Added on Friday, November 3, 2023  Fish Post

Tournament Report: Pleasure Island Surf Fishing Challenge

The annual Pleasure Island Fall Surf Fishing Challenge fell on October 20-22 this year, and aside from some brief showers during Friday’s registration, the beautiful weather weekend gave surf anglers a nice chance to pick up supplies from Island Tackle & Hardware, get their feet back in the sand, and search for up to five different species of fish.

The Carolina Beach public parking lot beside SeaWitch Cafe was the site once again of Tournament Headquarters, and 507 anglers from over six different states came through to get a wristband before heading out to the beach strand to find holes and sloughs that would hopefully be productive over the weekend.

This event’s leaderboard awards the top five fish in each of the following species: Bluefish, Trout, Black Drum, Sea Mullet, and Pompano. In addition, there’s an optional TWT that pays out three places for those anglers weighing in the heaviest slot red drum. The top two Junior, Lady, and Senior anglers are also awarded, bringing the total number of payouts to 34, and this year’s total purse was over $30,000.

Todd Fogleman, from Winston Salem, NC, won the top prize in the Bluefish Division for his 3.9 lb. fish.

Showing up just in time for the event, Todd made no efforts to pre-fish. He had received reports from his friend Ricky who fished the entire week leading up to the event. The two set up on a hole, and while the fishing for his buddy fell flat with only a few smaller fish, Todd’s luck was much better when his piece of cut pinfish was picked up by the nearly 4 lb. bluefish early on Saturday morning.

The Trout Division was won by Buddy Hucks, from Whiteville, NC, with a 2.1 lb. speck.

Hucks came to the coast with a Whiteville buddy, and they started their pre-fishing efforts at a hole they had spotted on the far northern end of Carolina Beach. They had some success quickly, catching black drum and sea mullet, but the bite shut off on them by early Saturday.

They each stuck out the slow fishing for those morning hours, hoping their pre-fishing efforts would ultimately payoff and turn back on, and then sometime after 9:00 a.m., the winning trout hit a piece of cut mullet Hucks had rigged on the middle hook of his bottom rig.

The top black drum this year was caught by Wilmington, NC angler Brandon Phillips. Phillips typically fishes the event with some buddies and all their sons, but this year the group fished without kids and decided to just wing it when it came to picking a spot, fishing in front of a house they had rented for the week.

The fishing action overall was hit or miss, with most catches revolving around small pompano.

As Phillips was getting called by his crew on Saturday around 10:30 pm to wrap it up for the night, the winning black drum bit a piece of cut mullet on Phillips’ bottom rig.

Kyle Terrell, from Greensboro, NC, took home the top prize in the Sea Mullet Division with his 2.0 lb. fish.

Terrell fished with his brother Ryan and another buddy, and they had a hole picked out around the middle of the island that had produced for them in the past. Their spot was one that always brings back good memories to Kyle, as his fishing life started thanks to his late father, Dwight Terrell, who would take him to Kure Beach Pier in his youth.

Kyle’s tactic in the event wasn’t just to fish for anything that would bite. His plan for the entire weekend was to specifically target sea mullet.

He caught a few quick mullet but nothing worth weighing, and then Saturday morning at around 2:00 am, a live shrimp on his hand-tied hi-low rig was picked up by the winning fish.

Jonathon Brianne won the Pompano Division for his 3.3 lb. fish, besting the second place pompano by over half a pound.

This year’s Red Drum TWT was big, with 409 anglers signed up and paying out nearly $4500 for first place, and Melissa Hunt, from Asheboro, NC, topped all of the 408 other anglers by weekend’s end with her stout 6.8 lb. red drum.

She fished this year’s event with her husband, and both of them spent a little time pre-fishing the week before to get an idea of which hole to focus efforts on. They fished all kinds of bait throughout the event, throwing shrimp, sand fleas, and various cut baits.

Her winning redfish fell for cut bait on a Carolina rig, and the fish was hooked within 3-feet of shore and bit in the middle of the afternoon (around 3:30 pm).

Melissa first thought she had a shark, as it ran enough to tangle another line, but she was able to maneuver the fish to avoid breaking off. After catching mostly flounder, she was more than excited to land an upper-slot drum that would end up besting the large field.

All of the fish weighed in in the Pleasure Island Fall Surf Fishing Challenge are picked up by NC DMF, who takes them for sampling and measurements, and then the fish are dropped off to First Fruit Ministries, a local food bank that serves over 20,000 hot meals, provides emergency groceries to over 5,000 households, and shelters over 24 homeless women and families annually.

To see the complete leaderboard, as well as to find out more information about the schedule and rules of the event, please visit FishermansPost.com or the Fisherman’s Post Facebook page.

Next year’s Pleasure Island Fall Surf Fishing Challenge is scheduled for October 18-20, 2024.