good mess of fish just be prepared to fish through lots of small fish (in small black tip sharks). That’s summer time fishing.

Fishing has been good! Dolphins can shut down a seatrout drop in a minuet. Dolphin need to eat as well. If your fishing is interrupted by dolphins just move on and look for the next drop. Typically areas with lots of dolphins means there is lots of bait there. Another day you might find good fishing in that area just make a mental or written note and move on. Shrimp Adams Bait Shop is catching is larger than last week. Bait looks great!

Hope this of help! Fish On! Capt. Jack McGowan 912.441.9930

Practice Catch and Release!

Lots of small seatrout caught last week. It’s possible to catch keepers when you’re catching undersized seatrout but it will takes lots of bait. The alternative to fishing with shrimp is put a DOA shrimp under a popping cork. You should get plenty of bites! Small jack crevalles and ladyfish can be found in tidal creeks close to the beach front. Redfish action is mostly large fish. Redfish numbers aren’t concentrated but good action can found if you can get these fish to bite and they don’t break off. The seatrout bite is good. Those fishing soft plastics will eliminate lots of trash fish.

Shark action continues to heat up! Lots of 30″ atlantic sharp nose can be found long sand bars as well larger sharks. Some mystery crashes that could be large black tip or spinner sharks or even giant rays or tarpon. Whatever they are they are large! Most of bait in the sounds is medium sized menhaden. Whiting are still biting but the bite has slowed dramatically. Small brown shrimp are showing up but throwing a cast net can be problematic. If you haven’t caught any shrimp in a few casts more casting could be a futile. Brown shrimp are moving it and will be more plentiful in coming days. Lots of fishermen are hitting the water with reports of good fishing. Don Adams, Adams Bait Shop reported on Saturday finding shrimp but as soon as he unloaded he had practically sold out. Donnie said he never seen anything like it. The fact that lots of folks are getting out and enjoying the resource is good. On the other hand if your day is dependent on the bait shop you might want to call ahead or dig out your cast. Recently on two separate occasions while fishing with Miss Judy a couple casts resulted in plenty of mullet.. The mullet are about 4 to 5 inches in length. A great size for fishing! Mullet are fast swimmers so loading the boat in one or two takes a little luck but it can be done. A veteran angler reports that he’s catching large roe seatrout on mud minnows. He’s releasing most of his fish. This fisherman says pay attention when you’re casting you might see thousands of tiny minnows scattering . He calls these tiny minnows “fry”. They might be immature glass minnows Whatever they are this fisherman believe seatrout are keying on this bait. Since fishing a glass minnow for the most part isn’t practical the next best bait would be a mud minnow. A down side to fishing mud minnows is the cut offs from small blue fish. That said a mud minnow is a great bait for seatrout, flounder and redfish!

With hot days the water can look cloudy due an algae bloom. The water close to the beaches looks very clean with visibility several feet maybe four or more feet. For these waters that’s very clean water. Shark bite is crazy! Like most fishing it’s all about the current finding the currents they like. In general those places with slow or no current will have less shark action. Areas with good current and structure are the best. Structure can be sand bars, gaps in the sand bars, edges of sand bars to name a few. The best bite can be achieved by moving or sliding your bait. This small movement is saying to the shark hey look at me. When a shark bite is on a fisherman can miss a fish, reel , miss again, then stop your bait practically at your boat to have a fish engulf your bait almost as if was on cue! Developing proper technique for sharks is much like seatrout just more intense! A fishermen will experience intense tugs that will be hard to replicate in years of fishing. Many will down play a shark. The thought is a serious angler would not fish for a shark. This is far from correct. The fight is about as good as could expect on light tackle. They can hurt you and your tackle. They are obliging in that if you miss one next is coming along. Electrically storms and abrupt changes in salinity can send these creatures to the depths or back to the ocean. With conservation in mind always treat these fish with respect. Handle as carefully as possible. One careless move can cost. Some fish are best not even handled. There are alpha fish. Size is not the determinant in whether to handle a fish. Sometimes if the fish is hooked deeply or it is too aggressive then cut the leader as close to the hook as possible and move on. There are certain rigs and tackle I prefer that will have to wait for another day.

As days heat up try to fish either early in the morning or late in the afternoon. Tidal creek and marshy areas can be miserably when things heat up. Add to the heat and humidity black flies and you a miserable combination. The best bet when conditions are hot and buggy is pull your anchor and turn the air conditioning. In other words crank the throttle down and get some air flowing.

Tides will be the negative range heading into the weekend. Fishermen should be able to manage. If fishing around the change of the tide, midday. Anticipate condition to hot and plan accordingly.

Hope this of help! Capt. Jack McGowan

Wow, it’s almost summer! The flounder bite is on! This week a couple of good catches and one phenomenal catch! A catch of dozen keeper and better sized flounder is a good catch. A catch of a couple of dozen fish with several over five pounds is a particularly good catch. It can and does happen but flounder fishing like any fishing is subject to vagaries of nature. Seatrout action this week likewise has been good. Seatrout are mostly mixed in sized with about half of what’s being caught are under sized. Nonetheless, fishermen are able to put together consistent good catches of seatrout. Just because the fish bit well in one location one day does not mean fishermen can find the same kind of on action on following days at the same location. There can be many reasons why the bite changed. In short fish have tails and fishermen sometimes will have keep looking till you find fish. As the shark bite intensifies, the whiting bite is slowing. Schools of altantic sharp nose sharks can be found along sand bars near barrier islands. Capt. Judy reports the size limit is 30 inches from the fork so if you keep one of these frisky rascals make it’s legal and be extremely careful in handling this fish or any toothy fish.

Lots of small menhaden in the mouth of the South Channel. Small menhaden in Warsaw sound as well just not as thick. Small menhaden can be a great bait for shark, seatrout, redfish and flounder. Often one throw of cast net will land all the bait you could want! Mullet while not in super large schools are abundant enough that one well placed cast could land a dozen or more great baits. One fisherman throwing a cast net reported catching several quarts of brown shrimp in an half hour. Then on a following day the report was the shrimp had vanished. This fisherman statement was check up into the creeks for brown shrimp. The down side with throwing a cast net deep in a head of creek is typically the mud is soft and gooey. Adams Bait Shop has consistently been able to find shrimp. That being said the time between brown and white shrimp, shrimp can be scarce. Shrimp can also be impacted by lunar stages. A full moon can literally pull shrimp into the sounds. Shrimp in bait shops are available but could become scarce as supply diminishes and demand increases.

Tides of late has been higher than normal likely due to rain water that’s still dissipating into the ocean and southeast, east wind that tend to hold water in the sounds. Despite higher water than predicted fishing has been good! Cloudy skies generally favor fishing. Cloudy days offer fisherman cooler conditions and pleasant breezes. The down size is being catch in a rain shower. On the other little or no thunder and lighting have accompanied these storms. Likely good fishing just before a front. As the front hits even if fish would bite its not possible to fish. Then as a front passes the bite returns. Where water has muddied fishing could be off. Fishing is generally best in areas with clean water and suitable current. Simply put not too strong, not too weak.

Hope this of help! Remember release the fish you don’t intend to eat! Tides look sweet all week!

Fish On! Capt. Jack McGowan