Cape Fear River Watch Striper Tournament
Austin Lords and Capt. Danny Wrenn with the largest striped bass ever tagged in the CFRW Striper Tournament. Wrenn hooked the big bass while they were fishing a creekmouth off the Cape Fear River with Mark Johnson.
“We had a plan, but we didn’t feel that great about it,” Capt. Jon Huff reported. “We were really just looking for one fish.”
Huff, who operates Circle H Charters out of Wrightsville Beach, and his crew, Frank Spencer and Steven Lancaster of Intracoastal Angler Tackle, found their one fish and four more, tagging and releasing them to capture the top honors in the 2011 Cape Fear River Watch Striped Bass Tournament, held January 15 out of Wilmington’s Coastline Convention Center. They also earned the victory in the event’s two-fish aggregate category, as their largest pair of fish went a combined 55” in length.
The trio had a slow start to their day on the Northeast Cape Fear River, going strikeless before deciding to head for the main Cape Fear. Just after midday, they found what they were looking for.
“We started catching fish in the Cape Fear on a drop-off in about 14’ of water a decent way off the bank,” Huff continued.
The bite turned on around 1:00, and Lancaster capitalized, bringing four fish to tag in short order while casting Gulp JerkShads and Yo-Zuri diving plugs. Spencer fired back with the 30.5” striper that was the crew’s largest for the day shortly after removing a hook from his thumb.
After the action slowed down, the anglers returned to the Northeast Cape Fear, looking to add to their total for the day, but they were unable to connect with any more fish. Fortunately, their five tagged stripers were plenty to secure the top spot on the event’s leader board.
Wilmington’s Capt. Danny Wrenn, of 96 Charter Company, fishing with Mark Johnson and junior angler Austin Lords, tagged and released the largest striper ever seen during the event’s three year history to earn the award for largest fish of the tournament.
After also experiencing a slow morning, Wrenn, Johnson, and Lords, who earned a spot on the boat by winning the tournament’s Junior Angler Essay contest, didn’t have much time left on the clock before the event’s 3:00 lines-out time when the big fish struck.
“I think I’d had two bites a little earlier,” Wrenn explained, “but it had been extremely slow. We were casting to creekmouths in the northeast Cape Fear around 2:45 when I hooked the big fish.”
Wrenn’s favorite crankbait fooled the big striper, a secret plug in white/blue/orange, and at first he wasn’t sure how big it was.
“When you’re fishing crankbaits, you never know how big they are,” Wrenn said. “The fish got out in the current and pulled hard, but when it came to the boat we knew she was a big, big fish.”
They soon had the big fish in the landing net. Once in the boat, the anglers measured it at 31” long, planted a tag in the fish’s flank, and sent it on its way. With a few minutes left before three, they continued casting in the area, but were unable to hook another fish before the deadline.
All told, the 11 boats fishing the tournament tagged and released 18 stripers over the course of the day, not bad after a series of cold fronts had the water temperatures in the upper-30’s and air temps in the upper 20’s on tournament morning.
In addition to the largest fish the event has seen, 2011 marked another milestone—the first recapture of a tagged fish in the event—by the same angler. After landing a tagged fish in a creek off the Northeast Cape Fear, Capt. Jamie Rushing realized it was the same fish he’d tagged in the same creek during the 2010 tournament.
In addition to the entry fees, the Cape Fear River Watch Striper Tournament has a banquet and large live and silent auction to raise money for the group’s mission of rebuilding the striped bass and other anadromous fisheries in the river. This year’s banquet attracted a record 320 people to support the cause.
And 2010 saw the completion of one of CFRW’s first goals, a rock ramp helping striped bass and other fish on their way upriver to spawn negotiate Lock and Dam #1, 39 miles upriver from Wilmington. Proceeds generated from the previous year’s Striper Tournaments were directly responsible. Two more locks and dams lie between there and the fish’s spawning grounds, and the group is working on rock ramps at both, projects that will help restore the watershed’s anadromous fisheries to their historical levels.
More information is available at www.cfrw.us/restore.
