THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, July 17, 1994 TAG: 9407140167
SECTION: CAROLINA COAST PAGE: 46 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: Ford Reid
LENGTH: Medium: 64 lines
The croaker is one of those fish that talks back.
If you listen closely after you have landed one, you can hear it. If your imagination is active and your conscience a little guilty, you might think it is saying ``Throw me back! Throw me back!''
If it is a small fish, follow those instructions.
Actually, the croaker is making a sound made by many members of the drum family. It makes the drumming sound with special muscles on the wall of its swim bladder.
It croaks.
You ought to have plenty of opportunity to hear the sound for yourself. The run of croakers has been fairly good already this summer, and it should keep getting better.
Although not nearly as glamorous as its much larger cousin, the red drum, the croaker has kept more than one mid-summer fishing trip from being a total bust.
You might find croakers most anyplace along the beach. Once you have found one, you are highly likely to find more. Stay in the same place until time proves that you have made a bad choice.
The croaker is a particularly good fish for kids of all ages who might not have a great deal of patience. If the fish are around, you shouldn't have to wait too awfully long for a bite.
A mistake often made in searching for bottom feeding fish is casting too far. Many of us have a tendency to rear back and throw the bait as far as we possibly can, then settle back and wait for a bite.
Often as not, that technique works about as well as any. But on other occasions, you might be casting right over a huge school of feeding fish.
If you want to show off your casting ability, that is fine. But if you want to catch fish, work all of the water.
Fish as far out as you can throw, yes, but also fish inside the sand bar and right at the bar on either side.
Exhaust every possibility of a spot on the beach before you give up and move on.
A standard bottom rig with size one, or a little smaller, hooks will work fine for croaker. Use just enough lead to keep the bait in place. On calm days at slack water, two ounces, or even one ounce, might be enough. You'll have more fun landing the fish if it is not dragging four or five ounces of sinker.
The croaker is not especially picky about what he eats. As with any of the small bottom feeders of summer, bloodworms are an excellent first choice.
But the croaker will also bite on bits of shrimp, mole crabs and even cut bait.
Once the croaker has been fooled and hooked, you are in for a treat. For his size, he is a very good fighter.
Although it sometimes may seem that the whole ocean is filled with croakers, that is not the case.
As with any fish, the small ones ought to be released alive and given a shot at growing.
Besides, what are you going to do with a cooler full of tiny fish?
When you get home and try to clean them, you will wish that they were still swimming around in the ocean. by CNB