It isn’t often a sport writer gets to tell a fish story so rewarding. Last week Mark Steffens emailed me saying he was bringing in his clan from Pennsylvania down to Bald Head Island for the holiday season. He wanted to try some surf and dock fishing for redfish and speckled trout and he asked for my help.

I sent Mark the best advice I could give him, which was basically a rundown on what Gulp baits to use for redfish and trout as well as how to fish with cut mullet if nothing else worked.

The resulting emails and photos were a bonanza of fishing fury.



Josh Gehman, Mark’s son-in-law, reported that dock fishing on Bald Head Island went exceedingly well.

“I took my nephew out on Friday during low tide and we saw a bunch of fish around the marina walls on Bald Head Island,” said Josh. “The trout and red drum were all there and feeding, hitting any Gulp baits rigged on a jig head. We caught maybe 40 red drum and 15 speckled trout the past few days. We’ve had a blast!”



The crew included Joshua Brown, Shawn Brown, Caleb Brown and Will Gehman. They fished the weekend at Bald Head Island throughout the rough weather and eventually had the luxury of changing tactics.



“The mullet were stacked up too and we caught some snagged fishing with jigs,” Josh said. “We took up your trick of using cut mullet and started really catching the redfish. They were all over it.”

Mark and Josh said that the redfish and trout were hitting Gulp shrimp and mullet baits on white and red ¼ ounce jig heads, in addition to nailing the cut mullet on bottom rigs.



“We tried it all,” said Josh. “They were hitting everything.”



Mark and his crew obeyed our brand new strict NC regulations on redfish and sea trout, but still were able to keep a couple of fish for the dinner table.



For more fishing tips and articles see my blog A Dash of Salty and my website
Surf and Salt.