cape fear gar

Greetings from the Cape Fear Coast.

Thurday May 1, 2008:

Made an evening run for Bonito. The buoy data showed 1.7' / 7secs and winds 10mph from the South. AR372 (5Mile Box Cars www.ncdmf.net/reefs/ar372a.htm) here I come. When I broke the Masonboro Inlet it was 2'/4secs. and it was like that all the way to the 5mile. It made for a wet ride in the Gosling and 30 mins later I was there. I made several very fast drifts and managed to land two 20" Bluefish. There were no signs of life in the water or in the air. I always get moving on the mind when the conditions are like this. I make three more drifts with nothing on the line or the scope. Time to make a move.

I arrive at AR370(Liberty Ship http://www.ncdmf.net/reefs/ar370a.htm) and a school of approx. 300 birds was working just West of the buoy. It was now about 18:45 and not much time left. I picked out the Thomas and Thomas 10wt. with 350grain sinking head and get at it. Sure enough if you are not the only boat out, there will always be one trolling right through the birds and sounding the fish. There were four other boats all of us upwind drifting and one Igmo trolling right through the middle round and round. I just don't get it. Anyway, I made several unsuccessful dredge drifts with the flyrod and decided to cast some jigs for the last drift as the sun was disappearing behind Wrightsville Beach. Again the Bonito elude me, damn fish.

Friday May 2, 2008:

Another Cape Fear River run in search of reported speckled trout around Wilmington. The tide was well into the fall when Pete and I arrived at the ramp around 12:30. The SW wind had a nice rolling swell by the Cape Fear Memorial Bridge all the way up to the Point Peter. We start fishing at the USS North Carolina and hit all the structure up to the 421 Bridge. There was no trout but the gars were rolling everywhere. Pete had on a white Rapala X-Rap and I was throwing a Berkely Frenzy (Tennesse shad). We kept on working structure down to Point Peter and got no strikes. We kept working structure around downtown. I told Pete to throw up into a dock and the sceond cast wham! Fish on at it was a nice one as the fish made it to the boat it was a nice gar. After forty or fifty more casts we decided to move up the Cape Fear River and speculate on

some new areas. After about a five mile run up river we found a small creek with a nice rip right out front and made some long cast into the mouth of the creek. A fortunate stop because the first cast gets slammed, as my fish heads for Southport, Pete gets hooked up. I could barely turn my fish and as I moved to back the boat off the hill I dropped the rod tip and my fish escaped the two treble hooks. I helped Pete land his first Cape Fear Striper. This creek was loaded with Rockfish. The were all around 20" fish but fun to catch. We landed 5 Rock and missed six or seven more. No trout but still a great day fishing with Rock and Gar.

Rip'em up and let some go

Capt. Danny Wrenn

96 Charter Company

Wilmington,N.C.

910.619.2224

Stripers and Dogfish

cape fear hybrid

Greetings from the Cape Fear Coast

Wednesday April 23, 2008 was spent fishing in the Cape Fear River around Downtown Wilmington, N.C.. I had heard reports of Speckled Trout in the area and decided to give casting some structure a try. I was armed with two new lures and wanted test them out for hitting deep structure and surface fishing. There was a strong NE wind blowing on the hill and threats of rain offshore but not inland and as usual never listen to the weatherman. I was dodging rain showers almost immediatly of getting on the water.
After casting for about an hour or so and hitting every piece of structure I could see I managed a couple of fierce strikes but could no get the hooks in. So I tied on one of my new lures and started over fishing a deep diver. I felt a bump along the bottom after a long retrive and decided to fish this bottom area a little more throughly. Five more casts and I had three soild strikes and on the sixth cast a fish hit that did not feel like a trout. As I lowered the rod tip to the water to break it's will, the hooks pulled and I never saw the fish. Three more casts and I landed a soild 24" hybrid.
I ended up fishing for about another two hours and had several more missed fish and landed another 20" hybrid on a shallow diver up in some structure but no speckled trout. I"ll take two nice hybrids any day. The new lures did there jobs nicely.

Thurday April 24, 2008 the forecast was calling for the ocean to lay down and a chance for Bonito again. I got the boy off to daycare and waited for my neighbor to decide if 3-5' seas and the end of a smallcraft advisory at 09:00 was okay for him to fish. He decided not to go and I was off by 08:30. This was later than I wanted to go but you go when you can. The inlet was rolling and the ride out to the Liberty Ship was a bit wet but totally do able. I made multiple drifts and only managed three blues. No signs of life at all in the water or the air. After about 09:45 the wind began to lay out and so did the swell but fishing did not improve. Time to make a move and I ran to Masons Inlet in search of life. There were random birds flying but none diving on any bait and I found no bait on the scope. I drifted and trolled around the inlet for a while and decided to make another move.
I hit Masonboro jetty and caught some blues. I cut up some bait and started bottom fishing the jetty where the Dogfish still rule the roost. I decided to call it a day and headed for the hill.

masonboro jetty dogfish

Rip'em up and let some go
Capt. Danny Wrenn
96 Charter Company
Wilmington, N.C.
910.619.2224