2025 recreational flounder season will open Sept. 1-14

The N.C. Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Marine Fisheries today announced that the 2025 recreational flounder season will open in Coastal and Joint waters of the state Sept. 1 at 12:01 a.m. and close Sept. 14 at 11:59 p.m.

The two-week season will open with the following provisions for both the recreational hook-and-line and gig fisheries:

• A one-fish per person per day creel limit.
• A 15-inch total length minimum size limit (from the tip of the snout to the tip of the tail).

Harvest of flounder with a Recreational Commercial Gear License will be prohibited.

The N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission's season will be open Sept. 1-14 as well, so the season, size limit, and daily creel limit will be consistent across jurisdictions.

The season, size and creel limits comply with provisions of the N.C. Southern Flounder Fishery Management Plan Amendment 3, which specifies that season and possession limits be set annually to keep the fishery within the recreational quota. The current 2025 recreational quota under Amendment 3 is 212,941 pounds, or 40% of the overall quota.

The N.C. Marine Fisheries Commission is scheduled to vote on adoption of Draft Southern Flounder Fishery Management Plan Amendment 4 at its August 20-22 business meeting. Adoption of Amendment 4 would result in a 50/50 quota allocation between the commercial and recreational fishery, whereby each sector would get 266,176 pounds, a quota increase of 53,235 pounds for the recreational sector. The additional quota would reduce the risk of overages in 2025.

For more specifics on the recreational flounder season, see Proclamation FF-25-2025.

The commercial flounder season for internal Coastal and Joint Fishing Waters (rivers, creeks and sounds) will be announced in the coming weeks through a separate news release and proclamation.