Giant Bluefin Tuna -Morehead City, NC

[Over Under]

Just a quick note here. The Bluefin should start showing up off Morehead City in another week or so. We have two boats, loaded and ready to go as soon as the weather breaks...lol...story of the year it seems. We just finished up in MA and are gonna be fishing all of December and January, which is the peak season in NC. The run is short, only 5-15 miles usually and the fish are smaller than MA...usually 300-500. We should have some fresh updates in a week or so, as soon as we get on scene. STANDY BY!

Tight Lines,

Trey
__________________
Capt. Trey Rhyne
Over Under Adventures
Offshore Fishing Charters with Over Under Sportfishing
866 OUA TUNA

[TOPPDAWG]

Good to hear. We'll be keepin an eye on things in case they make they're run south to bimini this year

[Over Under]

So, we have two boats "on scene", our 48' Ocean and our 55' Carolina Rig. Both fished their first day yesterday, scouting the area for signs of bait, life, etc.. Other than some albacore and king bites, it was slow. About 15 boats fished yesterday and I heard 1 fish was caught. Both are back out this morning, and they seemed to have a better idea now on where they will be concentrating their fishing efforts. They did mark some good bait and 1 or 2 tuna.... so hopefully the 130's will be screamin today!

55' Gwaltney

48' Ocean

[weekley rehab]

sweet keep us informed

[Disco Lady]

COÑO!!!! Thinking of takeing the" Back In Gear" 28 Whitwater up there in December for some giants.

DL,

[OU Sportfishing]

Here's Captain Joe Trainor's first audio fishing report for Morehead City, NC

[Over Under]

Joe Bonvetti - 55' Gwaltney

A slow day today only a few boats out there still kinda early in the season... But Trey the baits are primo could not ask for anything better I have a few on ice from thursday night that crunch when there backs are broken, tought stuff...

[Over Under]

If you go, take some baits... hear it's all ready tough to come by... trying to get some more here in Key Largo this week...

[John_Madison CT]

OU: I'll be down the week of 12/14, fishing on the "NightHawk", with Capt Mike Marro. It's not a charter, he's a buddy of mine.

Have a great season.

John

[Over Under]

Good luck John. Things should be heating up nicely by then!

Tight lines!

[Over Under]

Both Joe and Keith Fished today for us. Still no bluefin... lots of good detailed info and color on who/how/where/when here;

Morehead City Bluefin Tuna Report

Talked to the Ballyhoo boat today. As I thought, they are catching very few Horses anymore.

[OU Sportfishing]

Just got a call from Captain Joe on the Low Profile and they just got their first giant bluefin!! We'll have pics and more info later...way to go guys!

[54bullwinkle]

Little "Sporty" out there today guys..............Way to go.

[OU Sportfishing]

Here she is....

[Uncle Buck]

Looks like that fish had one too many shots of tequila.

[Uncle Buck]

Have y'all seen this one? ~720lbs caught off the Carolinas. I think it was just a few months ago.

[OU Sportfishing]

Nice one Uncle Buck!!!

Here's our captain's report on the fish they caught yesterday....

Well we feel very lucky as of late as on Friday we had a bite at 9 and yesterday was 930 that we came tight. We had the bite on a planer with a 3 oz joe schute pink head with a pink skirt. Yesterday's fish was a little more feisty around the boat and we had a dart in him in 30 minutes. Joe schutes lures continue to be some of our very best. This one was about a 3/4 mile from Fridays. Water had cooled however from 63 to 59.6 today in the same area. Here are some pics.

[OU Sportfishing]

We just got the call that Captain Keith Burnett is on his way in after catching TWO Giants today! Way to go Keith!! The first one this morning came in at 90 inches. We don't know as of yet the size of the second one but we'll update this as we get more info. Stay tuned!!!

[OU Sportfishing]

Sorry guys....we got a false report that the Justified were coming in with two Giants but it turns out that they just got the one! He's still a nice one though at 90 inches!

Here's Captain Keith's Report and some pics too!

We have fished six days now pulling out of the slip at 4:00 am and returning around 4:00 pm each day (putting in our time). We have been in position the past few days and have not had a bite other that King Mackerel and False Albacores. Each day there were a few fish caught between 2 to 5 until 12/12/09…there was a little over 15 fish caught and there was a good bite going on. We witnessed at least 10 bites right alongside us! On day five that gets pretty frustrating. We kept at it and just did not get our shot yet. Today day six we left the dock at 4:00 PM and were greeted by a little bit of fog. We ran the chain and started fishing to the west and worked our way to the NW Places. We were marking a little scattered bait then came across a few hay stacks of bait. Just before 7:00 am our rigger bridge rod goes off, Red Head with crystal Joe Shute lure. It sounds pretty good after waiting five days! ‘Lil John starts clearing rods and after a few minutes the line goes slack. The fluoro breaks at the hook loop. “AHHHH” he yells up, “I'll re-rig this to get another bite” then starting my turn the down rod goes and it's on! He cleared everything and was just about spent. He got a drink and we kept him tight with the boat. After he had a drink it was time to get back about 500 yards of line. We finished him off and got him in the boat after swimming him until about 8:00. Nice to have the first one of the season. The bite is pretty good right now.

[OU Sportfishing]

Here's Captain Joe's report on this:

Well what a day. We felt pretty down after breaking avery nice fish off at the boat which was a long rigger bite, not sure what happened but bet I will figure it out. Anyway we had our first bite at around 9 and then came tight on the planer rod today at 11 boating the 81 inch fish in about 25 minutes. Todays core was 235. Proud of my mates today for keeping their heads up after some tough luck this morning.Her are some pics from today.

[OU Sportfishing]

Just getting this up now...Captain Keith's Audio report from yesterday. They had one on at 6:45am and he ran. They got down to a half a spool of line then lost him. Disappointing but that's how the game goes. Check out his Morehead City Fishing Report Here!

Tight Lines and Good luck to everyone out there going for the big one!

[Over Under]

Keith's Report from Yesterday:

Friday 12/18,As the first blast of snow was moving into the northeast we worked our way off the beach to the area we had our bite the previous day.The winds were predicted to pick up during the day.We put our lines in just to the east of Big 10 and and worked towards west rock. The bites over the past few days seemed to start around 6:30 am. Today it was a different story in the fleet. There were just a few bites and It sounded like Three fish or so were caught one may have been a short. We spent the day on the west side between big 10 west rock and back up on the shoal between the Shad Buoy and NW Places .The sea conditions started out nice and deteriorated during the day I guess it was NE 25 or better by the time we reached the dock. We may get out Sunday; Monday looks like a better bet. No Bluefin bites for us today we had Gannets and False Albacores attacking our baits. We will be starting over next trip, things changed dramatically the bait was hard to find bites dropped off and we will most likely be seeing a new body of fish next week.

All in all a very quiet day for the fleet.

Capt Keith

[Over Under]

Had a chance to catch up with Keith tonight. They fished the last couple days, looking all over. Ended up over on the east side, found some bait but the water was very dirty he said. He knew of 1 fish caught today. So things have really slowed up. We were comparing to years past and it seems pretty similar...waves of fish, the first of which usually comes early/mid december, followed by another right around the new year. So that's our theory and we are sticking to it! Come next week, the fish will be rolling through again and both Keith and Joe will have more fish laying in the cockpit.

Till Then,

Tight Lines and don't eat too many Christmas Cookies!

Trey

[Harry Klauber]

I hope they will be arriving right after New Years as I'll be there with Joe on the Low Profile for 5 days. I've got my fingers crossed that we get a few shots. I hope you all have a happy holiday. See you Jan 3. Harry

[Over Under]

It was nice to start the New Year off with a bite .We have been hard at it this season staying right through the Holidays. My wife Diann and friend Tara came to town for Christmas, which was a nice break for us. We enjoyed some home cooking, a few dinners out and we spent a little time shopping in Morehead and Beaufort (great towns). We were back at it this morning. When I got to the boat at 3:20 AM I was happy to see that everything was prepped and ready to go, then I figured out Lil John wasn’t up early he never went to sleep. Needless to say, he slept well as we ran out about 24 miles west of R-14 buoy in 95 feet of water .We had our lines in at dark we trolled towards the break, the temp went from 60 to 64 degrees in 1 mile, the water was some of the cleanest we have been in this year. The last ½ mile we had dolphin with us jumping in between our rigger baits and alongside. There was mid column bait, and as the water went to 64 degrees the bait started to get balled up. We marked a few fish deep and kept circling the area .Our bite came at 7:00 am on a Joe Shute 3 oz Red head with a Crystal skirt on a down rod. We cleared the rods and down riggers and had the fish alongside in 40 minutes measured at 74” weighed about 250 lbs.

Happy to have him!. Oh yea….. Lil John Slept real well on the way home too.!!!!!!!!!

Happy New Year

Capt Keith

[Harry Klauber]

I just got back from Morehead City fishing with Capt. Joe and mates Joe and John on the Low Profile. It was brutally cold (Mon - Wed), broken water lines on the docks - ice all over, and quite windy.

Monday we left the dock at 4 AM and put the lines in the water just before first light on a temp break that went from 57 to 64 degrees. The air over the warmer water was so cold that there was vapor rising from the sea and it looked like something out of a special effects movie. We were part of a 35+ boat fleet and there was one fish landed in the fleet with a possible second bite.

Tuesday was much the same with 2 fish landed - one caught when the boat was trolling toward home and had 3 of their 4 lines in the boat when the last line (deep planer) got hit and they landed a nice fish.

Wednesday might have been the coldest morning and the winds picked up about 5 knots over the steady 20 we had on Mon and Tuesday. The fleet called it a day at 11:30 without a bite reported. We did catch 3 bonito (they call them Albacore).

Joe and his crew are great and they give it their best in the worst of conditions. The fish just weren't there and Joe was in agreement with our cutting our losses and not trying to fish another day as the weather was supposed to deteriorate further with snow tonight and tomorrow. We all could have handled the freezing cold, wind, and rough seas but add no fish to that and it's pretty tough going. Their 55 Gwaltney that we fished on had a nice warm salon (quite necessary) and handled the crappy weather in fine fashion. Should the fish show up I'd defintely drive back up and fish with them again as they are great guys that try as hard as anyone possibly can. When the fish just aren't in the area we all agreed that no one can catch them.

In speaking with the tuna fishermen they all say the same thing and that is the number of fish they see caught is decreasing every year - both up north and as they follow them south. The season ends for them on Jan 31 and since they have been fishing for about 5 weeks already the most any boat has caught is 4 fish followed by Joe with 3. One of the two fish caught on Tuesday was caught by a friend of Joe's who had gone 16trips without a bite. Compare that to what Hatteras was like years ago when double digits was a normal catch day and it makes you think the fish just night need protection.

I know this is not a "glowing report" that is going to get guys motivated to try what we did. I hope it gets more people thinking that the fish just might be in trouble as even when the weather was better than what we had the fishing was still very slow. Again, Joe and his crew would be a pleasure to fish with anywhere for anything and we thoroughly enjoyed their company. It certainly wasn't for lack of trying that we didn't catch anything but as we all know "that's fishing".

It's an honest report and after below freezing temperatures for 3 days it feels downright warm back home. I'll try again if the fish show up. Harry

[Over Under]

Hey Harry, great report. I had just put this up on another board and was gonna throw something up here, but u beat me to the punch. Fishing here in the Keys is equally as difficult these days and if you can believe it, the weather over in the Bahamas is even worse than here in S. Florida!

Sitting here in the Florida Keys freezing my .... off. what is up with the weather? omg. this is nuts. needless to say, it does not exactly help the fishing cause anywhere. you'd think it might turn the sails on here, but doesn't seem to have done much...either that or no one is eager enough to go out in the cold and try!

word from MHC is Slowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww very slow. the best chance at fish is now pretty far offshore...almost 30 miles or so and it is few (very few) and far between. nothing for us since this last fish on new years and we feel fortunate to have nailed that one.

Hoping for warmer weather and cleaner water!

[Over Under]

All i can say is Thank Goodness!

After way to much sitting at the dock, Keith told me yesterday he was gonna give it a go today. He said he thought things were looking a bit better and a fish or two had been caught and the water had warmed up a bit on the shoal. Nothing great, but atleast SOMETHING positive!

Well, just got the call...91"' laying in the cockpit on ice! He said it looks pretty good, with slicks popping up and some bait around, so he's staying out, looking for another.

Him and John sure deserve it! Nice job guys, and way to keep your heads up.
__________________

[Over Under]

Morehead City Fishing - Giant Bluefin Hits the Deck after a long dry spell

The fishing has been very slow there was a nine day period that passed without a bite or fish caught. Tough to keep positive.We have been sitting for the past five days, with not much to do. Hoping a few fish show up. Then two days ago Troy on the Maritime gets spooled on a 130, having him find the fish was very fitting since he was the first to catch a bluefin this season. Then yesterday a few fish came across the dock. After sitting for so long that was all it took, just a few fish showing up. We left this morning and worked our way to the temp break there was a strong 6 degree break about 25 miles from the inlet. We put our lines in about 6:00 and worked along the break. Everyone was seeing bait things looked good. We marked one fish , some bait and kept on the bait on our third pass there he was a stbd rigger bite on a Joe Shute Pink and Crystal .After we cleared our three rods and two planners we were down to a little less than a ¼ spool. It was a good fish (thank you!) We had it along side in about 45 minutes the fish rolled and the line was under his peck fin the rod tip bounced and he was still there after a few more minutes we had the dart in him. The fish measured 93’ and cored out at 388lbs.

Tight Lines

Capt Keith
Lil John

[Over Under]

Both our boats fished today in unseasonally calm condtions. Joe said things are looking right, but he knew of only 1 fish caught today. Weather looking no good for a couple days, so probably no fishing for us till Tuesday. Standing by...