The great thing about flounder fishing is that the necessities are minimal and most fishermen already have the tools necessary to get started.
While Kyle Perry’s preference is a medium-action spinning rod with braided line, any rod and reel combo used for catching bass on soft plastics will work.
“All my rods are 7-foot,” Perry said. “For flounder fishing I like to use medium action. You could probably get away with medium-heavy but I don’t think it’s necessary. You could use bait-cast gear if you wanted, and sometimes I do, but I just like that medium action spinning rod with braid.
“I like to use braid when flounder fishing; sometimes the bite is subtle. Sometimes when they pick it up you won’t feel the bite, you’ll feel the weight. Braid gives you that sensitivity to feel everything, especially when you’re bouncing the bottom.”
One thing Perry will not deviate from is his bait of choice — a Berkley Gulp! Shrimp is his hands-down No. 1 choice.
“Gulp! is my go-to,” Perry said. “You can catch flounder on any soft plastic, but for me, I’ve done it enough side-by-side now that Gulp! will catch fish that were there that I was missing or not catching with regular plastics. Put a Gulp! on and I catch them.”
When choosing lure color, Perry offers this advice: “With our water, the clarity is about a foot to a foot and a half. It’s usually a dingy, kind of tea colored, sometimes dirtier than that from the rain. With that water clarity in mind I use any of your glows, like a Sugar & Spice Gulp! Shrimp.
“There’s straight up glow, and it works pretty good. The new penny they’re making now, the bottom has kind of a white glow color, so it stands out pretty good with the contrast to the pinkish root beer color.”
On the rare occasion when Perry finds clear water, he makes a change to natural colors but stays with the same basic lure.
“You could go with some of your natural colors like molting or natural shrimp,” he said. “I like to use Gulp!, that’s my confidence bait. When I’ve used regular non-scented soft plastics I’ve had fish let go of it. When a flounder hits, they’ll grab it and a lot of times they’ll only grab half the bait; the same if you’re using live bait.
“What they’ll do is they’ll grab it, they’ve got teeth that hold on so they’re not worried about it getting away. They’ll grab it and go back down to the bottom, usually within a couple of feet of where they were at. What it feels like to you is a bump-bump-bump — that’s them knocking the bait back in their mouth in the process of swallowing it. That’s why with a flounder you always give a 5-count and wait for them to knock it back before setting the hook.”
Scent-impregnated lures, like the Berkley product, can fool the fish.
“The good thing with Gulp!, they’ll never drop it,” Perry said. “You’ll notice if you let them go too long the bait will be in their stomach. They will have literally already swallowed it whole.
“That’s another confidence thing with Gulp!; they’re not going to let it go as long as you don’t snatch it from them. I have had flounder drop the bait with regular non-scented plastics.”
Perry uses jig heads in the ¼- to 3/8-ounce range, based on depth and current. Do yourself a favor and buy jig heads with quality hooks like the hooks offered at http://www.davidscustomtackle.com. These jig heads feature a premium blued Mustad Ultra Point Wide Gap hook that will not rust.
“I use a ¼-ounce jig a majority of the time I’m fishing, because I’m usually fishing in 1- to 5-feet of water,» Perry said. “In shallow water like that you really don’t need anything heavier. If you’re fishing some deeper areas or areas with a lot of current, you could bump up to maybe a 5/16. If you’re fishing really deep you could use a 3/8-ounce.”
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