Fall Drum Window Cracking Open — Week of September 21

Cape Hatteras Point is the headline this week. Water at 80.2°F, NE wind laying down to 2-7 mph, and a clean 3.3ft swell at 8 seconds means the shoals will be fishable and the drum will be moving. Work the incoming from mid-morning through the 17:52 high with fresh mullet or a chunk of bunker on a Fish Finder Rig. Pompano are still in the wash — Hi-Lo with sand fleas or Fishbites in the first slough on the falling tide down to the 12:10 low. Watch that Tuesday night easterly bump to 12-13 mph, it'll dirty things up briefly but should push bait tight to the beach behind it.

Avon Pier is holding Spanish and blues on the morning slack around the 05:24 high — get there before sunrise and throw a white bucktail or a 4" topwater stick bait through the wash. Kingfish rigs on the end with live bait are still worth soaking through the afternoon high at 17:52. Water's warm enough that the second sandbar bite should hang on another week or two.

Hatteras Inlet is staging flounder hard right now. Fish the channel edges on the last of the outgoing before the 12:10 low with a Flounder Carolina Rig and a live mud minnow or finger mullet. Yellow/chartreuse bucktail tipped with Gulp works the same drops if you'd rather cast. Drum are showing on the flat edges on the incoming — Fish Finder Rig with cut bait as the tide fills back in toward 17:52.

Oregon Inlet — flounder in the cuts on the outgoing to the 10:48 low, and the sound side flats are worth a look for drum on the topwater in the low-light windows. False albacore should start showing nearshore any day now with this water temp trend. Keep a wire leader and a small metal in the truck.

Murrells Inlet is fishing well. 82.8°F water, light NE wind, and the big 5.3ft high at 16:23 is going to flood the spartina — redfish will push way back in the grass on that afternoon flood. Weedless gold spoon or a topwater stick bait along the grass edges. Trout are holding in the deeper holes on the outgoing to the 09:58 low, and flounder are stacked on the channel drops on a Carolina rig.

Folly surf is warm at 83.7°F with a solid 5.6ft high at 16:54. Whiting and pompano on the Hi-Lo with fresh shrimp or fleas through the falling tide, and reds are working the trough on the incoming — Fish Finder with cut mullet. Watch the afternoon thunderstorm chance and get off the beach if it lights up.