By Dr. Ken Neill, III
Virginia will have a cobia season this summer, but regulations will be much more restrictive than we are used to. Starting June 1, the minimum size will increase from 37 inches to 40 inches. Anglers will still be allowed 1 fish per person but only up to 2 fish per boat. Only one fish may be greater than 50 inches. Also, gaffs may not be used to land cobia in 2016. The season will be closed after August 30. A mandatory reporting program is being developed. What can be said about all of this is that is better than closing for the summer. Cobia fishing in federal waters will close June 20. These new regulations were as VMRC was willing to go in the face of federal request for state waters closure on June 20. “Request” is too light a word when it is coming from the federal government. But, federal managers have admitted problems with their management plan and acknowledged that most of the burden was being placed on Virginia. So, VMRC came up with this stopgap, very conservative, measure to get us through 2016. Stay tuned, informed and involved, as cobia management is planned for 2017 and beyond. Just one less person showing up to speak at the VMRC meeting or even just one less letter received and we very well may have had the cobia fishery shut down this summer. It was that close.
Fishing report:
Cobia are here in good numbers, early this year. More are still on the way, but good catches are being made by anglers chumming and by those sight fishing. The sight-casters are being distracted by large schools of red drum cruising around near the mouth of the bay. Sight fishing for red drum has been kind of epic this week. Those fishing baits in the seaside surf and on the shoals, especially in the evening hours, are still catching big reds. Black drum continue to be caught near Buoys 10, 13, and 16. That bite will be winding down soon.
The flounder bite is picking up. It is not great but some nice flounder have been caught at the CBBT and some are beginning to be caught at most of the flounder spots. Some decent catches were made off of Grandview this week. Some speckled trout are being caught in the Mobjack, York, and Back Rivers and up on the flats. Croaker fishing has been good up in the rivers. Sheepshead are at the CBBT. Spadefish have arrived at the Chesapeake Light Tower. A few Spanish mackerel have been caught along the oceanfront.
Offshore has gone from not much happening except for sea bass, tilefish, and other bottom fish to being wide open. Limit catches of yellowfin tuna have been made from the Norfolk Canyon to the Cigar. Good numbers of dolphin are also being caught. There are a lot of mako sharks around and blue marlin have been encountered. The first bigeye tuna was caught at the canyon.
Nags Head
TW’s Bait and Tackle reports on Wednesday:
Surf Fishing: Surf fishing is slow with a few scattered Sea Mullet. The wind is NE at 15 and the water temp is 72 degrees.
Sound Fishing: The Little Bridge anglers on the Nags Head/Manteo causeway are catching Trout this morning with some keepers.
Pier Fishing:
Avalon: Sea Mullet and Speckle Trout.
Nags Head: A good run of Sea Mullet and Blues.
Jennette’s: Sea Mullet.
Outer Banks: Sea Mullet, Spot and Pigfish
Oregon Inlet
Hurricane Bonnie didn’t do the fishing fraternity many favors, keeping many blue water fleet in port over the weekend. On May 31, however, one angler boated a 562.5 lb. blue marlin while another boat scored with a 42 lb. citation mahi. Other boats landed good numbers of mahi, mostly gaffers, and some nice yellow-fin.
Near-Shore anglers had good fishing on Wednesday, pulling in Spanish mackerel, bluefish, and speckled trout. It was a little too cloudy to nab those cobia, but we’re hopeful for a good sunny day tomorrow.
In-Shore anglers enjoyed good speckled trout and Spanish mackerel catches. Afternoon anglers had catches of shark.
Miss Oregon Inlet Headboat enjoyed very good fishing this afternoon, pulling in sea mullet, puffers, sea robins, pigfish, pinfish, and spot. Anglers also had catch and release of gray trout and flounder. There is excellent ticket availability and advance purchase is recommended
Hatteras Surf
Red Drum reports on Wednesday:
The rain spared us this afternoon, but set back in this evening so after this, hopefully it is over. Carla, one of the local fisher woman, saw some Spanish in Avon and was going to give it a shot. The south beaches had some Sea Mullet and Bluefish on bait. Ramp 43 had a Sea Mullet. Avon had Bluefish. The fishing was a bit slow today but there is always tomorrow. The water got a little dirty but the wind went east so it should clean back up and the Spanish should show back up on ramp 43 and 44.
On Tuesday, the sun came out shinning after a while. Fishing was a little slow but that was okay after the 7 inches of rain yesterday. Ramp 43 had Sea Mullet and Pompano. Ramp 49 had some Sea Mullet. Avon had some Blue Fish. The inshore boats had good bites on Puppy Drum and Trout.
Hatteras Offshore
On Wednesday, Hatteras Harbor reported that inshore anglers experienced good Gray Trout fishing in the morning. Afternoon anglers brought “keeper” Puppy Drum back to the dock. The Bluefish were biting as well.
Offshore, the Billfish bite was on! Three Blue Marlin, one White Marlin, and four Sailfish were released. Dolphin fishing was fair, with some gaffers caught. Blackfin Tuna and Wahoo helped to fill the fish box.
On Tuesday, Dolphin were the main catch with a scattered Tuna bite and some Groupers. Lots of billfish were milling around with some catch and release action. Inshore boats were catching nice Spanish mackerel and some Drum.