The reds were a little wary to start the charter. A few times our rods tips would bend slightly then spring back. This all changed once the water started moving! Our rods whipped over time and time again. Broke off plenty of big fish as they quickly dove for structure. Managed to get a few to the boat with the biggest at 32″!
We fit the whole rotation into today’s six hour charter! Slack high tide found us catching bull reds and sharks with live large menhaden while we also snared bluefish with gotcha plugs off the bow. As the water fell, we hooked up with trout and a rouge flounder using mud minnows under popping corks. To finish, we went onto the flats at low tide and landed slot reds using blue crab for bait. Fall is a great time to be on the water!
Visiting from France, Cedrik refused to let winds gusting 30+ out of the NE to keep him from catching redfish. We motored slowly over to one of the few corners with shelter and began to work the docks. Found a surprisingly strong bite given the conditions with cut mullet and mud minnows on jigheads both working. Good call Cedrik!
It was a gusty afternoon but the redfish were still happy! Needed to work hard to find places shielded from a heavy NorthEast wind but it paid off. Caught reds by structure with mud minnows and popping corks. Dotty produced the nicest fish of day, a 7lb red that fell prey to the old reliable blue crab.
Visiting Charleston on their honeymoon, the Cornwell’s joined me for a morning on the water. Brilliant sun and light winds made for excellent conditions and the bite was on as soon as we stopped at the first flat. We slowly worked from school to school of redfish catching a couple before moving to the next. The charter was supposedly just for Chad but even his wife got into the act! Caught a total of eight redfish including one in the slot with the rest between seven and twelve pounds.
Leaving under the cover of darkness, we rolled up on a flat where we could barely make out the shell rakes. At dawn, you could see the backs and tails of redfish as they busted shrimp. Lobbed in half a blue crab and a 7lb. red was on before I could even put the rod in a holder. Bite was so strong during the falling tide we could barely keep one bait out at a time and caught reds up to 10lbs. Once the tide turned, the fish were more hesitant and we had lots of pickups and drops but still kept putting fish in the boat. Awesome morning!
Left at dark to get as much low tide fishing in as possible. Spent the first two hours targeting large schools of redfish on the flats before they went into the grass. Until it warmed up a bit the reds were finicky eaters, often picking up our cut mullet and mud minnows just to drop them right away. Had several bites on cut mullet and then moved over to the docks. Found a dock holding some beasts that smoked our rods. Even with 40lb. test these reds were hard to get out quickly from the pilings. Nice to see the bite turning up with the better weather.
