Awesome Inshore Fun

By Scott Lenox

Posted on July 28th, 2017

The offshore report from today is easy….it was rough, tuna fishing sucked, that is all.

Inshore fishing today on the other hand was pretty darn good. The weatherman missed the start time of the rain by a few hours so some of us got out and caught the clean water on the high tide and had some awesome inshore fun before the rain started this afternoon.

My decision to get out on the water came with some help from my buddy Captain John Prather of Ocean City Guide Service. Captain John was on the water this morning and advised me that the water was dirty in the bay and he was shark fishing, but the water was going to be coming in clean and the tide would be good this afternoon. Captain John had some good shark fishing action and one keeper flounder on that morning trip and when I saw him again this afternoon he put another keeper in the boat for his afternoon anglers.

Captain Brad McCabe of Baytime Charters got out before the rain today too and found a couple of keepers. These fish were 17 1/2″ and 19 1/2″ and were two keepers out of the 16 fish he caught in just an hour and a half.

Thanks to the weather holding out I had a chance to get the Fish in OC Carolina Skiff on the water with my wife and first mate Kristen, my son Ryan and his buddy Owen. The boys did great and smoked “Captain” Scott releasing a total of 15 flounder on Gulp baits on the Harbour Island drift.

Captain Luke Blume of the C Boys had the B Boys on the water today with his family and had some fun fishing the route 50 bridge. The crew of Emily, Michael, Brian, Dave and Joshua released several throwback flounder and Joshua lucked into this 22″, 4.2 pound red drum on a live minnow…..and then they got soaked in the deluge.

Today on the Tortuga with Captain Drew Zerbe there were several throwback flounder caught and the kids on board were hot with young anglers catching pool winners on both the morning and afternoon trips.

I just got this photo from Captain Drew of the Tortuga from this evening’s trip. It seems three hours of fishing in the rain paid off for Jason Wise from Marsteller, PA. Jason just landed this 4 lbs. 8 oz pool winner and new 1st place Derby fish on the Tortuga’s last trip of the day. The big flattie is currently worth $500 and was caught on a shiner and squid combo in the east channel. Netted by mate Serge Garder.

I got two reports today from Captain Monty Hawins of the Morning Star who had some good sea bass fishing and a couple of flounder before this weather.

“I sure as heck wouldn’t call it flounder fishing, but we are seeing a few. (very few)
Here’s a pair pushing 20 inches – with Terry’s edging out Gary’s by a shade.
Pictured are Gary Cohen, Milton; Donny Brenneman, York; Two-Drop Terry Burgess, York; & Aaron Berman, Nashua, New Hampshire… Sea bass bite, though mostly throwbacks, was decent in front of this blow.
I have NO IDEA what we’ll find afterward – but we will go find out!”

These fellows call themselves, “The Culvert County Boys.” (and do not care what the actual spelling is!)
They hit sea bass pretty good today — fish bit before the blow.

The Angler with Captain Chris Mizurak might not be fishing this weekend thanks to the weather forecast, but today there were some nice sea bass that came over the rail.

Captain Marc Spagnola took advantage of the conditions before the rain moved in and put his shooters on some great action for southern and cow nosed rays in the south bay.