By Walt Rhodes

The 8-ounce sinker shot through the blue water like a torpedo blasted out of a nuclear sub.

With the heavy monofilament line stripping off the level-wind reel at warp speed, my thumb burned as I feathered the spool just enough to prevent a backlash. Five seconds later - thunk - the sinker had found its mark on the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean.

As if the bait had landed right in the fish's mouth, quickly there was another bump on the line and the fight was on.

I wasn't quite ready for such an immediate - and hard - strike. My rod was slammed into the boat's gunwale. I regained my composure, but line continued to surge off the reel in bursting jerks.

"Keep him out of the rocks!" a fishing partner onboard yelled. As I fought the fish, I barked back, "I'm trying!"

Guesses about what kind of fish I had hooked started circulating around the deck like a roll call.

"Amberjack, snapper, cobia, barracuda."

Most gag grouper are in the 10- to 20-pound range, but some fish can weigh over 40 pounds. Photo by Walt Rhodes

Finally, a mottled-tan hulk was becoming visible through the Windex-colored water. A hefty gag grouper was coming to the surface, lured from its underwater lair by a frozen cigar minnow.

"You must have dropped that bait right on him," said the boat's captain from the bridge.

"I think so," was all I could muster in a tired breath. The idea of grilled grouper fillets danced in my mind.

When the weather gods permit heading offshore, South Carolina's waters can yield bountiful surprises. You never know what's going to take your bait off the bottom. It could be a brawny bottomfish, like a grouper or a snapper, or a surface-dweller prowling the depths, such as a cobia.

The inshore waters offer the same degree of variety. Put a bait next to the marsh edge, and there is an equally good chance that either a spottail bass, spotted seatrout or flounder will run off with it.

The similarities don't end there. Any of these surprises are excellent when it comes to pleasing the taste buds.

Your choices for this fishing can be determined by deciding if you prefer light-tackle fishing and hot grease for frying or heavier angling equipment and glowing charcoal for grilling or both.

"Here it comes," said Capt. Mark Brown of the Mount Pleasant-based charter boat Teaser2. "Those right there are fish," he said pointing to the sharp, irregular break in the bottom contour.

Brown made a mental note of the location, circled the boat back around while still eyeing the depthfinder, and then ordered the mate to let loose of the anchor. Bingo! The boat settled right over whatever was causing the blip on the screen.

Lines dropped overboard, and within a minute or two, fish started coming topside. Large black sea bass and red porgies were first. Then someone hit the jackpot: a premium gag grouper. A few more followed at other locations throughout the day.

"Gags bite all year," Brown said. "There seems to be both an inshore and offshore movement as well as a north-south migration during the year. The fish can be as shallow as 40 to 50 feet during the summer and as deep as 250 feet in winter.

The key to finding gag grouper is to locate underwater structure. Brown recommended anglers search artificial reefs as well as bottom features listed on commercially made maps. If you can find the spots, grouper are usually not hard to hook, although keeping the big ones out of the cover they are associated with can be a challenge after the initial bite.

Common baits are cigar minnows, squid and live menhaden. Any sort of cut bait is suitable, too. A big chunk usually deters more ravenous sea bass and triggerfish and favors gags.

"The type of rig is going to depend on the current," Brown said.

"If the current is strong, I suggest using a drop rig.

"You might have to use as much as 1 pound of lead. Put a No. 6/0 to 8/0 hook above the weight on a short dropper line. Your main line should be 80- to 150-pound monofilament."

If the current is slow, Brown uses an in-line sinker and long leader, one as long as 8 feet. This allows the bait to flutter in the slow current and puts it farther away from the main line, something that is key when the fish has time to eye the bait.

Most cobia are caught on the surface by fishermen sight-casting to them around buoys or as the fish shadow sea turtles. Capt. Brown, however, picks them up during bottom-fishing trips with regularity.

"Like grouper, the cobia seem to make an inshore-offshore and north-south migration as well," Brown stated. "I wouldn't say that someone can go out and specifically target cobia on the bottom offshore, but they should not be stunned when one bites. We've caught as many as a dozen in a day. It's sporadic but not surprising."

Brown has taken cobia in 90 feet of water during the fall and as deep as 180 feet during the winter. These are all the same locations that he would be fishing for grouper.

"Baits for cobia vary," Brown said. "They'll take all sorts of live baits, but they really love blue crabs. The bait choice is going to depend on the mood of the fish. If you think cobia might be in the area, you can also drop down a white 4-ounce bucktail and jig it."

The majority of cobia caught in the ocean off South Carolina is by happenstance. You will luck into some from off the bottom, but the key to consistently catching cobia is to be certain that you have something on board to present once a fish is spotted near the surface.