Dr. Ken Neill III says that the cobia are mostly gone – but some continue to be caught. They are being boated mostly be anglers chumming on the hills in the bay and along the oceanfront as well as off of the buoys as they head south. While the cobia bite has cooled down, the red drum bite continues to heat up. Reds are being found by anglers looking for cobia. More fish are being caught stacked up at the islands of the CBBT. Sheepshead are active at the CBBT along with a by-catch of triggerfish and tautog. There are still spadefish hanging around the islands, but they will be moving out and hang around the coastal wrecks into October.
Wreck fishing is very good right now with excellent catches of flounder, triggerfish and sea bass. If the first wreck you visit is not loaded, try another. Wrecks in the Tower and Triangle Reef areas are very productive. Spanish mackerel can be caught around the wrecks and along the oceanfront. King mackerel are also being caught. Jack crevalle and amberjack are possibilities at some of the wrecks and at the Chesapeake Light Tower.
There are some good catches of croaker and spot being made in the rivers and from area fishing piers. Pufferfish, sea mullet, and pigfish are all being caught in good numbers. The speckled trout bite is predictably poor, but there are some fish being caught up on the flats, inside Back River, in the Mobjack Bay and in the bayside creeks of the Eastern Shore.
Offshore fishing is very good. The marlin bite is at its seasonal peak. Dolphin are plentiful. Good numbers of wahoo are being caught and there are some tuna around – bigeye, longfin, yellowfin and blackfin.
Nags Head
TW’s Report 9-16
Surf Fishing: Another beautiful day on the Outer Banks with Carolina blue skies. Scattered Bluefish, Sea Mullet and small Black Drum are in the surf. We have NW winds at 7 and the water temp is 77 degrees.
Sound Fishing: The Little Bridge on the Nags Head/Manteo causeway reported Stripers, Croakers, small Flounder and the Trout are getting bigger. There was a nineteen-inch Trout caught yesterday.
Pier Fishing Report:
Avalon: Scattered Blues and Spanish
Nags Head: A few Blues and Spanish
Jennette’s: A few Sea Mullet, few Spanish and Blues.
Outer Banks: Slow. There are still loads of bait in the water.
Inshore/Nearshore boats: Nearshore trolling boats caught Blues and Spanish. Inshore charters also had good catches of Blues and Spanish with Albacore and Pompano as well.
Oregon Inlet
The Oregon Inlet Fishing Center said that blue water boats on 9-14 brought in good numbers of dolphin as well as more of the prized yellowfin and blackfin tuna, including 2 trophy citations at 71-lbs. Two make-up charter anglers brought in a 222 lb. Big Eye Tuna and a 161-lb. Big Eye Tuna. There were 27 white marlin, 3 blue marlin and 5 sailfish releases.
On 9-15, the off shore charter boats brought in some nice Yellow Fin Tuna. An angler on Escape landed a 200-lb. Big Eye tuna. They are also still catching a bounty of Dolphin. Off Shore Charters caught and released 41 White Marlin and 3 Sailfish.
The Near Shore and In Shore Charters are catching some beautiful Spanish mackerel and blues along with albacore and Pompano.
The Miss Oregon Inlet headboat caught a variety of fish including flounder, bluefish, sea mullet, sea bass, sea robin, gray trout, pin fish, pig fish and puffer fish.
Hatteras Surf
On Monday, Red Drum & Tackle reported that The Point had Bluefish and Spanish caught on glass minnows and sting silvers. Behind the motels, it was Bluefish, Spanish and a few Flounders. The best baits for the Flounders were shrimp and squid. Some of the lure colors for the Spanish and bluefish catches were natural, red and white and pink.
The Tuesday report noted lots of Spanish and Bluefish. Some of the best lure colors were red and white, white with pink and green on the sides and pink. Behind the motels, it was Spanish, Bluefish, and albacore. The Jetties had some pretty Sea Mullet. Behind Cape Hatteras Motel, anglers using sand fleas caught Pompano.
Hatteras Offshore
Capt. Dave Wilson reports: “Things were a little scrappy on 9-15, but we were blessed with a little bit of action throughout the day. Out in the deep, the yellowfins found us again and we managed to land three. We picked at a couple different schools of dolphin till we had thirty, and Glenn topped everything off with a sailfish release.”
“On 9/14, fishing overall was been pretty good. Plenty of dolphin and wahoo, although they were not as abundant today. We did stumble on some birds out in the deep and got our first yellowfin “wham” of the fall. We landed four and a bonito out of seven bites, to go with a handful of dolphin.”