Morning surface water temperatures have dropped to about 68 degrees inshore in Little River and clarity has improved.
With some beautiful weather this week they have been able to venture out a little more, and Captain Buddy Love of Captain Smiley Fishing Charters (843-361-7445) reports that the fishing for weakfish has been pretty incredible. They are on the nearshore reefs and off the beaches on any sort of structure in 10-20 feet of water, and you can catch them a variety of different ways. Jigging spoons, fishing live mullet or mud minnows, and cut shrimp are all working. It’s not unusual to catch 40 or 50 even though you can only keep one per person.
At the 3-Mile Reef they are also catching bluefish and Spanish mackerel casting at them, which is partially making up for the fact that the big red drum fishing is still spotty at best in the inlet and around the jetties. They are scattered and mixed with the sharks, and the numbers just aren’t great.
Inshore the redfish bite is still good around the tide cycle, and live finger mullet, cut mullet, Vudu Shrimp and more are all working. Most of the fish they have been catching are in the slot or over, but there are also still tons of smaller redfish around. If you fish shrimp or smaller pieces of bait you will catch them.
More trout are also showing up, and even though tides have been a little tricky for trout – and they have not really been targeting them – they are picking up some fish in moving water throwing artificials. They also caught a nice one on a topwater lure yesterday.
The flounder are also biting this week, and it seems that there are still decent numbers around. The best place to look for flounder has still been creek mouths on falling tides.
Finally, it’s been a really good week for black drum fishing with cut shrimp. The fish have been around creek mouths, and both the rising and falling tide have been good.
