Big Cliff

Well if you order it and have it shipped to me I can either forward it to you or bring it back with me the end of March and drop it at your door on my way up to French River. Let me know if that helps and I'll pm you my address.

I believe these are called little neck clams and they seem to be the only variety harvested around these parts, they sure are good eating! The shrimp, well we have had them bbq, steamed, sauteed in butter and garlic....... no matter how you cook this fresh seafood it's all good 😊

Well it turns out there is a lot more to clam digging than just going out and digging! My first attempts yielded some pretty decent harvests but I really had to work at it. Not knowing much I had been told I needed a "clam rake", a non resident salt water fishing license, a bucket or basket to put the clams in, and rubber boots. Well I had brought boots with me and I had a five gallon pail so off I went to Walmart. No problem getting the fishing license, $35.00 for a year, the clam rake was something I hadn't seen before, sort of looks like a lawn rake with a basket attached. That clam rake works but boy did it get heavy fast and I found it hard to use. I noticed other people were using a garden cultivator style rake, it was a lot lighter, didn't have the basket attached and the tines were longer which allowed you to dig deeper with much less effort. I took the clam rake back and bought the cultivator and my harvest went up quite a bit with a lot less effort but I was doing a lot of digging still. That's what most of the other people seemed to be using so I carried on. My last trip out I noticed a man walking along, he'd stop and within a few seconds he'd have a clam. This went on for quite a few minutes so I walked over, explained that this was quite new to me and while I was getting some clams it looked like I was having to work much harder than he was. He laughed, told me he was form West Virginia and if there was an easy way to get free food he probably knew it. It was one of those immediate friendships, we just hit it off. Anyway Jim showed me what to look for in the mud, a little breathing hole that looks like one of those old style key holes (there's lots of different holes in the mud but this one is very distinctive) and it is only made by the little neck clams. My success went up immediately and the effort went down to almost nothing. I also got to meet one of the local COs, Chuck Beacham, a really nice guy, very friendly, very helpful, they were checking licenses, catch limits and sizes. Clams have to be a minimum of 1" thick through the hinge to be legal and the fines start at $165.00 and can go up to $1000.00/ clam so you want to make sure you don't have any undersized. Anyway, Chuck showed me how to make a simple little gauge by cutting a slot in my pail, he also suggested making the slot 1 1/8 inches just so there was a bit of a buffer and I could be sure I would never have a problem, If the clam goes through the slot it goes back in the water! Other things I've learned: The smaller clams are considered "steamer clams", the larger ones are called "chowder clams" the names are pretty well self explanatory. Clams unlike mussels will only open up once they are completely cooked and you want to get them out of the steamer as soon as they have opened or they can get tough so it's better to do them in smaller quantities. Anyway that's clam digging 101 LOL. Anyway I promised pictures of these shrimp so: I've got a fairly big hand! A bowl of them And last, some of the newest batch of clams: Anyway, tight lines and stay safe.

You did a great job! 🤗 there is no wrong way to make a tip up just variations. Good on you and enjoy your day with the first timers.

That will have to wait until next trip, we ate the evidance lol😊

Pier life is always interesting, dolphins swim by almost daily looking for their dinner, it's amazing how close they go into shore chasing the schools of bait fish. The pelicans drop by for a visit from time to time. I love watching them glide by just a foot above the tops of the waves, they seem to know exactly how to catch the updraft off the waves so they hardly have to flap their wings, they can glide for hundreds of feet without loosing altitude. One flew into my line yesterday, it was quite a surprise for both of us but he seemed to survive unscathed as did I when I ran for the rod thinking I had a huge bite LOL. Then there are the cormorants, pigeons, a variety of ducks, terns, and seagulls. It's hard to believe the variety of different things you catch from the depths, so far the list includes but is not limited to: Conch, Blue Crab, Spider Crabs, Black drum, crokers, whitings, a clam, spots, a shark, stingray, slick, sugar perch...... I think that's the list so far (apart from the oysters and clams I've been getting about once a week). I tried cooking up the blue crab yesterday (thank you google) one more delight to add to the list, you don't get a lot of meat but it sure is worth the effort! I am told that once the water warms up the list will be significantly expanded and the larger fish will move back in. Then we have the pier characters; My buddy Al, a retired NY state trouper and a very smart man, he taught me that if you want to communicate with the fish you have to "drop them a line". He also explained why in a flock of geese one side of the "V" is longer than the other; there's more birds in that side! 😲. I can't believe how wise he is. Rick; retired US army infantry comes for a walk on the pier every day; super friendly and boy can he sing, I went to church last week and he sang amazing grace accompanied by a guitar, I've never heard a nicer rendition! There's Tom, Bruce, Rick... pier fishing is as much a social event as it is a fishing trip. Yesterday we went to the docks where the shrimp boats come in (Calabash), one of the boats had just unloaded and I managed to buy two pounds of huge fresh shrimp for $6.00 a pound, had it home and cooked within an hour OMG is it ever good! I'll be making another trip back there again, if you buy 10 lbs the price drops to $5.00 a Lb. and these guys are almost the size of small lobsters (ok I might be exaggerating a bit but they are the biggest shrimp I have ever seen😉) The weather has been pretty good so far with temperatures slightly above normal for this time of the year for the most part, it looks like we have a bit of cooler air moving in for the weekend then it bounces back up into the high teens low twenties which should really help the fishing. The water temperature dropped to 50F and that really affected the whiting bite, it's slowly climbing again now and a couple of days of bright sun will have it back to where we want it (55F+). Fortunately all the big storms that have been hammering this area have gone around us, there is a big one going on right now but it has stayed North of Myrtle Beach. We had company here for the last week, a friend of Lynn's flew down from Toronto to spend the week with us, it was pretty reasonable, return airfare from Toronto was only $350.00 CDN. It costs me about that to drive it by the time you factor in food, accommodation and fuel. Anyway, that's my update for now, time to get ready to head to the pier. Tight lines and stay safe!

Like sinker, I might be able to help you out depending on what route you are taking, I should be in the French River area around that time.

Thanks Geoff but that one is regular eucher, the game I am looking for is bid eucher. For some reason I am having a hard time finding one that will work on android

I have been trying to find a good bid eucher app for my Samsung tablet without much luck. If anyone has one could you please post the link. I don't mind paying for one if it's a good one

The only thing that could make this trip better would be to share the experiences with good friends

All the very best in the new job!

$80.00 for a new set of heat shields is nuts, I just go to Wallmart and buy one of those $25.00 charcoal BBQs which last me 2-3 years and I prefer using the charcoal instead of the propane anyway.

Nice haul! Glad you got the chance to get out and do some fishing😊

I wonder how many cell phones are at the bottom of that lake, I know I donated one a few years ago😊

Got the oyster shucking knife, boy did I put it to good use last night😁. Fresh raw oysters, steamed clams with garlic butter, we ate until we couldn't eat anymore then I steamed the rest of the oysters. I am making a seafood chowder for tonight's supper , that with some fresh homemade biscuits, I'm getting hungry already. Best part is apart from a bit of gas to get there and a bit of time it's free! I think we have to plan a G2G in Myrtle Beach for next winter😊

Seafood for the taking! Fishing has been slow ever since that cold front moved in last week, the water temperature dropped from 57°F to 50F in three days and the catching became almost non existent. A few whitings and crabs but nothing like it was. A friend and I had been talking about going digging for clams and oysters so I decided this would be a perfect time to give it a try. Unfortunately Bruce couldn't go with me today but I decided to go on my own anyway. Went and got my South Carolina salt water fishing license ($35.00 for a year) bought a clam rake $45.00 and headed out to see what I could find. I had never dug for clams before or harvested oysters so I was kind of flying blind here but the sun was shining, it was 18° and I had checked the tide charts and would be at my selected spot just before low tide; perfect! It turns out digging clams is hard work, you are walking through this black mud that will suck the boots right off your feet then you start trying to find these clams which it seems like to bury themselves several inches below the surface of the mud. It took me a bit of practice but after about half an hour of trying to figure out how and what to do I started to get the hang of it pretty well. Oysters are a lot easier; well you still have to walk through that darn mud to get to where the oysters are but they are sitting right out in the open (amid a plethora of old oyster shells) all you have to do is pick them up, perhaps break off a few old shells, wash a bit of mud off them and you are good to go. Now shucking them is a whole different story, that is an art form in itself but I've had a bit of practice now and it's getting easier. I spent three hours out there this afternoon and came home with a five gallon pail of oysters and about 1/4 bushel of the most beautiful clams. If you like fresh seafood it doesn't get any fresher than this! Today's catch: about 1/4 bushel of little neck clams Oysters About a bushel (5 gal pail) of the freshest oysters you could ever get. Considering the clams sell for about $8.00 a lb and the oysters sell for about $50.00 per 1/2 bushel I think I've already recovered my initial cost and I'm going back again tomorrow . 🙂 One last picture, this guy is called a "spot", I caught it yesterday, apparently they are excellent eating and quite abundant in these waters. They don't get very big, I believe the record is only about 2.5 lbs, a quick picture and this guy went back to grow a bit bigger. Anyway, tight lines and stay safe!

Well it depends on what we are targeting at the time; shrimp is pretty standard for most things but when we are targeting whitings a product called FishBites seems to work very well and it stays on the hook better than shrimp do. For sharks and skate we use squid, shrimp, or cut bait. King fish; jigging or mullet. I don't bother fishing the beach although when we are fishing the pier we can fish anything from dry sand to about 1000' off shore, I just get the annual pass so I can use the pier as many times as I want. Myrtle Beach is quite good for pompano but not this time of the year, the water is too cold, pompano prefer water in the 70-80° range, last week it was 57° at the pier and this last cold front brought it down to 50.

Thanks, I've driven a lot further than that just to go for a coffee. Might be nice to get together and swap tactics.

A wonderful adventure that ended in a terrible tragedy, so very sad!

Welcome to the board, some of the best fisherpeople in the world on here. I'm in Myrtle Beach this winter and having a wonderful time. Met a fellow that owns a condo in Destin FL and he has offered me a really good deal if I want to spend next winter over there. I am thinking about it, how far would that be from your stomping grounds?

Oh Roy, so nice to see you back, Beans very kindly emailed me copies of some of the pictures he had from the time you and J came for your visit at Snug Harbour; brought back some wonderful memories!

WOW!

Tim Hales has huts out on the perch grounds as of today

Won't hurt to give it a try, I have sent lots of companies emails some of appreciation some complaints, almost all of them respond.

Thanks so much! I still have so much to learn but I am loving the challenge.