By C.R. Edgerton 



Under the cool night 

 sky off Ocracoke Inlet, 

 several fishermen keep 

 a vigil, casting their lines again 

 and again into the foamy surf. 



Silhouetted by the moon's 

 orange glow, they catch spot, 

 croaker, flounder. 



They've spent uncounted nights 

 here, relishing the salt air in their 

 lungs and the spray of surf in their 

 faces. They figure they know all 

 there is to know about fishing in 

 Ocracoke Inlet. 



But they don't. 



Just beyond their heavily 

 weighted lines, a mysterious pro- 

 cess unfolds in the open sea. 



A dynamic merging of water, 

 wind and currents prompts the 

 migration of millions of recently 

 hatched fish from the warm waters 

 of the Gulf Stream, through the in- 

 let and into the calmer waters of 

 Pamlico and Albemarle sounds. 



Within this migration are the in- 

 fant spot, flounder, croaker and 

 other fish that one day might 

 dangle at the end of an angler's 

 line. Yet, most fishermen don't 

 know the migration process or how 

 important it is to life in the sea. 



Nor do they realize that the 

 numbers of fish in the sounds may 

 be traced to this migration. 



Sea Grant researcher John 

 Miller, a North Carolina State 

 University zoologist, calls the 

 winter migration of infant fish one 

 of the most important biological 

 events on the East Coast. 



"People need to be aware that a 

 great many of the most important 

 species in the estuaries don't 

 spawn there," Miller says. "They 

 spawn offshore and migrate into 

 the sounds through a quite remark- 

 able process." 



Amazing Journey Into 



Miller says the fish involved in 

 this annual migration account for a 

 significant slice of the state's 

 fishing economy, with menhaden 

 topping the list in volume. About 

 90 percent of the fish caught in the 

 state belong in this group. 



The fish are spawned and 

 hatched in early winter in the Gulf 

 Stream and spend the next 60 days 

 crossing the waters of the conti- 

 nental shelf. Currents toss them 

 toward the Outer Banks with a fury, 

 sometimes carrying the quarter- 

 inch creatures four miles a day. 



Sea Grant researcher Len 

 Pietrafesa, an NCSU oceanographer, 

 says the fish are ferried along by 

 upwellings produced by the north- 

 ward flow of the Gulf Stream. 

 These twirling masses of undersur- 

 face water push toward shore car- 

 rying the fish to within a few 



hundred feet of the Outer Banks. 



As they reach the coast, the in- 

 fant fish are carried along a ' 'con- 

 veyor belt" of shoreline currents, 

 Pietrafesa says. If luck is with 

 them, those currents push the fish 

 into Pamlico and Albemarle sounds 

 through Ocracoke, Hatteras and 

 Oregon inlets. 



Millions of them squeeze through. 



Inside the sound, these small 

 creatures become part of yet 

 another amazing combination of 

 wind and water. 



In winter, cold fronts blow in 

 from the northeast every seven to 

 10 days, their winds pushing the 

 water of the sounds toward the 

 barrier islands. Gravity creates an 

 opposite current in bottom waters, 

 carrying the fish into the estuaries. 

 There, they will grow and develop 

 into adult fish. 



