OCEAN: Offshore action has been diverse, North beach anglers caught very high numbers of blackfin tuna along with scattered catches of dolphin, wahoo, yellowfin tuna and atlantic bonito. Billfish catches were few. Hatteras fishing yielded limits of dolphin and very large specimens of both wahoo and amberjack, lesser amounts of assorted “tuna’s” were also reported along with a few sailfish releases. Midrange/nearshore success out of north beach marinas has been fair with bluefish making up the bulk of the catches, Spanish mackerel, little tunny, and red drum of all sizes were also reported. Anglers fishing these waters out of the Hatteras marinas had very poor success rates.
INLETS/SOUNDS/BAYS: Success has been moderate at best with a variety of species reported. Spotted seatrout keeper ratios have shown signs of improvement throughout the area with Roanoke sound anglers catching the bulk of them. A host of others were also caught including puffer, weakfish, flounder, kingfish, pinfish, pigfish, black seabass, and spot.
PIERS/SHORE: Things have really improved to the delight of these anglers. Spotted seatrout landings have been very good from both the piers and surf zone, very large spot and seemingely endless amounts of silver perch were also reported along with moderate catches of puffer, bluefish, and kingfish. Anglers fishing from Avon southward caught red drum of all sizes along with some very large black drum, a few pompano were still being caught in the surf zone due to unusually warm water temps. Dogfish and cownose rays were next to impossible to avoid by anyone wetting a line at most locations.
Brian A. Melott
NCDENR
Marine Fisheries Tech II