‘Bugs’ and Specks

Nothing quite goes together in the fall better than live shrimp and speckled trout, especially in the Morehead City area.

At a top-drawer lodge during turkey season several years ago, the host trotted out a sumptuous dinner of “bugs and spiders.”

“Bugs” were shrimp, and “spiders” were soft-shelled crabs.

It’s hard to beat soft-shelled crabs, but there may be one combination that’s even better than “bugs and spiders.”

That would be “bugs and specks” — shrimp and speckled trout.

If there is anything on the planet that likes to eat shrimp as much as a hungry fisherman, it’s a hungry speckled trout.

Putting a live shrimp in front of a speckled trout is about as sure a bet to get a bite as any fisherman will ever experience. Plus, if you have any bait left over after a day’s fishing, you can grill it alongside the trout filets.

And November is the peak of the best trout fishing of the year, especially in the waters of Carteret County: Morehead City, Atlantic Beach and Beaufort. If it seems like most of the trout in North Carolina spend autumn there, well, that’s not too terribly far from the truth. For a period of about 10 weeks, fishing is simply fantastic.

“October is the commencement of the festivities,” said Capt. Joe Shute, owner of a popular Atlantic Beach tackle shop and an inshore guide. “October, November and December are as good as it gets. When the shrimp start coming out of the sounds in September and October, the specks school up better, and you start to see more action.”

So shrimp and trout naturally go together? You bet. After spending the summer in coastal rivers and creeks, shrimp start to pour out into open water in the fall, heading for the ocean.

Along the “Crystal Coast,” there just happens to be plenty of open water in the form of sounds, productive marshes — and of course, the Atlantic Ocean.

The movement of shrimp and specks is a progression. As the water cools, both shrimp and fish move toward the ocean. Along the way, they spend time in the area’s extensive marshes, then around high-rise bridges and rock jetties, and finally, they spread out along the beaches. Fishermen who can follow or predict their movements can take advantage of fishing that often borders on terrific.

Shute and Chris Elliott, an inshore guide from Beaufort, said catching trout is just a matter of keeping up with what’s going on in the water.

Where are people seeing shrimp?

What kinds of places in those areas are liable to hold the greatest concentrations of trout?

How can I catch them?

“November is a really good month,” said Elliott, who doubles as a professional bass fishermen when he’s not immersed in saltwater marshes, creeks, sounds and rivers. “Trout will be everywhere. You can just about fish anywhere you want to. You can catch ’em in points, oyster rocks and holes in the marsh, or you can catch ’em right off the beach if you get a light northwest wind.

“They’ll be scattered around, but the common denominator is that most of them will be heading to the ocean, and they’ve got to go through the inlets to get there.”

That means trout will eventually wind up in either Beaufort Inlet or Barden Inlet, the latter a narrow opening between the Shackleford Banks and Cape Lookout proper. Moving out of coastal rivers and creeks, following shrimp, trout will work their way through the Newport River marshes, North River marshes and Middle Marsh, across the Bogue, Back or Core sounds, and out through the inlets into the ocean. When they get there, more often than not, they’re met by big schools of trout that are already in the ocean, migrating up and down the beach as water temperatures change.

The constant is, trout will hit live shrimp everywhere, anytime.

“The shrimp are moving out of the rivers and the creeks,” Shute said. “When we get our first hard northeast blow of the fall, they’ll start to move. They’ll be in Core Creek, the North River, the Newport River, Gales Creek and Broad Creek — they’ll all be good spots.

“I like to fish the rivers and the ‘Haystacks'(a local name a large chunk of the Newport River marshes) the first part of October. Later on, I’ll start working my way toward the beach. I’ll start checking out the rock jetties at Fort Macon, then just off the beaches in front of Shackleford Banks and Atlantic Beach. If we get some cold weather, they’ll start showing up on the beaches and at the jetties (Fort Macon and Cape Lookout).

“With all the shrimp coming out, you get to fish all kinds of good stuff.”

Shute likes to fish Core Creek and the rivers early on, in part because there’s less fishing pressure than in some of the more easily accessible marshes and other areas close to Morehead City. The key is moving water —either a rising or falling tide that will position fish on the downcurrent side of obstructions such as piers, docks, bridge pilings or oyster rocks.

You’re also liable to feel the peck-peck-peck of bothersome species like pinfish or hogfish, especially early in October before cooler temperatures run those pests out. You may have to go through a dozen pinfish before you get the bait to a trout, but when you find them, you’re liable to get repeated hook-ups.

“You’ll get more fish schooled up in the fall, and they’ll be bigger fish,” Elliott said. “You’ll find some schools with only little ones, but they you’ll find schools where they’ll all be 2-pounders, or 2s and 3s; they seem to school up size-wise. And it’s not unusual to find a group of fish that all weigh three or four pounds.”

The Newport River marshes are by far the most popular among fishermen, in part because of their proximity to Morehead City and Atlantic Beach. The marshes are extensive, from the main “Haystacks” just north of the Morehead City-Beaufort high-rise bridge, to scattered areas of marsh in Calico Creek and along the main banks of the river.

Elliott and Shute look for fish around marsh points, the mouth of tiny creeks and deep holes, always fishing upcurrent. Shute is especially happy when he can get out on a high, outgoing tide. He said the current will pull baitfish and shrimp out of the marsh grass and into the shallow flats, where specks are often waiting.

“(Fall) is great in the marsh,” Shute said. “When the tide is pulling out of the grass, you’ll catch ’em around oyster rocks, the downcurrent sides of points. In the rivers and creeks, moving water is a key. They’ll hold behind something that breaks up the current, and they’ll feed on whatever gets washed past them.”

Shute said that as November approaches, he pays attention to the movement of shrimp and trout, figuring that more and more are going to be moving toward Beaufort Inlet.

“You just have a feel for it — you fish enough, and you’ll know when you have to move,” he said. “When they start to move and you’ve got the majority of your fish from the Haystacks to the inlet, you can fish your high, falling tide back in the marsh, then run out to the high-rise bridge and fish another 45 minutes of high tide, then run to the inlet and fish another 45 minutes at the rock jetty. You can run the tide like that.”

As fish get closer to the jetties and the ocean, Shute and Elliott will fish artificials or other live baits in addition to shrimp. On the jetties, Elliott said, you’ll run into enough hogfish and pinfish that getting your shrimp to the trout can be tough. That’s when he adds mud minnows, finger mullet and artificial baits to his selection.

Shute likes a variety of sinking MirrOlures, including the 52 and TT models in red, green back, black back and Texas chicken, plus curlytail grubs in smoke, lime green and electric chicken fished on leadheads. He said that trout are also a sucker for a big topwater plug like a Top Dog or Top Puppy.

Last but not least, trout will pull out of the inlets and set up on the beach or at the Cape Lookout rock jetty. Elliott loves to fish off Atlantic Beach, especially when a northerly wind blows in and flattens out the water.

“I’ll fish sloughs on the beach, places where the waves aren’t breaking,” he said. “You need a pretty day, but (in the fall), we get a lot of north wind, and that makes the beach slick calm. You can still fish shrimp, because there won’t be a lot of pinfish or croaker out there. Or you can catch ’em on plastics like a Gambler Trout Treat or one of the Gulp! baits.