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Lower Cape Fear River (Detailed Report)

Inshore 
7K views 9 replies 10 participants last post by  Scott Hobbs 
#1 ·
The fishing in the Lower Cape Fear River has been really good the past two weeks. Cooler temperatures at the end of July fired things up. This has been one of the best summers I have ever had for trout fishing. Early morning starts have produced a lot of quality trout on topwater. The afternoon topwater bite has been more decent than I expected. We are getting blown up until noon especially in overcast conditions. Solid fish have also come on jigs as well as mirror lures. The best performing jig colors have been natural colored Zmans. The best performing Mirror Lures have been 17MR’s in rainbow trout and pink. We have been picking up a bunch of redfish mixed in with the trout while topwater fishing. The trout have been on deeper water edges along islands and banks with current near the main river. It has seemed that when we slide in a bit shallower we have been picking up redfish in the same area. I have not been catching trout in less than 3 feet of water. When the sun gets up and the tide gets low I have been focusing my efforts sight fishing for redfish. This time of year the fish get extremely shallow on the last of the falling and the first of the incoming. They’re eating the shrimp before they get in the grass. This makes for very exciting sight fishing with lots of tailing and belly crawling fish. We have had a lot of aggressive eats in the shallows with the Eye Strike Texas Eye Jig and Zman SwimmerZ in Houdini. I have not been spending much time focusing on flounder, but I have seen quite a few nice fish in the shallow water while red fishing. The amount of big flounder I spook out of just inches of water while looking for redfish is mind blowing. Creek mouths and scalloped banks with oysters and miniature points are the places I have seen the most flounder. August, September and October are my favorite months out of the entire year for fishing the Lower Cape Fear. Don't miss out!
 

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