Sounds like a familiar refrain nonetheless, “fishing has been good”! A mixture of large and small fish. Lots of small redfish holding in most marshy area with oysters beds close by. Similarly lots of seatrout around twelve inches in length. Lots of bigger seatrout can be found close to beach fronts. Don Adams, Adams Bait Shop, said most of the brown shrimp have been pulled out with the last spring tides. Plenty of white shrimp in the creeks and rivers. Those throwing a net should have little trouble in getting bait for fishing. These shrimp are still too small for eating. Fiddler crabs seem to be everywhere! Opening the screen door of the cleaning station at the marina a dozen or so fiddlers can be seen scurrying to find hiding a place. There so many fiddlers that several will stow away on your boat if left overnight in the water. Fiddlers crabs compromise the bulk of the small redfish’s diet. Perhaps the abundance of fiddlers crabs up and down the coast is an indicator of a banner year for redfish! Redfish action has been good with the bulk of the redfish being caught are small juvenile redfish. That being said there are definitely nicer redfish to be found. Most days we’ve fished for a combination bite. We’re primarily targeting seatrout. When fishing close in too structure its possible to catch some nice reds. When water conditions are poor we’re fishing more for redfish. Some nice flounder and black drum being caught! We generally have the best flounder fishing when the tides are small and the currents are slow moving. As said at the beginning of the report fishing has been good! We catching good numbers mostly small fish but plenty of larger fish as well! Sheepshead can sometimes be found congregating on the tip of shallow water points. A more consistent sheepshead bite can be found at the Savannah River jetties. When fishing a float for sheepshead fish close to the jetties and deep. It’s possible to a fish drop shot rig for sheepshead as well as the traditional egg sinker carolina rig. Nice whiting still being caught. The down side to whiting fishing now is there are so many newly birthed baby black tip sharks. Those desiring a mess of whiting might want keep trying new spots. We’ve seen some very large whiting in lat couple of weeks.
Big fish are in! First report of large ocean pogies on the beach front. When big baits come into the sound system large fish will follow. These fish can be jack crevalles, cobia, tarpon and large sharks. Last week a few tarpon have been hooked and landed as well a couple of cobia. Break offs are likely large sharks or massive rays. In short, big fish have moved in! This time of year even when not targeting big fish it’s always a good idea to have at least one tarpon class rod on your boat. You never know.
Tides will be building throughout the week, peaking with an 8.2 feet high tide on Sunday July 19th in the evening. Typically an 8.2 foot can be a difficult tide to fish. With tides running higher than predicted anticipate more water. If the pattern remains as it has for the last couple of high tides periods fishermen will likely catch some quality fish. Tides look fishy all week. The question mark will be the weather in particularly thunder storms. When fishermen are able to get out fishing should be good! Big fish are in!
Hope this of help! Fish On! Capt. Jack McGowan