Fishing Report 03/21/2019

 

This week around Atlantic Beach has been nothing like last week. We have been dealing with wind, rain and cooler temps, really the only day anglers got to fish was Monday.  Last week, was an awesome week for fishing here, just about every day we had customers coming by with fish. We did see a crazy Puffer Fish invasion on Tuesday in the area, people were catching them all over the place. This time of the year it’s all about the weather, when it’s good the fishing has been great to be this early in the Spring.

We did see some great news on the Offshore bite Monday, had a customer that just smoked the Yellow Fin Tuna, Wahoo and even had some Dolphin. It’s looking like we’re going to have a decent weather weekend coming up with winds starting to die out on Saturday and Sunday be down to 5-10mph with sunny skies both days, so we should see some fish being caught in the next few days again!

 

Inshore / Neashore:

Sea Mullets are still in the Beaufort Inlet back to the Turning Basin area, last weekend we saw some decent catches not too much this week just because no one has been out with the bad weather. Best places to look still have been around the 18 to 19 Buoys. There was a customer last weekend that caught a nice catch back in the Turning Basin area. Rule of thumb, these fish are going to be somewhere in the Turning Basin back up toward the Beaufort Inlet. The Sam’s Gitters Rigs we have in the shop still’s been the go-to lure to catch these fish. Tipped with our local caught bait shrimp has been a deadly combo. Tim, Trout Man from the shop has been doing something a little different that’s been giving him a little extra advantage. He was telling me this morning he was taking Pro Cure in the Shrimp favor and putting on the hair of the Gitter Rig, he said this past Monday he out fished everyone he had on the boat. So, keep that in mind when trying to get a few extra bites.

We’ve been invaded by Puffer Fish this week, earlier this week we had reports coming in from Beaufort, Radio Island and the Oceanana Pier all catching lots of them. One customer caught over 80 in just a few hours of fishing. Bottom Rigs and Sam’s Gitters Rigs tipped with shrimp on the bottom has been working the best, just about the simplest fishing you can do. I hear all the time can you eat these fish? The answer is “YES” some of the best you can eat, locals call it “The Chicken of the Sea. So, that’s pretty exciting to see the Ocean Piers already getting some action this early in the Spring.

The Albacore has also made an early showing, we’ve seeing a few schools in the Beaufort Inlet but really good numbers last weekend and really good this week at the Cape Lookout area. We’re seeing the best luck with the small glass minnow’s jigs. These jigs are the right weight and cast like a bullet, not seen another jig on the market that does as good and we been fishing these the last few years.

Last week, we saw great Speckled Trout fishing some of the best we’ve seen in the Spring in quite a few years. Last week, one of our Charter Boats saw a 100 fish in a half day of fishing. Pretty much catching fish the entire trip and brought home 12 nice 2lb fish. Also, I had quite a few customers coming by with nice fish and good reports. Some customers stopped in on Monday to pick up more supplies and was telling that they just had one of best days they had seen in a while. Anglers are having the best luck on Z-Man plastics in the Jerk ShadZ, MinnowZ, a new plastic we have in the shop “Down South” has been working well for us and our custom colored Mirrolures in the 14MR and 17MR sizes. Also, this time of the year our boats don’t leave without taking a few live Mud Minnows with them, because they can make a difference if the fish aren’t hitting artificial.  Also, we’ve been fishing Paul Brown’s Soft Dines having very good luck. Crazy enough one trip we had out last week even saw some Topwater action. I’m guessing with the mild winter we had a lot of fish never left the creeks and now are starting to feed as the water temps have been on the rise. So, with the numbers that we are seeing now this Fall could be a great one.

We’ve been seeing some Red Drum and Black Drum under the docks and hearing of some Red Drum working along the beaches. Some customers have been seeing some really nice Red Drum off the point at Cape Lookout. Most that are catching them there are fishing from the beach casting Sea Striker’s metal jigs into the Surf.

Another surprise, we saw over the last week was some Flounder starting to stack up at some of the nearshore reefs. It’s a little early to see them but I had a couple of customers go out and catch a few jigging Spro 2oz Bucktails tipped with the Berkley Gulp 4” Pearl White Shrimp. That combo is so hard to beat when jigging the nearshore reefs, so many people have tried to copy that combo but it just never out fishes it. We do have a new 2oz Jig in the shop this year that might compete with the Spro, it’s the Berkley Fusion Bucktail.

 

Piers / Surf:

Both of our local piers are now open the Oceanana and Bouge Pier opened up last week for the season. Usually it takes a few weeks before they see much action but so far, the Puffer Fish haven’t been hard to come by. I know this past Monday anglers kept coming back to the shop picking up Bait Shrimp as they were catching so many. Not heard all that much from the Surf Zone yet, except the Radio Island beach access as the Puffer have moved back in Gallant’s Channel to catch. We did have a customer catch a few Albacore from the Fort Macon State Park access last weekend on the sound side. So, anglers are seeing some action already from the beaches and piers.

 

Offshore:

Still been kind of quite but we did see some really good catches of fish earlier this week. We saw Yellow Fin Tuna, Black Fin Tuna, Wahoo and some Dolphin; yea, that’s right might be hard to believe but two boats really caught them this week. Also last week, we saw some nice Wahoo coming to the scales on the good weather days. The best action this week was around 28 Fathoms around the 420 line and, most of the Yellow Fins were around the Wall. So, it’s time to get ready, the next time we have a good weather window for a few days I’ve a feeling the bite is going to be on fire going in April.

We’re more prepared this year than ever on the Offshore side of things.  Lots of new lures in the shop, going to have lots of custom options this year some new colors in the Monk A Lure and a large shipment of custom color Islanders that will be showing up in a couple of weeks, stuff that’s never been seen before all going to be some fish slaying lures.

We also just got our fresh shipment of Ballyhoo from Bait Masters the other day. We pre-ordered these baits all the way back in the fall of last year to make sure we have the best for our customers. For you Bionic Ballyhoo fans don’t worry we also have a shipment getting ready to head our way from them also. We have worked hard and got some good Combos rigged and ready to go, from entry level Shimano TLD 2-Speeds, mid-level Tyrnos 2-Speeds and top of the line Tiagra’s all paired up with Star Rods ready to fish. We also have Shimano 80W Tiagra and 50W Tyrnos Planer Combos set up at the shop to have the entry level planer outfit to the top of the line planer outfits both paired up with the Star Planer Rod. So, come see us, we can for sure get you set up for Offshore fishing.

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