# Surf Fishing Myrtle Beach



## JLute (Dec 24, 2017)

I have some friends coming from out of town and they want to do some surf fishing. I'm newer to fishing and the area and I was wondering where would be the best place to go in the Myrtle Beach area? I'd prefer to stay south of Myrtle if possible and to avoid swimmers. Any help is much appreciated.

Thanks


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## SmoothLures (Feb 13, 2008)

Go to Garden City south of the pier. The pompano bite is on fire and the whiting are good to very good. Sand fleas, shrimp, and shrimp Fishbites. Don't put anything on your rigs except 2 hooks and a sinker. 

The kings are also still on fire if you want to take a charter out to Belkie Bear or the MB rocks.


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## Killasnipe (Jul 10, 2013)

How far out do you have to go for kings trolling? Can you barely go out so you can still see the beach and troll a ballyhou? My friend has a small 17' and we have always been afraid to go too far out because of mother nature and the ocean. I'm comfortable in a boat, but i know nothing of the ocean and we dont have a CB. I want to stay in contact with phone towers. I know they catch kings off the pier and dont mean to ask a stupid question, but I would love to try trolling for one. Can you do it right outside the mouth of the jetties at the state park?


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## SmoothLures (Feb 13, 2008)

Killasnipe said:


> How far out do you have to go for kings trolling? Can you barely go out so you can still see the beach and troll a ballyhou? My friend has a small 17' and we have always been afraid to go too far out because of mother nature and the ocean. I'm comfortable in a boat, but i know nothing of the ocean and we dont have a CB. I want to stay in contact with phone towers. I know they catch kings off the pier and dont mean to ask a stupid question, but I would love to try trolling for one. Can you do it right outside the mouth of the jetties at the state park?


They can be from the gulf stream to 50 yards off the beach. Right now most people are fishing Belkie Bear @ 20 miles and MB rocks @ 5 miles. You can find some at 3 mile too. These are the smaller fish, 5-15 lbs. The biggest fish are right on the beach on the menhaden balls but of course there aren't as many. People are limiting out in 30 minutes to a few hours on the little guys at Belkie and MB rocks. You also can catch cobia on the bait balls though I got a 42" at Belkie on Thursday. Was just chilling in the prop wash looking at us and ate a pitched cigar minnow on a king rig. 

We either use a frozen cigar minnow or live bait (menhaden usually). 

For trolling cigar minnows: 
Get a 1.5 oz jighead in a bright color (chartreuse/orange is #1) and a 5 lb box of frozen cigar minnows. Stick them in a bucket of saltwater about 10-15 minutes before you get to your spot. Stick the jighead hook through the dead center of his head, and stick your #4 4X stinger hook in his back with a slight bend in the wire. If the wire is straight and tight it can cause it to roll. You can bend him left/right and up/down a bit to break his back and help him swim better. Troll 2-4 knots, a downrigger can get you some extra bites some days.

I make these and they are available for purchase at MI Outpost and Perry's. Get a handful of skirts as well. Both can tie you a rig if you need to see one. 










For live baits you just put 2-3 trebles in your live menhaden and troll them just fast enough to keep them pointed the right way either over structure or around the bait balls on the beach. 

For the smaller fish especially you can use a flounder/whiting rod, if you have them you can use a small conventional reel too. 

Go easy on them, the hooks pull easy, and have a small gaff ready.

Also fun fact: they got a 30 lb on a Clarkspoon right outside the jetties today.


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## spydermn (Apr 26, 2009)

Piggy backing this!

Do I need to bring a heaver and throw for distant or is fishing the wash/beakers good? 

Any small sharks south of horrey county? I will be at Pawleys Island


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## SmoothLures (Feb 13, 2008)

spydermn said:


> Piggy backing this!
> 
> Do I need to bring a heaver and throw for distant or is fishing the wash/beakers good?
> 
> Any small sharks south of horrey county? I will be at Pawleys Island


Kind of. A heaver is too heavy for the pompano but I have intel that they were caught really far out on 10-12’ light rods a few days ago. Might have been a bar forming out there. But that’s the exception not the rule for SC. Generally a 7’ rod in and behind the breakers will find the pompano and whiting. 

There should be a ton of small to medium spinners, blacktips, and sharpnose in the surf. I use 10-12” of 80 lb wire haywired to a 6/0-8/0 2X-4X circle hook and a 60 lb mono shock leader that doubles as a rub leader for the smaller sharks. If you want to land bigger ones you’ll want to add some heavy mono to your casted leader. Heads are great baits right now because of all the pup sharks in the surf that will chew up your baits before a real shark can find it. 
There’s also like a .0001% chance at a surf cobia that you can keep in the back of your mind.


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## spydermn (Apr 26, 2009)

Thanks. I have tons of gear. We are meeting some kids from Minnesota and am sure they would love to see sharks of ANY kind. I am going to really be targeting sharks. As I will not be is Horry Cty I can do that 🙂 Nothing of size since I will be with a fishing crew of one. I have a couple 10’ light spinners that will be fun with small to med sharks.

What hooks are you catching the pomp’s on? Never caught a keeper and want to try them in the fryer


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## SmoothLures (Feb 13, 2008)

spydermn said:


> Thanks. I have tons of gear. We are meeting some kids from Minnesota and am sure they would love to see sharks of ANY kind. I am going to really be targeting sharks. As I will not be is Horry Cty I can udo that 🙂 Nothing of size since I will be with a fishing crew of one. I have a couple 10’ light spinners that will be fun with small to med sharks.
> 
> What hooks are you catching the pomp’s on? Never caught a keeper and want to try them in the fryer


You’ll definitely catch some pup sharks on any kind of cut bait. I would use the rig I said with a 50-60 shock leader and 4-6 oz of lead and you’ll have a good chance of landing blacktips and spinners under 6’. 

I only use #4 Owner Mutu light circles. I buy them by the 50 pack. You could use #2 if you don’t care about missing some of the smaller stuff (spot, baby whiting, pinfish, etc). Do not get the inline tournament ones. You want the offset ones. 

Tie one on to 25# Seaguar fluoro. Slide 6-8” and tie a small surgeons loop. Slide down 18” or so and tie a bigger surgeons loop (3” or so). Pull 16-18” and tie on a second hook. Hook a flea up through the bottom through the digger or a 1/2” square of Fishbites shrimp blue bag in whatever color you like. Green pink and orange work great. You’ll catch anything from 4” spot to 30” drum. Take it easy on big fish as the little hooks will open right up which I am perfectly happy with when I see it’s one of those monster rays that love to eat sand fleas. Hooks also pull pretty easy on nice pompano. 

You tie your main line to the small loop and loop on a 2-4 oz sinker on the bigger loop if that wasn’t clear.


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## JLute (Dec 24, 2017)

Update: We went fishing 2 different days, once two hours before and after low tide and the other day 2 hours before and after high tide. We used live sand fleas from Perry's Bait and Tackle and also used some cut shrimp. However, we did not have any luck either day and we caught 0 fish. I did have one good strike, but did not hook the fish. Thanks for the suggestions, hopefully other have better luck. I think I skip out of the surf fishing next time.


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## Guest (Jun 28, 2018)

JLute said:


> Update: We went fishing 2 different days, once two hours before and after low tide and the other day 2 hours before and after high tide. We used live sand fleas from Perry's Bait and Tackle and also used some cut shrimp. However, we did not have any luck either day and we caught 0 fish. I did have one good strike, but did not hook the fish. Thanks for the suggestions, hopefully other have better luck. I think I skip out of the surf fishing next time.


Don't miss out on a good thing. I tried for years with very little luck. I started reading a lot on this site and finding videos on Youtube that helped me understand how to read the surf so I could turn my luck around. Since I started learning, I've caught at least some fish each of the last 4 times I've gone to NC and fished in the surf. Don't give up, it's very rewarding when you start figuring things out. Have patience, relax, and enjoy. You'll figure things out.


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## smilliganqb (May 18, 2016)

Fished Crescent Beach this morning from the surf, caught 12 whiting, 1 blue, and a stingray. Fished from 5:30-830, low tide was 4:30 am.


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## smilliganqb (May 18, 2016)

12 more whiting this morning for the fish fry! Crescent Beach surf fishing


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