Belhaven makes a good lure testing site
The waters around Belhaven, NC are a special destination for fishing.
In numerous places in the area, freshwater streams become brackish on their way to transforming into saltwater in the length of a mile or two.
The Intracoastal Waterway crosses the upper edge of Pamlico Sound, lower edge of the Pamlico River, and runs up the Pungo River between Wades Point and Willow Point to the Belhaven Breakwater and entrance to Pantego Creek at the edge of town.
At this point, the northbound Intracoastal Waterway/Pungo River makes a hard right bend and continues through southeast Beaufort County into Hyde County to connect to the Alligator River on the Waterway’s northward course.
The boundaries between Coastal and Inland Waters are at the Belhaven Breakwater and a few miles up the Pungo River. These boundaries are also in effect at the mouths of many of the smaller creeks that connect to the river. However, the fish don’t know and don’t respect these boundaries. Speckled trout, red drum and more may be in waters designated as Inland. And bass, catfish and more in waters designated as Coastal.
This makes for a great melting pot of baitfish, and the larger fish that gather to eat them. The Belhaven area is best known for its good trout, red drum and striper fishing. But the fish wander across lines they can’t see and don’t know, and other species may be in your favorite spots. This makes it incumbent on fishermen to have the proper licenses for the water they are fishing. Fishermen familiar with the area carry both saltwater and freshwater licenses and tend to be a bit secretive about exactly where they are catching which fish.
Dingy water, no problem
Capt. Chris Ivey and Lambert Garris are from Greenville, NC but make the roughly hour drive to enjoy the Belhaven fishing regularly. Ivey runs Five-Oh Charters and Garris works at Greenville Marine Outdoor Center. Both are part of the Pro-Staff crew for Salty Bay Baits of Dunn. Garris and Ivey enjoy fishing tournaments at Belhaven and to do a little R&D on new lures and colors.
On a recent scouting trip, their newest lures and colors caught speckled trout, red drum and flounder. Ivey and Lambert said they were also expecting to catch a striper or two, but that didn’t happen this day. They blamed that on the less-than-stellar water conditions. Several inches of rain in the few days prior turned the water a dingy brown.
Ivey headed down the river at first light and eased near the bank just outside a fair-sized creek. It was dark enough to run the navigation lights, but he could see the water was still carrying a lot of effluent from rainwater runoff. He and Garris had good history with this creek and decided fishing in the murkier water would be a good test for the lures and colors, so Ivey slipped the trolling motor over while Lambert made his first cast.
While easing a little closer to the creek mouth, Ivey was walking the dog across the surface when a decent speckled trout whacked his Dazzle Peanut lure. This topwater lure is shaped with larger ends, and a slim waist between, roughly similar to a peanut. It also has a single low frequency rattle. Several casts later he hooked another and then Garris convinced one to bite a different color Dazzle Peanut. Smiles were creeping across their faces with the quick and somewhat unexpected success. They thought this might be a bite firing off, but it didn’t continue and they had to cast a while before getting another bite.
Switch it up
“I’ve fished this area many times before and there are usually some fish here,” Ivey said. “Sometimes they can be stubborn and sometimes they are hungry and attack right away. When the fish aren’t biting, but you think they’re around, you change lures and colors trying to find something that gets their interest. I’ve switched to this cigar minnow soft plastic in the Lemon Pepper color and I’m going to throw it a while. I’ve had good luck with it before. It took me a while to convince Salty Bay to add the color, but I like it and others must too. It’s starting to sell.”
About 15 to 20 casts later, Ivey’s confidence was rewarded again. He was twitching the cigar minnow bait along the bottom and a trout sucked it in. While he was removing the hook to release the trout, Garris lobbed a cast near a few remaining pilings from an old dock and was immediately rewarded with a strike. This was also a trout.
The action slowed again and Ivey made a substantial change. He put a chartreuse shrimp-shaped soft plastic lure on a Salty Bay Pencil Jig and tied it about two feet under a Red Line Rigs Dinner Bell popping cork. He threaded the shrimp on the pencil jig backwards, so the hook bend was at its head and the hook eye came out its back. He explained that shrimp move backwards when startled and this would make the lure mimic that movement.
Shrimp is always popular
“Everything likes to eat shrimp, so let’s see if a drum is up there along that rip-rap,” Ivey said as he lobbed the shrimp and cork to within about a foot of a line of rocks protecting a section of shoreline and let it settle for a few seconds.
After the ring from the cast had spread wide, Ivey gave a sharp but short tug on the rod to make the cork pop. The shrimp jumped backwards under it. The response wasn’t immediate, but after a few casts, something jerked the cork under and took off running down the shoreline.
Garris said he thought this would probably be a drum acting that way, but added it could be a striper or a large flounder. His first guess was correct and, in a few minutes, Ivey led a tired red drum to the landing net and Garris deftly scooped it up. This was the second species on colors new to the Salty Bay line and in less-than-ideal conditions.
They had been moving deeper into the creek, but the water began looking murkier. So it was time to try somewhere else. The next creek was closer to the mouth of the river, but the water was still dirty and off color. Ivey and Garris covered most of the area just inside the creek’s mouth, but couldn’t convince anything to bite. After giving several lures the opportunity to shine, they decided to move again.
This time they moved to a creek on the opposite side of the river to see if it might be a little cleaner with this wind direction. The wind had blown up and the river was choppier than expected. But Ivey and Lambert would find out pretty quickly this was a good move. The water in this creek wasn’t clean by any means, but it wasn’t as dirty as the water they had been fishing earlier in the day. The best part was the fish seemed to like it better too and began biting more consistently. The action wasn’t enough to be considered hot, but pretty dang steady. And that was good, as the weather began to deteriorate.
Flounder, too
With the bite being more consistent, Garris decided this would be a good time to try one of the new Salty Bay Wood Series #1 lures. The reaction of the fish in this creek confirmed it was a good change. The fish didn’t jump on it with his first cast, but they soon warmed up to it and were biting slowly, but steadily. This lure had a unique action as pulling it forward made it dive, while releasing the tension allowed it to wobble back to the surface.
It wasn’t long before Ivey had a flounder grab one of the cigar minnow soft plastics he was twitching across the bottom. He quickly released the flounder and pronounced it as the third species for the day.
They moved across the mouth of the creek and realized the wind had picked up a little more. This prompted Ivey to check the radar picture on his phone and the image wasn’t good. It showed several nasty rain clouds moving in. They fished roughly another half hour trying to add a striper to the species tally, but it wasn’t to be. With thunderstorms closing in, they decided to call it a day.
This had turned out to be a pretty good trip, especially considering the water conditions. Some fish were willing to feed and gave positive results from the new lures and colors. Even better, the timing was right and they made it back to the Belhaven ramp, loaded the boat and were sitting in the truck when the first raindrops fell. Yes, it was a really good day.
Be the first to comment