January 2013 Holden Beach Fishing Report
What a wonderful day this was. Joining me was Sherry and two kids Arron and Leigh from Boling Springs, NC. These kids just wanted to go have fun and catch some fish. So that's what we did. Loaded up and headed out about 7 miles to a spot I had fished a few days ago. This time I brought along some light inshore tackle so that we could have some serious fun with the Sharks that seem to be everywhere right now. I will have to admit this was the first time the kids had really ever fished in the Ocean before and they did great. We were hooked up with fish from the time we arrived to the time we decided to leave.. Half Day nearshore fishing is great way to introduce ocean fishing to kids for the first time.
Today I had a family from Charlotte join me in on what was supposed to be a inshore red fishing trip. We left the dock at 8 am and the live well was full of bait and the tide was just right. Ran down the river and started fishing in areas that hold red fish. Around 11 am I was starting to get worried, we had not had one bite from a fish.. The wind started to pick up and was blowing a steady 20 knots and it was beginning to get a little tough to fish in certain areas. We decided to go fish the canals in Holden Beach to escape the wind. Once we arrived it wasnt 5 minutes and we were hooked up with a flounder. We continued to fish the canals and ended the day hooking 4 flounder and boating 3. Tough day but ended it well..
I had the opportunity to take one of my good clients Earl out today along with his two daughters Taylor and Madison. Our mission today was catch and release Sea Bass. We loaded up 4 light weight jigging rods and headed for a nearshore reef about 7 miles out. It was like clock work. Every time our baits hit the bottom we were pulling up fish. The one thing that made this trip interesting was the number of sharks we were catching. We were catching them two at a time and needless to say they kept me busy the whole trip. Its the middle of January and the temp. was in the high 60's. I did manage to take a pic. of the sunset on our way back home.
1-14-13 Red Drum Missing In Action (M.I.A)
1-14-13 Man what a day. This was one of those days I would have given my right arm to have my client Micheal Roth and his mother from Ocean Isle catch some fish.. The tide just wasnt going to be good until later that evening and I knew conditions were not in my favor. We fished for 4 hours with out one single sniff from a fish. We pulled up in a spot that we had fished earlier that day and everything looked good. Tide was down and saw a little bit of bait swimming near bank.. I set the anchor, baited the hooks and within seconds we were hooked up and the fight was on. We ended up catching 3 redfish and a decent 17 in. flounder all in a 15 minute period and ended the day with a smile on everyone's face.. It's those kind of days that really make me appreciate what I do for a living and that not just fishing but making memories for people that will last a lifetime.
1-13-2013 Flounder Fishing Offshore
1-13-2013 This past Sunday I took some family out for a fun-filled day on the water. The winds were light and slight and the ocean looked like a lake. We decided to push-off to a ledge 28 miles out in 80+ ft. of water. Over the years when bottom fishing for Black Sea Bass we would catch a flounder every now and then on squid. So today since the Black Sea Bass fishery is closed I wanted to try and do some jigging on the down side of the ledge away from all the sea bass.. It started off slow but after about 20 minutes of running away from the sea bass we finally picked up a nice 18in. flounder. We were drifting over the ledge and would pick up a sea bass on every drop but once we were down current and not marking any structure or bottom fish on the fish finder is when we knew we were in flounder territory. We managed to pick up 5 keeper flounder, the biggest 4+lbs.
O.K. Guys. If your looking for something fun to do this winter and you think your MAN enough and TUFF enough to do batlle with some hard fighting WAHOO. I dare you to give me call and lets set up a trip. All Jokes aside. Winter time wahoo fishing can be world class off our North Carolina Coast.. Pictured here is one of our Wahoo we caught while trolling some 60 miles offshore in the Gulf Stream
on Sunday January 6 2013.