Each time I think of May, the first thing that pops into my mind is stripers spawning on the Roanoke, at Weldon. At any one time, there are 100,000 to 500,000 in the upper five-mile stretch of the river. This is my sixteenth year guiding for them up there. The frenzy of the keeper season is over and the river has calmed down from all the boats that were present during keeper season. The stripers have one thing on their mind, spawning, and the morning and evening topwater bite is on! You can almost count on 100+ fish days and I have witnessed two guys have days of over 400 fish…did I say it can be very good!
Red drum abound on the flats, waterway edges and docks. Topwater bites can happen all day long and bigger fish may be taken on topwater. I prefer the smaller topwater plugs like the MirrOlure, Pups and Jrs., smaller Rapalas and Zara Spooks will all work well for you. Gold spoons and grubs on worm hooks also work well for use as search baits for the flats and waterways. Around the docks, live baits on lead heads work very well.
Flounder are moving into the inlets in good numbers and you can move up in bait size now. Inlets and waterway edges on the rising tides are target areas as well as around creek mouths on the falling tide. If you find one, there should be more in that area. This is also the time to fish the flats (one to two feet of water) in the grass edges with live baits or soft plastics. Purple with a Chartreuse tail is the color of my choice for flounder.
Speckled trout are hitting the topwater baits now. I like smaller topwater baits for trout, too. Those I listed above will all work very well, but you should also have some without a rattle in them. When you have multiple hits on a cast, you will know that you are on a school of fish. Soft plastics and small hard plastic baits like the MR17 MirrOlure will work well for this. Hit any marsh edges that have moving water, oyster rocks and any deep holes to locate your trout.
Have a great time fishing in May. Fishing is going off! As always, be safe on the water.