Flounder lie buried in sand with only their eyes showing and ambush what passes overhead. They will not chase far and they will not come up in the water column to find you, so a flounder lure has one job: stay on the bottom and move slowly.
How to catch flounder on D.O.A. lures
Where they sit
Flounder want a hard edge with current over it. The sandy lip beside a channel, the down-current side of a bridge piling, the mouth of a creek where it dumps onto a flat, the rocks at an inlet. They face into the flow and wait. In autumn, as they stage to move offshore, inlets and passes concentrate them and it becomes the best fishing of the year.
The retrieve
Slower than feels right. Cast across the current, let the bait touch bottom, then drag it a few inches at a time with the rod tip low, pausing between each pull. You want to feel sand. A flounder often takes the bait and simply sits there, so a "snag" that gives a little is worth setting on. When you feel weight, give it a two count before you come tight — they grab a bait crossways and turn it.
Baits that work
- C.A.L. Curl Tail — the tail keeps working at a crawl, which is exactly the speed this fish wants. The best flounder bait in the line.
- 2.75" Shrimp — keel-weighted, so it lands and stays upright on the bottom, with a rattle cavity molded in.
- 2" Shrimp — when the fish are small or pressured, downsizing produces.
- Tiny TerrorEyz — good around inlet rock where you need a compact profile.
- C.A.L. 4" Jerk Bait — for bigger fish, on a light jig head, hopped rather than dragged.
Jig head weight
Use the lightest head that still holds bottom in the current you are fishing — usually 1/8 oz on a calm flat, 1/4 to 3/8 oz in an inlet on a moving tide. Too heavy and the bait plows; too light and it never gets down. The short shank jig heads in 1/8 and 1/4 oz cover most flounder situations.
Color
Flounder are looking up at a silhouette against the light, so contrast matters more than realism. Pearl and white patterns are the reliable starting point over sand, with Gold Glitter and Chartreuse tails when the water carries color.
