26 February 2011 West Neck Creek & Pungo Ferry Bridge

Went out this afternoon and did more graphing and exploring than I did fishing on the North Landing River and some of it's feeder creeks.

I started my day off fixing my trolling motor.  I had to replace the three pop rivets that hold my older Motorguide Trolling motor head inplace.  Once that was fixed, I loaded up my old Nitro boat and headed out for alittle while to the river.

Air temp was in the 40's but the wind chill had it feeling like it was in the 30's out on the water!  It was partly cloudy and pretty soon after getting on the water it went to overcast.  Wind was East/Southeast while I was out there at around 10'ish mph.  Water temp in West Neck Creek and the main river was 51.3 to 53.2 degrees.  Water was muddy with little visability.

I put in at West Neck Marina.  There was good water in the Creek.  It was alittle low but it was nice to see water back in there as it seems all we have been getting is North wind here lately blowing the water out and to the south!  My first stop was the bridge by West Neck Marina.  No luck there.  I worked all the pilings with a spinnerbait and beetle spin.  Then I headed to a nice little spot by marker 6 that has done me well here of late and no takers there with the spinnerbait or beetle spin.  I decided to head out to the main river and down to the Pungo Ferry Bridge.  After getting to the bridge, I trolled a chartruese crankbait that dives to 6-8' for some stripers.  I found lots of fish on the graph in the 6-10' depth but had no takers after trolling up and down the river a few times.  I headed to a little canal that backs up to some grain silo's.  Good water depth in there at around a constant 10-14' deep.  LOTS of fish showed on the graph.  I had one fish on my Chartruese crankbait midway up the canal, but it got off after a short fight...not sure what it was.  After that, not a bite.  I did some graphing in the area and found some nice points and depressions that I want to come back to at a later date and fish.

Headed back to West Neck Creek and fished a few more spots with no luck.  The temp was really dropping and I was getting alittle chilled so I called it a day.  It was nice to be out enjoying Mother Nature and it was a nice suprise to see three BEAUTIFUL Bald Eagles flying up and down the creek!!!  They are a beautiful bird and graceful in flight!

A pic of West Neck Creek east of the bridge