[gentle orchestral fanfare] - One two, those Cape Fears, the Advance Techs are really sweet.

- There he is, right there on the surface.

- Yup.

- Look at him.

Man, he's got some shoulders, doesn't he?

- [George] That's a good one!

- How big would that-- - Do you hear him drumming?

It's a male.

Hear him drumming?

- Uh-huh, that's unreal.

Listen to him.

[reeling rig] [water whooshing] All right, George.

Man, can we get the tagging kit?

- [George] Yeah, man.

[laughing] - Oh man, check him out.

- [Announcer] The production of Carolina Outdoor Journal is made possible in part by: - [FEMALE ANNOUNCER] WILDLIFE IN NORTH CAROLINA MAGAZINE.

NCWILDLIFE.ORG/WINC.

- [MALE ANNOUNCER] AND BY EZ BAIT & TACKLE, FAMILY OWNED AND OPERATED.

WE FISH FROM FRESH TO SALTWATER.

WE PROVIDE FISHING SUPPLIES AND ADVICE TO EVERY TYPE OF ANGLER.

FOR ALL YOUR FISHING NEEDS, EZ BAIT & TACKLE.

[light instrumental music] ♪ - Hello, welcome to the Carolina Outdoor Journal.

Well today, we're gonna be fishing for red drum, but we're also gonna be taking a look at some of the research that's going on with this particular fish.

- That's right, we're learning more about the red drum, and I think it's important we do it because, these fish, when they're in the shallows of the Pamlico Sound in the summertime, it's a big fish, so your spawners, and we need to be able to take care of them, and catch and release 'em, and that's what that fishery is, and we'll be joining Captain George Beckwith, who's a well known guide out of Oriental, probably the foremost expert on red drum here in the state and probably in the country.

He, along with his fiancee, are doing some, a joint research project.

She's doing, actually, one on the vocalization of the fish and the movement of the fish as they're, spend the summer with us in the Pamlico.

He's doing, and has been doing, some research on the rigging, on how to catch these fish safely, and they'll share this with us today.

- Now the rigging, we will talk about that, during Gear Time quite a bit.

- Right, he'll, George will actually show us how he rigs up for 'em, what he's learned about it, and how it's really made a difference in the survival of these fish.

- Well he'll tell us a new technique to catch 'em, and Donna will give us a technique for cooking fish today.

- We'll learn several fish cooking techniques from her, from frying, to baking, and so if you're new at cooking, pay attention today.

- All right, we got a lot going on here today on the Carolina Outdoor Journal.

- George, we're out here in Pamlico Sound, drum fishing, and why don't you tell us a little bit about what we can expect this morning.

- Hopefully expect a bunch of big drum.

- That'd be good.

- But we're anchored up on a little drop off, about a two foot drop, and it doesn't take much of a change out here to really create a highway for these fish to move up and down.

And we're fishing with cut mullet, on circle hooks, what we call an Owen Lupton rig.

- Right.

- It's the middle of August, which is getting ready to be prime time.

And they start showing up in June, and fishing really heats up the end of July, and stays good through September.

- Right.

- And the fish we're fishing on are, you know, 30 to 50 pound fish, they're big adults.

They're the spawning fish, and it's just critical that we take care of these fish 'cause it is the future.

- Right.

- That's part of what Anna's doing with some of her research.

- Yeah, Anna, so you've been doing research on these fish for a few years now.

Why don't you tell us a little bit about that?

- Well, more or less what I've been doing is these fish use a very specific courtship call.

The males do to bring groups of females towards them, and actually come together and spawn.

And what I'm trying to figure out, using underwater microphones to listen for this courtship call, is what habitat they're using.

Do they prefer depth, shallows, what, you know-- - [Jim] What kind of bottom?

- Sure, you know when's the peak of the spawning season happening?

Is it anything to do with the lunar phase?

So I'm taking time and just really trying to figure all those details out for their life history.

- And that's really interesting and good for the fisheries to understand them, I guess now we just need to catch us a couple, huh?

- Yeah, we need to catch a couple.

You know, hopefully a couple more than a couple.

- Yeah.

- Exactly.

- All right, well, let's see what we can catch.

- Hit the bait, let's see what we can do with him.

- Yeah, see, just, I mean, as soon as the rod starts to bow over, just pick it up and start reeling, and keep it tight and it should stay connected.

- They really don't do a smoke and run that first time, they just kind of pick it up and ease off with it.

- Yeah well, you know it depends.

Sometimes, sometimes they make a heck of a run.

- He's not quite ready to give up yet.

- No.

That's a fun rod to catch them on too.

Those Cape Fears, the Advance Techs are really sweet.

- There he is, right there on the surface.

- Yup.

- Look at him.

Man he's got some shoulders on him, doesn't he?

- [George] That's a good one.

- How big would that-- - Do you hear him drumming?

It's a male.

Hear him drumming?

- Uh-huh, that's unreal.

Listen to him.

[reeling rig] [water whooshing] All right, George.

Man, can we get the tagging kit?

- [George] Yeah, man.

[laughing] - Oh man, check him out, isn't he pretty?

- Listen to him, listen to him drumming.

- [Jim] That's wild, just unbelievable.

- Feel the vibration there.

- And this is actually a very specialized muscle that only the males, male red drum have, and it lines right across here within the muscle, and what they're doing is they're actually banging these muscles against their swim bladder-- - And that's how they make the noise?

- Their air bladder, and this is what we listen to, to find their spawning habitat.

- Right.

- Because they'll, now, when do they drum?

- They only drum during their spawning season, so what you're hearing here is what we'll call a distress call, but typically these males, the purpose of this call in this family is really as a courtship call.

- Right, to get the females-- - So the males start to vocalize at around sunset, and they'll call the females towards them.

- [Jim] Kay, so we're gonna get the hook out and then we're gonna tag him?

- [George] Yeah, he's right in the corner of the mouth.

This is a 14 aught Mustad hook, it's one of the hooks that we're testing.

We're also using a 10 aught Eagle Claw, which is working out real well.

This is the last tag in the card so we get to break out a new card today.

Hopefully we'll finish that card out, too.

- That'd be all right.

- I'm gonna pop a scale off, and this tag number's five-three-900.

Pop a scale off and boom!

- So he's tagged, now you're gonna measure him?

- Yep, he's tagged, he didn't even flinch.

Now we're gonna measure him.

We measure fork length.

- [Jim] Right.

- We're gonna go to the tip of the nose, 44 inches, that's a citation fish.

Let's say, oh, 111.5 centimeters is the exact measurement.

So 111.5 centimeters.

And you get this bad boy back into the water.

- Yeah.

- He didn't even flinch when we put that tag in him.

- Now we want him to come back to fight another day.

- Yeah here you go, here's a little souvenir.

Maybe we'll get you a tarpon scale later today-- - There you go.

- But for now, you'll have to settle with a drum scale.

- Well that's the biggest drum I've ever caught.

- Yeah, and it's a citation fish.

Anything over 40 inches is a citation.

- Cool, that's great.

- All right.

- Beautiful fin.

- [Anna] You wanna be real gentle, especially with the females when you put them over.

- Yeah, you really, I mean, they've got a nice handle here on the base of the tail, and you wanna support their abdomen, you know, you don't wanna use a BogaGrip and hold them up and hang them up and let those heavy organs hang down.

- Right, so you just gonna?

Are you?

- We're gonna.

- You're just gonna let him go?

- Just like a bass, we're gonna-- - Right, drop him head first, or, nope, just lower him in.

- Give him some side to side movement and there he goes.

- [Jim] There he goes.

- All right, see you baby.

- How many fish have you tagged, George?

- Thousands.

- That's awesome.

- I mean, we tag about 2500 and 1000 a year.

So, a lot of fish, and we're gonna tag about a dozen more today if it all works out.

- Sounds good to me, appreciate it.

That was great.

- Let's bait these hooks up.

- Yeah, time to get some hooks in order again here.

- Anna, we're out here catching some really nice drum, and you've been doing some research on these fish, why are these fish up here?

I mean, tell me a little bit about, what these big drum are doing up here in the Sound and in the rivers up here in North Carolina.

- Well this is the third year I've actually been working on red drum, and what we've been able to document is, that in fact these fish are up here, because they're using this area as spawning grounds.

We've heard them, just like we heard them a few minutes ago, making those courtship calls.

We've done some plankton tows where we actually collect eggs and larvae and gone ahead and confirmed that, yes, in fact, red drum are using this area to spawn.

And that's really important, even more so to, really consider how these fish should be caught and handled when we bring them up to the boat because these big, beautiful fish that we're looking at today, are the big ones that are the bulk of the spawning population.

- So a lot of the techniques we're using have come around to try to keep the stress down on the fish so we can release them?

- We want to try and release, deep hooking, and make sure that, we're placing them back in the water really gently and just making sure that we're protecting those big guys.

And one thing that I have found in my research is, that I'm finding that these fish are using the deeper habitat more so when they spawn, versus where the recreational anglers are catching them up in the shoals and the shallows.

So, it may be that the pressure on the spawning fish is possibly a little bit less the nights that they're spawning because, you know, the recreational fishermen are catching them-- - Up in the more shallow water.

- And I'm listening to them more in the deeper portions of the river.

- Right.

Well they're a beautiful fish and it really helps to be able to understand what's going on so we can manage it better and make sure they survive for the future.

Very interesting.

- Yeah, thanks.

[upbeat music] - George, yesterday we came out yesterday morning, it was slick calm, and we caught one fish and then a front came through and really chased us off the water.

And the winds shifted, blowing strong out of the North today, but what happens when that wind shifts around like that and those fronts go through-- - Yeah, you saw the many faces of the Pamlico Sound the last couple of days-- - What's that?

- What, have we got a-- - No, thought we had a bite there.

- We'll change it out in just a second.

But the, this place can change so quickly, you really have to watch the weather and be careful because like yesterday, a slick calm in the morning, absolutely gorgeous, and then in the matter of an hour, squall line comes through, that front came through.

Now behind the front, you know, it's clear skies, just a cloud here and there, but the wind is pretty stiff out of the North, and a lot of times that'll pick up the fishing.

You know, that's one of the things about drum fishing, is they like it rough, but it makes it difficult to get to them.

- So it doesn't really matter, Southeast, Northeast, whatever, they'll bite?

- I think a Northeast wind's best.

- You like Northeast?

- Yeah, I like these Northeast winds.

But, you know, Southwest wind's good too.

It's just, when you've got a Southwest wind, a lot of times you've got those afternoon thunderstorms you have to really watch out for and be careful.

- You gotta be careful out here.

- You gotta be careful.

It's a lot of water, it changes quick.

Let's change these baits out, I saw the bluefish pecking on that one and this one right here.

- Yeah that one right there on the front too.

- [George] Hey, we got some nice bluefish though.

That's what I'm having for dinner.

- Yeah, I got him on, buddy.

- [George] You got him?

Just reel down, get him tight, get it tight, get it tight, get it tight.

There you go, there you go.

Yeah that's a drum, that's no bluefish there.

- Nah, no, big blue like we've been catching.

- All right, good deal.

- This one's got some shoulders on him.

- Good deal.

- I feel him shaking his head too.

- [George] That's definitely a drum, you can tell, the head shake is a give away.

- Looks like he's right up here on the surface on there.

- [George] I tell you what, when he sees that boat, he's gonna make a run in the other direction.

- Yeah, he's right here at the boat.

- [George] Is he clear of the anchor line?

A lot of times, you know, they'll run towards it, but they won't go, you know, all the way, wrap around it.

You just gotta keep an eye on things.

- Ah, he doesn't like that.

- I'll keep an eye, see which side of the anchor he's going on.

- He's staying right off the side there.

- All right, good deal, good deal.

There you go.

- Not quite right the way his shaking that head right there big time.

- Good deal.

- Water's kind of muddy but I saw a good flash.

- You know, and one thing you want to do is, when you do get a bite, you wanna make sure that your other baits are fresh, because a lot of times these guys will come together in schools, and you can get a couple bites-- - Oh, there he is.

- Oh yeah!

- He's on the surface.

- Oh yeah, that fish is bigger than I thought he was.

- Oh, he's going back with the anchor.

Let's see if I can turn him.

- [George] You're doing a great job, he's over the anchor.

- Yeah he's still back on this side.

- [George] You're doing a great job.

- I've got him turned.

If I can get is to circle around.

There he is, right there.

Man, look at the size of that baby, that's unreal.

Now he's going under the boat.

- [George] If he goes under, just keep, get it low, stick your rod in the water, there you go, perfect.

- Cleared the motor, yep.

I got double line right here.

- [George] He ain't done, he's not done quite yet.

All right.

- [Jim] See if I can get him to you, oh man, he's pretty.

- Another male too, I hear him drumming.

There we go.

Whoa, hold on, not yet.

[water splashing] [laughing] Woo!

- Man, that's a nice fish.

Man, is he ripe.

- Very ripe.

- Yep.

- Very ripe.

Say I'm gonna lay him right down here, and we're gonna measure him, put a tag in him.

- [Jim] There he is, George, get him, get him!

- All right, that's a drum, that's a drum [cheering].

- [Jim] All right, another one.

- All right!

- [Jim] Good job.

- All right!

You gonna let me catch this one?

- Yeah this one's yours.

- I don't get a chance to do this that often.

- You doing all the work.

How do you watch everyone else reel in the fish, this one's yours.

- Woo!

Man, he is out there, too woo!

- You got some line going off.

- I tell you what, check these other baits, make sure that we-- - Make sure they're fresh.

Like you said, try to get that fresh bait on?

Sometimes when you bring a fish up like that, will the school follow him around?

- Well, a lot of times a school 'em, but they're just in pairs and triples and, you know, and sometimes big, big schools.

So you wanna make sure you've got fresh bait out there.

- [Jim] There he is, oh man!

- [George] Yeah, he feels good.

He's not as big as yours, though.

- [Jim] Nah, as soon as you saw a double line, it's like he saw that boat, he took off.

- Yeah, he is not as big as yours, but he's a good one.

- Yeah, he's pretty.

- All right, there's your double line again.

It is a nice fish, though.

It's a pretty fish.

- Woo!

- There he goes!

- I love it, I love it.

That's a beautiful sound.

That is a beautiful sound, all right.

I'm waiting for one of these other ones to go off behind.

- [Jim] Yeah I think the bluefish is nibbling on that one.

He's right in the corner of the mouth.

I mean, he's hooked, got a perfect hook.

- [George] Yeah, hook right in the corner of the mouth.

There we go, we rolled him over.

- [Jim] Okay.

- Actually, I don't hear this one drum.

- [Jim] Maybe a female?

- Maybe a her.

Oh no, it's a male.

[laughing] Woo, all right.

- [Jim] There he is.

- Yours is definitely bigger.

- [Jim] Good job!

- This is five-three-three-nine-five.

- Three-nine-five, and it's a male.

- It's a male.

Let's see.

Yeah, you got me a little bit.

This one's not even 40.

Man, it's been a long time since I caught one, 'cause this sure did feel good.

It's 100.5 centimeters, so just under 40 inches.

Fork length, but for a citation it's gotta be 40 inches.

And total length, it's like 41 and a half, so we're in good shape.

- [Jim] 40 inch?

- Yeah, well 100.5 centimeters.

- [Jim] Right, okay.

All right, so he's tagged and ready to go.

- All right, hear him drumming?

- Man, that's a nice fish.

- Listen to him.

- Pretty fish.

- Good deal.

Okay, let's get this baby in.

- Joe, it looks to me like there's a lot of hard work going into this research?

- There really is, and we're gonna learn a lot more about these fish, and that's real important, because again these fish are your, it's the spawning population of the species here on this part of the Atlantic Seaboard.

So, anything that we can learn about 'em, is, puts us that much ahead on how to manage the fisheries, what we need to do to protect them, and 'cause it's a great fisheries, and you can see them, and the size of the fish today were just you know, world class.

- Now, catch and release, George has got a rig that he wants to share with us on Gear Time today.

- That's right.

- Let's join George, and Gear Time.

[upbeat music] - George, we are using some pretty specialized rigs to fish for these drum today, and also some heavier spinning tackle, what I call heavier spinning tackle.

- Heavier than speckled trout fishing, anyway like a drum.

- Yeah, tell us a little bit about the tackle and the rigs we're using today.

- We're, you know, you wanna use...

I mean these are 30 to 40 pound fish, so you wanna use 20 pound test.

You know, these Advance Tech Cape Fear rods are just a lot of fun and got plenty of backbone to handle these big fish.

And we've got them spooled up with 20 pound test.

The rig is really a special rig, it's unique.

It was developed by a gentleman by the name of Owen Lupton in Pamlico County.

A lot of the concern about deep-hooking these fish with a j-hook, we had the deep-hooking.

This is the hook that most people were using.

- Right.

- We had deep-hooking at 50%, which is unacceptable, especially when, you know, even though 90% of the fish that are deep-hooked, we found survive, that 10% of the fish is just too much.

- Right.

- Using this 14 aught Mustad circle hook, or a 10 aught Eagle Claw hook, we've gotten the deep-hooking down to less than 5%, so we went from 50% to 5%, which is fantastic.

- Right.

- But the key to it is keeping the line tight.

And the way we're doing that is we're using a super short leader, this is less than six inches, about a three to five inch leader.

The circle hook's got the barb mashed down.

It's snelled on, and the weight is crimped on there, so it's a fixed weight.

So, we'll bait this rascal up, cast it out, and as soon as the fish picks up the bait, he starts swimming away and that weight drags the circle hook right to the corner of his mouth.

And you keep the line tight, as soon as you feel a bite, you start winding, and he's on.

- And you're using, what, 80 pound mono?

- Go with 100 pound mono.

- 100 pound?

- 100 pound's the way to go.

- And the key to this rig is, when you snell it, you wanna snell the line so it's going in the eye this way, so it acts as if it's a continuation of the circle.

- To turn the hook the right way?

- Yep.

- Well thanks, for the information.

So, let's try to catch a few more fish.

- Let's get a few more.

- All right, sounds good.

- That was good information and George, we appreciate that, but Joe, tell me just a little more about that rig, how it rolls out.

- Yeah, it's the way it's rigged up, again, it's snelled on to the leader.

It's a barbless hook, the sides of the hook, it rotates.

When you go to set the hook, you don't traditionally, you think about setting back on it, you don't, you pull back on it, the fish is swimming off with the bait, so what you're doing is, you're pulling back on the rig, it rotates in the fish's mouth, and sets the hook.

And like he said, 90% of them, you'll get them back with the hook right in the corner of the mouth.

You pull it right out and it has no impact on the fish, and it's just the way to go if you're going to fish for those big fish.

- Well, George, thanks for sharing that information with us.

Now let's catch up with Donna, she's got some cooking techniques.

She's in the kitchen here on the Carolina Outdoor Journal.

[upbeat music] - Hi, today in the kitchen we're gonna talk cooking techniques for frying.

And there are three different basic techniques.

There's the deep frying, there's pan frying, and there's oven frying.

So, to deep-fat fry is when you fill your fryer with about two to four inches of oil, and usually if you buy a commercial fryer, it will give you a line of where you need to fill your oil.

And I would use an oil with a high burning point.

So that means that, like a peanut oil or a safflower oil are the best because you can heat them, to higher temperatures before they begin to smoke.

So, when you're cooking with your deep fryer, you're gonna make sure that you set your temperature to about 375 degrees, 'cause if your oil is not at the proper temperature, you will, if it's too hot, then when you put your food into your fryer, into the oil, it will burn or really cook really fast on the inside, and the inside of your food will be raw.

Or it won't cook, if your oil is too low, then it will absorb all of the oil, your product will, and you'll have a oily food, and it won't cook fast enough, and it will just absorb all that oil and it will not be very pleasant.

So make sure that you use a thermometer, or your temperature gauge to make sure that you cook at the proper temperature.

When you are pan frying, we're going to use a skillet, or you can use an electric skillet if you'd like, and those usually have a temperature gauge on them as well.

You're gonna use about one eighth of an inch of oil.

So we're using quite a bit less oil, and you still wanna use an oil that has a high burning point.

And we're going to coat our food with either some kind of bread crumbs, or some kind of butter, and place that into your hot oil.

You still need to make sure that it's, the proper temperature as well, so that your food will cook properly and not absorb all that oil.

And you will cook for a very short period of time, usually use this for if you're going to just, flash fry something so it's just coated on the outside, and then maybe you're gonna finish it off in the oven.

This is also a very popular, especially if you're out camping and that type of thing, you don't have to carry a lot of oil with you, and you can cook your fish or your wild game that way.

Then, if you're going to oven fry, usually there are several different ways you can do that.

You can use a breader or a coating for your, say we're doing fish, for your fish filets.

And then you can drizzle over some olive oil, or some corn oil over the top, to give it that nice and crunchy.

Or you can use the non-stick spray, which you can just spray over the top as well, which will add a little bit of oil to it, and make it nice and crunchy, or you can use a product that already has, that oil incorporated into your coating.

So there's several different ways you bake.

When you're doing an oven fry, you bake at a very high temperature, like 400 to 450 degrees for a short period of time.

So I hope that helps you, and I look forward to seeing you next time here on Simple Cooking.

- Thank you, Donna.

She does such an excellent job for us here.

Joe, let's go back and talk about the red drum.

I'm impressed with the new hook, but I'm equally impressed with the research that's going on.

- Yeah, and that's again, it's whatever we can find out about any of our wildlife species, whether it's game animals like the wild turkey which has been a great success story, to the red drum, and the more we know about it, the more we know what we need to do to manage it.

There's more pressure these days on the resource, so we just need to have that information, and George and Anna are doing some great research out there, and we're learning more every day about them.

- And as always, catch and release.

- That's right.

- For Joe Albea, I'm John Moore.

Thanks for joining us today on the Carolina Outdoor Journal.

- [Announcer] Make sure to visit our website for more information.

- [Announcer] The production of Carolina Outdoor Journal is made possible in part by: - [FEMALE ANNOUNCER] WILDLIFE IN NORTH CAROLINA MAGAZINE.

NCWILDLIFE.ORG/WINC.

- [MALE ANNOUNCER] AND BY EZ BAIT & TACKLE, FAMILY OWNED AND OPERATED.

WE FISH FROM FRESH TO SALTWATER.

WE PROVIDE FISHING SUPPLIES AND ADVICE TO EVERY TYPE OF ANGLER.

FOR ALL YOUR FISHING NEEDS, EZ BAIT & TACKLE.

[light instrumental music] ♪