This Jacksonville guide is dialed into gator trout.
The best saltwater fishing usually occurs behind the dunes along North Carolina’s coast during the early summer or fall months.
That’s when the water temperature (68 to 72 degrees) fires up the metabolism of gamefish before their spawning periods (spring) or when they must store enough energy (fall) to survive the coming winter.
But in the creeks that feed the New River south of Jacksonville, big speckled trout start chompin’ when water temps are just above freezing and the threat of early spring snow or sleet storms remains in the air.
Only a few anglers brave the elements when it’s that cold. One of them is 41-year-old Ricky Kellum.
“Fish are here all the time, but they start to get real aggressive and feed during March and April,” said Kellum, the “Speckled Specialist” of Inshore Fishing Charters (910-330-2745, www.speckledspecialist.com).
“My best day was Jan. 1, 2008,” he said. “It was freezin’ cold, but I caught 100 trout with the Billy Bay (Halo) shrimp. It’s good on a cold day because it’s such a slow-falling lure, and specks don’t move so quick then. My biggest fish that day was four pounds, but none of ’em were smaller than three pounds.”
Although several local trout experts — Larry Hill, Ryan Gilbert, Earnest Humphrey and Charles Howard, plus guides Jimmy Price, Jeff Cronk and Mike Taylor — fish the area, none may have a better handle on the comings and goings of New River specks than Kellum. That’s probably because his family has been chasing these fish for three generations. He couldn’t have lived in a better area to hone his skills for chasing trophy trout.
Perhaps the size of the New’s specks is a result of getting ready for the spawn by loading up on baitfish. Meanwhile, some people think it’s because of Jacksonville’s terrible ecological past, while others think the town’s recent commitment to clean water has rejuvenated the fishery.
Whatever the reason, today’s fishermen regularly come home with full creels, often including 7-, 8- and 10-pounders.
“(The fast-growing fish) may be because of the baitfish,” said Kellum. “Jimmy Price said baitfish are in the creeks all-year long because the average depth is so shallow — 10 feet.”
The shallow nature of the New River means sunlight can penetrate to the bottom, and that keeps the water column heated fairly easily. Once that water temperature rises in the spring, even if a cold snap comes through, it won’t be long until the sun warms the creeks again. Moreover, the river’s winding tributaries (Southwest, French’s, Northeast, Duck, Wallace, Lewis and Town creeks) generally are protected from the north, northeast and west winds of winter.
“The creeks have baitfish in them all the time,” Kellum said. “I think that’s why guys have so much success, even when it’s cold on the main river. And I think it also may be the reason the specks grow so large here — there’s plenty of baitfish to eat year-round because of the warm shallow water back there; there’s plenty of places to hide.”
One early March morning, after Kellum launched his 22-foot Triton center-console at a ramp behind an abandoned seafood restaurant off U.S. 17, water dripping from his trailer tires immediately froze, making walking treacherous — even on the hard-pan sand. A stiff northeast wind tried to flick the tops off 1- to 2-foot waves on the river as Kellum sped along the eastern shoreline, headed for the protected waters of Southwest Creek.
A wool facemask, used mainly for duck hunting, saved noses from frostbite, and Gore-Tex-lined gloves protected fingers from the freezing chill.
“(The weather’s) gonna change soon,” Kellum said, shouting above the wind whistling over the boat’s windshield. “When (the temperature) starts climbing from the mid- 40s toward 50 degrees, that’s when the big-trout bite starts.”
Kellum said he had his best results during tough fishing conditions.
“It seems like I have my best luck during bad-weather days,” he said. “It seems like fish move more and feed more then.”
After entering Southwest Creek, he eased back the throttle, and his Yamaha outboard quieted from a muffled roar to a gurgle, then went silent as Kellum walked to the bow, opened a rod-box lid and pulled out a mixture of medium-action graphite Shimano and Quantum rods fitted with similar brand reels and Power Pro braided line.
“I like braided line,” he said. “I went with a friend and used his rods with mono, but I couldn’t feel the lure.”
His smallest Quantum reel is a PT-10.
“I don’t like a fast-retrieve reel (for specks),” he said. “When the water’s this cold, you want to work your lure slow; you can’t do that with a fast-retrieve reel, so I like these smaller reels.”
Kellum will use live bait (mostly shrimp) when he has novice anglers aboard during spring and summer, but when he’s “fun fishing,” he prefers to cast artificial lures, especially topwaters.
“I’m a topwater guy,” he said. “I like to see ’em blow up; I’ve caught a lot of my biggest fish with topwaters.”
Standing at the bow near his trolling motor, Kellum began casting with a MR17 MirrOlure in the “mullet” color. He also had a Rapala Skitterwalk ready to try if the MR17 didn’t produce results.
“The little MirrOlure, the MR17, I caught a really nice trout not too long ago with it,” he said.
Kellum kept the boat slowly moving parallel, about 50 to 60 feet from Southwest Creek’s woody, structure-laden shoreline as he cast toward the bank. It was an identical technique to spring largemouth bass fishing, except he kept his boat just out of tangled range of downed trees and roots near the bank.
The dark gray water was the color of the late-winter sky.
Kellum had retrieved a lure about halfway back to the boat when the surface exploded. A big speckled trout had smashed a MirrOlure.
After about three minutes of struggling, Kellum worked the fish to the surface, and with a landing net slipped under it, the cigar-shaped trout was lifted aboard.
“Now that’s the way to start the day,” Kellum said, grinning.
Within a couple seconds, he’d unhooked the lure from the fish’s mouth and returned the speck to the water.
“I don’t keep big trout,” Kellum said. “I keep little ones for supper sometimes, but I let the big ones go.
“The key about speck fishing in these creeks is fish bunch up this time of year. So when you catch one, there’s likely to be others in the same place. Let’s turn this boat around and try that spot again.”
Kellum quickly added another 4-pounder to the first one while another fisherman had a larger fish nearly jerk the rod out of his hand.
“I have two favorite lures, the 17MR Mirrodine (twitchbait) and the Billy Bay Halo Shrimp (sinking lure),” he said.
The Mirrodine 17MR twitchbait resembles a mullet (silver bottom, charcoal top).
He also uses the MR19 surface-walking MirrOlure in Texas Chicken (pink bottom, black top) that’s three inches long.
“You normally pop (the 17MR) about six inches in the water, then let it pause for two or three seconds,” he said. “If the water’s really cool, I let it sit there a little longer before I pop it again. It looks like a wounded mullet, and that’s what this place is full of.
“Once they hit a (specific) lure, it pays to pay attention because it’s gonna be the same way every cast after that.”
After a couple of hours, the topwater bite slowed, as expected, so Kellum turned to other lures. Two favorites are the Billy Bay Halo Shrimp in chartreuse and Storm Tuff shrimp (chartreuse with an orange spot and black eye). He also uses a shallow-running jerkbait, the Rapala X-Rap and a MirrOmullet, which is pink on top, silver on the sides and pink on the bottom.
“After the topwater bite ends at mid-morning, (those lures are) what I use,” he said. “The first time I used the Halo shrimp, I caught a 6-pound, 8-ounce speck. They like the chartreuse color because of this dark water.”
Late-winter or early-spring chasing of speckled trout isn’t like the prime times of late spring and fall, but anglers are more likely to catch big trout, he said.
“You might catch 10 or 15 trout on a good day this time of year,” Kellum said. “But if the conditions are right, you could have 20- to 70-fish days, although it’s pretty rare. Cold weather usually means scattered fish, but most of the time you’ll catch at least one big fish.”
He admitted that for numbers, spring is when his customers can use live shrimp (not available in winter), which increases their chances to hook up with a gator speck.
“(Specks) love live shrimp,” he said. “The biggest (trout) a client of mine — an 8-year-old kid — ever caught was a 7½-pounder that hit a live shrimp.”
The best speckled trout months for numbers and chances to catch gator-size fish are April and May.
“Those months are hard to beat for big trout,” he said. “The May females will be full of roe and will be eatin’ machines.”
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