Early Winter Fishing Along the Carolina Coast

Name’s Artificial Lure, checking in with your coastal Carolina fishing rundown from the Atlantic side.

We woke up to a cool, breezy start along the beaches from Oak Island up through Hatteras, with northwest winds around 10 to 15 knots and seas running 3 to 5 feet off Oregon Inlet according to the latest marine forecast from Marineweather and the National Weather Service. Air temps are riding the upper 40s early, pushing into the upper 50s to near 60 this afternoon under mixed sun and clouds. It’s classic early‑winter beach weather: chilly, but fishy.

Tide is key today. At New Topsail Inlet, Tide‑Forecast shows a low around 8:20 this morning with the first high just after midnight and another high mid‑afternoon. Up the line at Kitty Hawk, tide runs similar with a predawn high around 1:25 AM and low near sunrise. Plan to be set up an hour on either side of that incoming water; that’s when the bites have been turning on.

Sunrise along the Crystal Coast is right about 7:10 AM, sunset a little after 5 PM per Tides4Fishing’s Oak Island tables, so your best windows are first light into mid‑morning and that last two‑hour push before dark.

On the catching side, December has slid things into more of a winter pattern. Carolina Sportsman and local shops along Morehead and Wrightsville report speckled trout still chewing in the surf holes and around inlet jetties, with a mix of slot red drum and some puppy drum roaming the sloughs. Nearshore boats have been finding scattered false albacore and a few late‑season Spanish mackerel on the warmer days, plus sea mullet and gray trout on the bottom. Offshore, when seas allow, wahoo and blackfin tuna have been the headliners along the break out of Oregon Inlet and Hatteras.

Bluefish are making a bit of a comeback story. The N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries announced that, starting January 1, bag limits for bluefish will increase thanks to a 2025 stock assessment showing the population is rebuilding. That matches what pier anglers from Atlantic Beach to Oak Island have been seeing: decent runs of tailor blues on metal and cut bait when the water’s got some color.

Best offerings right now: in the surf, rig fresh shrimp or cut mullet on double‑drop bottom rigs for sea mullet and drum, and keep a 1‑ to 2‑ounce metal spoon or diamond jig handy for blues and albacore. For specks, local regulars are leaning on 3‑ to 4‑inch soft plastics in electric chicken, opening night, or plain white on 1/8‑ to 1/4‑ounce jigheads, along with MirrOlure 52Ms and MR17s in natural baitfish or chartreuse patterns. In the inlets, a live mud minnow or finger mullet on a Carolina rig is still hard to beat for reds.

Couple of hot spots to circle today:

• Around Atlantic Beach and Oceanana Pier: the tide charts from Surfline and TidesChart show a healthy overnight high and a falling morning tide, which has been stacking trout and sea mullet in the first and second gut. Work soft plastics slow near the bottom at first light, then switch to bait once the sun’s up.

• Oregon Inlet and the bridge catwalks: with that northwest wind and 3‑ to 5‑foot sea noted by Marineweather, the inside waters stay manageable. Jig Gulp shrimp or flukes along the pilings for trout and gray trout, and soak fresh-cut mullet on the bottom for reds and the odd black drum.

Fish are a little sluggish with the cooler water, so slow your retrieve, downsize your leaders to 15–20‑pound fluoro, and let those baits soak a touch longer than you would in October.

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