Catching report 12-06-07

It’s wacky weather time. More often than not it seems each year we get some wacky weather this time of year.

Sometimes it comes in the form of temperatures that are out of the norm, like an 80 day in February or like this past week when the temperature vacillate between hot and cold. Sunday and Monday we had highs in the 60’s with an overnight in the high 50’s. Monday night thermometer plummeted from 62 in the daytime to 32 that night. A 40 degree shift! Brrrrr.

It pays to wear layered clothing, that way you can add or take off layers depending on the weather at hand. I also try to keep something water/wind resistant on top. That helps to keeps me warm and dry.

The fishing has been decent in spite of the wacky weather. From what I’m hearing and seeing we aren’t having a spectacular speck season this year in this area. Some are being caught but not as consistently or in the huge numbers we have seen the past two years. But that could still change as the water temperatures are still above average for this time of year.

The flounder bite has been got. A lot of little fish are being caught with some nice keepers mixed in. One just has to be patient and persistent. Natural bait, Gulp! shrimp, mirro-lures, X-Raps and Billy Bay shrimp are all working well for the trout and an occasional drum. Finger mullet (yes, there are still some here) and Gulp! are working well for the flatfish.

In the surf some very nice speckled trout are being caught. The north end of the island has seen the best action. The schools of drum are still making occasional visits to the inlets along the shoals. Plenty of grey trout are being caught on the ledges and rocky bottom areas in the 1-3 mile range.

Further out the black sea bass bite is going strong with some decent size fish being picked out of a ton of smaller ones. The grouper are still fairly close. Several of the big charter boats out of Morehead have been catching blue fin tuna if you want to give that a shot.

With the slower fishing season, I’ll be going to an every other week format through March.

I hope you catch ‘em up!