Georgia Saltwater Fishing Report – September 2024

Saltwater: Inshore: Capt. David Newlin reports, “The best fishing of the year is always the month of September on the Georgia coast. The fish catching here is as good as anywhere in the world in September. I have fished all over the South and no place has fish catching like we do in September. The redfish bite has been really good with plenty of legal fish and a lot of fish from 25 to 38 inches. I have never caught this many big redfish in August. I have had some really good topwater action on big redfish the last few afternoons. A red-and-white MirrOlure has been really hot. The last hour before dark has been the best time for me. A live shrimp under a cork, as usual, is the best way to catch redfish of all sizes. If you can’t get live shrimp or if you run out of bait, try a pink D.O.A. Shrimp soaked in Gulp! Alive! Shrimp spray. Fish it under a cork just like a live one, and just move it around with an occasional jerk. We have a really big crop of small redfish that should be legal size around the first of September. Everywhere that should hold redfish will have a few. Look up in creeks, around trees, docks, oyster shells and any kind of structure. Some of these spots will be better on certain tides. Figuring out our big tide swings takes many hours on the water. Redfish can be in 1 foot of water in one spot and 20 feet deep on the next spot. Move around a lot until you find some feeding fish. In September, we should have a lot of 50-plus redfish trips. The trout bite has been good and should be getting better the next few weeks. September and October are always the best two months of trout catching we have. The last few weeks the incoming tide has been the best trout bite for me. Live shrimp under a slip-cork rig has been the best bait, unless the little bait thieving fish are thick. When the bait thieves move in, switch to artificial shrimp. This is about the only use I have for a fixed-position cork. I prefer the ones that make a lot of rattling sounds. Nick’s Corks, a local Savannah company, makes a real good one. However, Burnside Bopper, Cajun Thunder and Four Horsemen all work. Put 3 feet of 20-lb. fluorocarbon and a D.O.A. Shrimp under one. Make a long cast and retrieve it in 3-foot jerks with a few seconds between jerks. Try different colors until you find the one the trout want. Green, pink, gold glitter or clear with silver glitter are colors that usually work. The main thing to look for is clear water. Trout always bite best in cleaner water. On the Georgia coast that means around 1 to 2 feet of visibility. I always stick my fishing rod tip in the water, and if I can see it a foot or so deep, we are good to catch trout. After a couple hundred trips, you will have a good idea where the clearer water will be. On big tide days, the water will usually clear up the last hour of low tide and the first hour of the incoming. Look for trout around creek mouths, points, drop-offs and shell beds. Trout will be a lot farther out in the currents than redfish. Some of your better trout drops may be 50 yards from the banks. Keep moving until you catch one, and there should be more close by. Black drum have been showing up good lately. I very rarely target drum, but they are a welcome by-catch. They love trees in 10 to 25 feet of water. Fish a shrimp on a slip cork or a bottom rig close to the structure. They will usually hit fresh dead shrimp as good as live ones. I will change up to a 30-lb. leader when trying to catch drum. I caught 18 out of one tree last week. In September, they should be here in good numbers. You should catch a few anywhere redfish are thick. Flounder, croaker and whiting should all be here in September. Many of the inland areas that most years hold fish will not have saltwater fish in them until probably late October. Tropical Storm Debby runoff has pushed the saltwater for miles. The Ogeechee is fresh all the way to the ICW. I have never seen this amount of freshwater in my area. The upper-river areas that usually have plenty of redfish are completely fresh right now. Just keep this in mind. You may need to fish closer to the sounds than normal during September. This September should be a good one. The redfish and trout catching should be excellent. No need to drive out of state to go fishing. The best fishing anywhere is right here in September and October.”

Capt. Judy Helmey reports, “The temperatures are still hot, but there is a subtle change that takes place in the month of September. All of the nearshore fish are basically put on notice that fall patterns are pending. Just the fact that daylight is a couple of minutes shorter just about every day makes all the difference to those down under. This is not the month for migrations, but it’s the month for feeding on everything that is available. Spotted seatrout, redfish, sheepshead, black drum and flounder might feed at different times of the tides. However, here’s what they have in common: all of them like live shrimp. You can serve it up any way you like, from naked—with or without any sort of leader or weight—or under popping or adjustable floats. Here is the secret to the bite in September. Once you get the bite going, it’s easy to change your bait. If you start using live shrimp and they all happen to die or you run out, your best bet is to change over to any leftover parts from previous hits and/or start using D.O.A. Shrimp patterns. The D.O.A. Shrimp patterns work like a charm. When using pre-rigged D.O.A.s, I suggest removing the weight and hook. Then I suggest taking a 2/0 to 3/0 kahle hook and hooking the shrimp up like you do the real deal. Since you want the D.O.A. to look as natural as possible, you would need to place the hook in the mid ship of the shrimp. The best early fall colors are rootbeer, clear gold glitter, clear chartreuse tail and golden cherry red. Use a 1/4-oz. jig head for D.O.A. Shrimp patterns. Another secret is to drop a few D.O.A.s into the livewell. I call this adding juice appeal. Now there are other artificial baits to be considered and have been proven by the fish, as well as the fishermen. There is Berkley Gulp! Alive! I like the 3-inch shrimp assortment recharging baits, which have new penny/natural, shrimp/pearl and white/molting shrimp patterns all packed together. Heck, the best news is that if one pattern doesn’t work, remove it off the hook, drop it back in the sauce and grab another. Popping corks, traditional adjustable floats and threaded onto a jig head tied directly to your fluorocarbon leader will work. For those fishermen who don’t care to use artificial baits, live shrimp is the most preferred bait, but there are quite a few alterative live baits that you can catch yourself. Knowing how to throw a cast net is a big plus. During this time, the creeks and backs of creeks are full of schooling finger mullet. They do come in all sizes from petite to large. I suggest keeping all sizes, because when using live bait, you want to match the hatch. When using larger live finger mullet as bait, your chance of getting lots of bites is going to be less. However, when you do get a hit, the fish are going to be larger. The other live baits which you could catch while casting for shrimp or finger mullet are mud minnows, peanut menhaden, croaker, yellow tail and basically any other small live fish. Whatever you do, don’t rule out any type of live bait, especially during this time of the year. Why? All fish have been put on notice that they had best start feeding and bulking up.”

Nearshore: Capt. Judy Helmey reports, “During September, the artificial reefs can at times seem completely baron. Then, as if someone turns on a switch, the bite starts. So, when you arrive at an artificial reef, I suggest staying and waiting it out. When the bite is on, you could find yourself catching Spanish or king mackerel and barracuda. Trolling Clark and Drone spoons will get a topwater bite going. For those fishermen who prefer trolling real bait, I suggest using medium-sized ballyhoo rigged on a Sea Witch. The best colors have been red/black, blue/white and chartreuse. As far as head style, I prefer the round lead heads. However, there are all sorts of different shapes (split, cone, bullet) that pull through the water differently. You must be the judge on whether or not you want your bait to push or be pulled through the water. I rig the Sea Witch-type lures with my three-hooks-in-a-row method while using 100-lb. test single-strand wire as my leader. It is old school, but it works. I take three 7/0 Mustad trailer hooks (j-hook style with open eyes) and rig them in line. When a fish hits this rig, the hook configuration makes it almost impossible for them to avoid getting hooked up, but they still somehow do sometimes. I suggest pulling this bait about 50 to 75 feet behind your boat. It is going to be best if you adjust your reel so that it has a medium drag. This helps in the hook-up department. I must add that the topwater bite has been slow until the month of August rolled around. We have been catching some nice king mackerel trolling 3 1/2-inch Drone spoons 30 feet behind a No. 3 planer. I am attaching a 100-lb. snap swivel to the back end of the planer, then tying on 15 feet of 80-lb. test monofilament line, then a 100-lb. test swivel, then 15 feet of 80-lb. test monofilament line, and then I tie the 3 1/2-inch Drone spoon directly on to the 80-lb. leader. The Drone spoons with green and blue flash attached have been getting the most hook-ups. We also substitute the same trolling setup behind a No. 2 planer. In most cases, we are pulling one No.  3 and one No. 2 planer with Drone spoon in tow. For the surface lures, I am pulling a trolling spread of light green, red, yellow and white tube lures, which I have rigged custom with 5/0 treble hooks. I rigged each tube with two treble hooks, placing one at the tail and the other in the mid-ship of the tube/lure. The leader used for hooks is 100-lb. test single-strand wire. All color tubes have been working except for the yellow. So far it has not received any strong hits. So, I suggest using greens, reds or solid white. As far as the bottom bite, I suggest doing a little drifting, keeping your baits at the mid- to lower-water-column depth. The best bait is going to be exactly what you catch with your gold-hook sabiki rig. And of course, always take along a little squid. This bait works offshore, as well as shrimp does for inshore fish.”

Savannah Snapper Banks: Capt. Judy Helmey reports, “For many years, I have called the month of September ‘snag a gag month!’” Well, gag grouper season was closed this year on June 15. Normally, the season for gags is May 1 through the last day of December. Scamps and red grouper are still open. These fish are normally moving and always looking for something to eat. Best places to look for one of these fish are the live bottom ledges at the Savannah Snapper Banks. I like to call these fishing cities, which are small areas that hold all types of fish from small to large at all depths. These are basically ledges that are surrounded with sand. Best baits are going to be live cigar minnows, Spanish sardines, which can be caught with sabiki gold-hook rigs. This bait is known for schooling over the structure at the artificial reefs. Baits such as these are known for triggering a serious grouper bite. However, a bigger fish sometimes wants bigger bait. Baits caught at the Banks are normally those fish that have air bladders, such as sand perch, rock bass, vermilion snapper, pin fish and ruby red lips. Before putting them in the livewell, I suggest deflating the air bladder with a sharp pointed knife. These baits will also bring on a big time grouper bite. For those who prefer jigging, this would be a great time to give this type of fishing a type. I suggest using any sort of butterfly jig. When vertical jigging, I suggest using 80-lb. braided main line, 4 to 15 feet of fluorocarbon leader and a jig (4 to 8 ounces) that has one or two hooks located at the top of the lure. You want your main line attached and your hooks at the same end. Jigging during this month is great because the large bottom fish start to move a little farther from the protection of the ledge. The secret to perfecting this style of fishing is to keep the jig moving erratically. This style of jigging does a great job of imitating a baitfish that’s trying to make a solid getaway move. Once you have located the depth of the fish, drop your lure to this depth, and just jig. Do not reel and jig. You want your lure to stay in the strike zone. As far as the topwater bite, we have been catching king mackerel nearshore at the Savannah River Channel, artificial reefs and at the Savannah Snapper Banks. Best bait when targeting this fish is the liveliest possible. Blue runners, ocean menhaden, Spanish sardines, Spanish mackerel and cigar minnows are just some of the good live bait choices.”

Gulf Stream: Capt. Judy Helmey reports, “This is not a great month for blue-water trolling due to the fact that water temps are still about the same in the Stream as they are in waters to the west. However, if you want to get a full-pulling, bottom-fishing deal, now would be the time. The live bottom areas located in 150 to 220 feet of water are holding a lot of large fish. Just to name a few, which come in mostly large sizes, you can catch grouper (red, scamp, snowy) sand tile, vermilion, black sea bass, triggerfish, white bone porgy, knobbed porgy, red porgy, white grunt, cobia and then there are those fish that you could catch that we really don’t know what the heck they are! Whatever you do, don’t forget your fish identification book. So if you do make a trip to this area, the best bait is going to be squid and cut fish. If you happen to have cigar minnows or Spanish sardines (fresh dead, live or frozen), these baits will also work. These baits work great when used with a two- to three-hook bottom rig. Or you can skip the small baits and go straight to big live baits, such as ruby red lips, pin fish, vermilion snapper and tattlers. Best rig for these fish are going to be Carolina-style rigs with long leaders (80- to 100-lb. monofilament) and large circle hooks (10/0 to 14/0). Now for those who want to do a little jigging, this is definitely the right place for this type of fishing. The best lure to use is a heavy Williamson deep-water jig. We are now offering once again, 14 hours Gulf Stream bottom fishing trips.”