To Catch Flounder Is To Know Them
By Tony Rose
Flounder fishing can be like shopping at the mall, you can find success in many places, but you need to know where to look first. You need to know something about what your looking for.
Targeting these fish takes patience and a little scouting.
Its all about structure.... bends, breaks, holes, and dips, drop offs in the rocks, creek & inlet mouths, grass edges sand bars,troughs, pillars, pilings, docks and jetties. Structure that will funnel the tides current and cause eddies.
Flounder are ideal ambush predators using their flat profile and camouflage sitting in these eddies waiting to strike.
Slack out going and the first of incoming tides seems to be the best times to fish for flounder. The current is moving just strong enough to move bait.
Flounder can be caught year round but the BEST Bite is when the water starts cooling off around Oct./Nov. It is said thats when they want to FATTEN UP for their migration to deeper water to spawn. Most fish will be caught in water less than 5 feet
Facing into the curent flounder will eat almost anything they can fit into their mouths. A flounders strike will never take the rod out of your hand. Its is subtle, and sometimes just feels like some extra preasure like maybe your sinker is hung up. The trick is not to set the hook right away. When you feel that preasure the flounder usually has the bait in its mouth, holding it in it’s sharp teeth. It may swim 10 feet away to it’s safety zone before swallowing. If you set up when you first feel the fish you’ll get back half your bait.
Anglers use a variety of drifting rigs and rod reel combos depending on water conditions. Here are a few I have used
1. Egg sinker about 1-3oz ( NOT TOO HEAVY, you want the sinker and bait to move around alittle with the current) between two swivels, then about -- "5-8 inch" leader-- ( remember you want your bait ON THE BOTTOM ). You then want to put a wide gap hook on. Mud Minnows are the best but are hard to come by. Small Finger Mullet,and croakers are more common baits used.
2. A soft plastic on a jig head, tied to about 1-1/2 foot of leader. I like the Monster 3X, DOA or Gulp Grub Tails and Shrimp with a 1/8-1/2 jig head. The trick is to let the jig bounce the bottom while reeling in SLOWLY. Every once and a while raise your rod tip and let the jig go back to the bottom. COVER AS MUCH GROUND AS YOU CAN ------SLOWLY
3.My FAVORITE is using live shrimp on a Troll Rite Hook-UP jigs. I like using the lighter jig heads, the heavier ones tend to have a bigger hook which makes a big hole in the shrimps head and it jumps off.I'll fish this the same way I do a soft plastic
For the rod reel combo I mostly use a bait casting type set up. A 7-1/2 to 8ft med-heavy rod with a sensitive tip, 30-5l0b. Brightly colored braid (my eyes are not what they use to be)...... I also will use a spinning combo, but I can let line out easier, rising and droping my bait with my free hand
when I feel a bite with the bait casting outfit.
Since covering lots of water is the key to catching lots of flounder I us live shrimp or artificial lures most of the time. I’ll try different types of artificial baits tring to find something NEW. There has been many times when I use my swimming pool as a test tank to see how things move and work in water.
One other thing I feel that is important to have is some sort of landing net with a long or extendable handle. Flounder have a way of getting off right when you start day dreaming on how your going to cook it.
FLOUNDER FISHING IS SLOW, TEDIOUS FISHING. You almost have to fish every little spot there is. Fishing is all about PATIENCE and real Flounder Fishermen are just that. If you take your time, do alittle scouting, and present your bait naturally , you can bring home a limit in a short time.....
