My family and I are going to Charleston for a few days of vacation. We’re staying at the Francis Marion hotel. I’ve only done a small amount of salt water fishing, so I don’t know a whole lot about it. Any tips on rigs, bait, or places to fish? I’ll only be there for a couple of days, so any help would be appreciated. I have an 8 ft rod with 20 lb test on it and a 6 ft rod with 12 lb test. I’ve done a little bit of surf fishing, but not a lot of pier fishing. I was fortunate enough to hook and land a bull redfish, but that’s about all I’ve caught. I’d like to catch some Sheephead, flounder, or another redfish, but I’m not really after one species. Please help!
if you try from a pier, shrimp or squid on the bottom with a carolina rig will likely at least catch you something (whiting, bluefish, croaker, stingray, …) if you try one of the inshore rivers, try casting a leadhead jig with a 3 or 4" paddletail jig (white, electric chicken, natural baitfish colors work good for me) and that will catch you sea trout, flounder, and redfish. put a piece of cut mullet or half a blue crab on the heavier rod and you stand a chance at reds and sharks…however my biggest sheephead was on half a blue crab (23"). sheephead you will want fiddler crabs and fish them along pier posts or dock pilings. hope that helps ya a bit and good luck!
Thanks man, I really appreciate the help. Tight lines!
Ohio basically covered it but I like a carolina rig with a 1 ounce or half ounce egg weight with either mud minnows, shrimp, or squid. I like mud minnows because they’re much harder for crabs or pinfish to strip or steal, plus reds and flounder love them. I’m also a fan or using a popping cork with either a DOA shrimp, live mud minnows, or live shrimp. Dead works too but it gets stripped very easily. Some days the trout and reds love the artificial DOA’s but live shrimp and mud minnows are always on their menu. I hope I helped at least a little.
Oh yea, if you’re staying downtown try fishing the battery or in the harbor, you’d be surprised. You can get rays, flounder, sheepshead, reds, and flounder.
You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take. -Wayne Gretsky