Volume 19 Number 4 - April 2012

FEATURES:

	2012 Saltwater Preview Fishing should be decent, but changes may be coming Saltwater fishing in North Carolina, offshore and in coastal waters, shouldn’t be much different in 2012 from the recent past. Changes may be coming, with the state legislature’s Committee on Marine Fisheries studying a number of ... Craig Holt

	All Terrain, All Turkeys A change of tactics is necessary for North Carolina hunters who travel to different areas of the state in search of nice gobblers. The morning hunt had been perplexing. By 8:45, only two toms had sounded off a total of four times on Arthur Dick’s 1,800-acre Willow Oaks Plantation in Rockingham County outside of Eden. “We have so many gobblers and hens here,” ... Bruce Ingram

	Badin’s Bass Basics Chose your water — clear or dirty — and set out to catch that big bass this month by following these experts’ advice. Badin Lake is full of big bass. To catch them this month, you’ll first have to decide whether you want to fish clean or dirty water. The clean water is for the patient fisherman who favors finesse techniques to catch spawning bass. The dirty water ... Glenn Hudson

	Lake of the Month: Jordan Lake Bass fishing in North Carolina can’t get much better than this in April The glory days of largemouth bass fishing at Jordan Lake are long gone. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers closed the dam to impound the Haw River and New Hope Creek in 1973, and it took until 1984 to get the lake to full pool. Bass ... Craig Holt

	Mountain Slam Graham and Swain counties offer trout, walleye and smallmouth bass to anglers with a hankering for the fun of a mixed bag. When I was a boy growing up in the heart of the Smokies, my Grandpa Joe used to say, in his pithy way, “There ain’t nothing like April.” His perspective embraced a variety of considerations — joy that the miseries of winter and ... Jim Casada

	The Reds of Spring Moving from the ocean to the Cape Fear River, redfish give Wilmington-area fishermen plenty of opportunities in April. Capt. Stu Caulder discussed the day’s gameplan with his fishing party while idling through a No Wake zone in the Intracoastal Waterway at Wrightsville Beach. The target was redfish, and Caulder figured that on a nice, April day, a ... Jerry Dilsaver

	Wired for Wahoo Cape Fear captains take full advantage of a great springtime run of these fast, aggressive fish. Here’s how to join them: Capt. Butch Foster fired up the engines of Yeah Right, his 34-foot Chris Craft. On a chilly spring morning, his fishing party for the day was inside Southport Marina, drinking steaming cups of coffee. The were all getting wired for ... Mike Marsh