The Leading Edge

Hi All,

Time to talk about leaders...no im not talking about the men who run our countries either... but rather the business end of our tackle. More specifically leaders used for lures rather than bait...sorry bait fishos...but get with the program!

The current craze is obviously to fish with flurocarbon. It has so many advantages over mono that it makes sense to use it most of the time. Some of the advantages are;

1) Light Refraction Index - Very wanky terminology for a simple meaning. Basically fluro line has the same light refractive properties as water meaning once the line is submerged it becomes virtually invisible. The benefits are obvious especially if your using pink or green braid.

2) Abrasion Resistence - Some pundits believe mono has better abrasion resistence than fluro. In some brands this may be the case but as a whole i refute this somewhat. I reckon fluro is inheritly stiffer and harder than mono, therfore lends itself better to wear and tear.

3) Aging - Mono has a tendency to brake down over time. My early indications are fluro has a longer shelf life than mono. The colour, although virtually non-existent, doesnt bleach or degrade, or even go milky as some brands of clear mono seem to, like Maxima and Platypus.

Even though Fluro does have its advantages there are some fishing situations where Mono will out-perform Fluro. And there are some upsides to using Mono too, these are;

1) The Price - Mono is much cheaper than Fluro. For the tight arses out there mono makes commercial sense, especially 600m of Jarvis Walker for 4bux! In my opinion the best thing this super cheap line can be used for is backing...on reels that will never see the backing ever. On reels that may catch fish that might empty a spool, i use better quality line.

2) Knots - The one area that i will conceed to mono is in tying knots. The line pulls up better than fluro line. The fact that fluro line is stiffer and harder does hinder the knot tying process. More care needs to be taken to ensure the knots bed down snuggly and lay evenly. The extra stretch in mono has an elastic effect of tying snug knots that pull up even tighter under the load of a fish.


These are the built-in features and benefits of the two leader materials. In fishing situations though the use of one over the other has its place too. Lets see some examples;

1) Mono has a tendency to float. In a fishing situation where you require the light lure to hang high in the water column, such as fishing boat hulls, the mono will aid in keeping the lure bouyant. Fluro has a tendency to sink so in reverse, if you want to fish light lures a bit deeper, which would be the majority of times, Fluro aids the sinking process to get the light lure deeper, quicker.

2) Fishing with Mono leader of hard pulling fish. In situations where braid is used zero stretch in the line can mean more pulled hooks. The use of mono can put a little bit of elasticity in the system pretty much like a shock absorber. There are Fluro lines now made with a stretch factor to cater for this exact issue.

3) With poppers mono aides in keeping the popper on top of the water rather than digging in. As i suggested fluro sinks and therefore can have a negative effect on popper action.

4) 80% of my fishing revolves around deep water cast-and-retrieve. In this scenario Fluro is the way to go.

So in rounding up...there are times to use fluro and times to use mono. Understand the inherit characteristics of each and this will aid in your selection. Don't get caught up using only one type either.

Some of my current favourite lerader are;
Fluro
Sunline Basic FC - in 4-12lb
Sunline Hard Rock - all lines classes
Siglon FC - 10-20lb
Varivas Shock Leader - 20lb

Mono
Platypus Super 100 - 4lb-10lb
Penn 10X Pro Line - 6lb-30lb
Platil Universal - All line classes

Results of the 2008 Hawkesbury Classic

Hi Everyone,

So the scorecards are in, the fish have been weighed and the boats are cleaned and packed away back in the garage. The classic is over for another year. All the hype, anticipation and nervous sweat that goes into it ends in either excitement of sweet victory or the taste of hollow defeat.

In years past the taste of hollow defeat has been the subtle pill i have had to swallow. I have come close on occasions, seen my fishing partner bring home the bacon and even been cleaned up by fish that would surely have won the whole thing...but it wasnt my time.

So in 2008....yep you guessed it....it still wasnt my time. Sorry if you were expecting me to say i won. I didnt. But i did do a few things that gave me a glimmer of hope moving forward. I caught the 5th biggest jewie of the comp. Ok so thats not particularly exceptional as 4 fish weighed more but it was the only fish of substance to be caught on a soft plastic. The 4 other jewies were all caught on live bait.

So how big were the fish i hear you keep asking??? The winning jewie weighed 19.5kgs cleaned. The same angler caught the second biggest fish 15.7kgs and 3rd place weighed 13kgs. The 4th biggest weighed 11kg and my little puppy weighed 10kgs cleaned. Not a bad effort as i said, especially on 8lb braid and 20lb leader. The winners were probably using 30 or 40lb mono leader and 60 to 80lb leader...sporting??? I think not. I'd still be happy to catch one on anchor rope regardless but the light line really put my heart in my mouth.

The fish took 25mins to subdue and gave a brilliant account of itself. I orginally thought it to be better than 11kgs whole, thinking to be 13 or 14kgs...but my excitement over-rode my ability to judge and it weight alot less.

We did catch some other notable fish too. We caught a stack to flatties...probably 60odd fish in 2 days but none were real monsters...the best was 2 fish at around 2 kgs each...nowhere near big enuf to win comp. The results of the winning fish were;

1st Heaviest Fish - Jewfish 19.5kgs
2nd Heaviest Fish - Jewfish 15.7
3rd Heaviest Fish - Jewfish 13kgs
Flathead - 4.2kgs
Bream - 1.18kgs
Whiting - .450g
Jewfish - 11kgs
Biggest Other Species - 2.8kg kingfish

The low light was seeing all these 50-60cms jewies weighed in. Now all the fishos knew that the fish wasnt going to win the comp...so why keep em??? Why pilfer sooo many juvenile fish out of a system that is constantly raped by the commercial fleet??? It makes no sense...but is a typical reason why the mighty Hawkesbury River is little more than a shadow of its former self. It devoid of life and the sad reality is the noose is being pulled tighter...no managemet plan is in sight and the over-harvesting of its resources will surely be its downfall.

Next year i will not be fishing for flathead either. The winning fish is always a female...so why bother??? Keep a breeder for the possible chance of noteriety or give the system an opprtunity to re-stock. 1 breeding flathead will put over a million young into the system per year...its only a small step but one im prepared to make.

Time to cahnge to more ecological practises i think!

5 Must Know Things About Soft Plastics

In thinking why soft lures are so successful i wanted to also try and highlight what would be the 5 most important things i could teach a greenhorn in order for them to hit the ground running. Its always easier to be pointed in the right direction otherwise the journey is a slow and painful one.

So here are my 5 must things to remember about using soft plastics.

1) Be patient - It astounds me to see people flick lures for all of 5 mins only to put a dirty old pilchard back and lob it out. Not all lures work all the time. Not all fish eat all the time. Lulls in the bite is common and even the gun fishos out there weiding a lure cannot profess to catch fish all day long every time they go out fishing! What the gun fishos will do is know the habits of a fish and time their fishing with peak activities such as tide changes and low light etc. This will tilt the odds in you favour for success but even still some days are diamonds some days are stone. Stick it out, be patient and have confidence the lure your using is the right tool for the job.

Also be patient on the retrieve too. Too many newbies wind back thier lures at too brisk a rate. Aim to bounce your lure off the bottom with methodical hops and twitches. Mid water will rarely catch your chosen estuary species, except up north with speedsters like trevally and tunas.

2) Fish Light - The finesse concept is a highly publicised facet of flicking lures. The trade off is like most in fishing. Fish too heavy and get less bites or fish too light and get dusted up more often. Usually a happy medium should be reached but on the tough days light is the only way to go when fish are shut-down.

3) Use the Right Gear - I've seen fishos believe that any old glass rod is still sufficient for flicking soft plastics. I'll tell you now graphite is the only way to go. Glass rods are too soft, dont set the hooks as well, have reduced casting distance and less feel for the subtle bits that occur with lures. On the flipside graphite has the exact opposite features. It has a fast recoil rate helping set the hooks better, increased casting distance for the same reason, more sensitivity to feel bites and a stiffer tip to work the lures more accurately. mated to braid and a decent little threadline reel makes for one super sensitive integrated system ready to catch fish.

in my opinion fused gel spun is better than braid on thredlines and definately use flurocarbon leader as well. The correct knots should be employed as well (see Mondays article for the right knots)

4) Have a Reason to Fish a Spot - Dont just pull up somewhere and start chucking lures. If u wanna catch fish you gotta fish where the fish are. Use your sounder if you have one. Barring that use your knowledge of the system. Fish known fish holding locations and look for vital signs of activity.

If you cover enuf of the right kind of water, results will follow.

5) Stay Mobile - Probably the most important reason of all, keep on the move. Drift, walk, use the electric, do whatever you can to cover water. When fish are found stay with em till the bite shuts down again. The beauty of lures means you can put your lure where you want it in as many places as you want it...utilise that fact.

They would definately be my 5 must things to remember if i was re-learning to use soft plastics. While theres a heap of small details i consider important they basics must be mastered b4 any of the trick shots can be used!

November Rain

Hi People,

Just a quick blog today. Dunno if any of you have noticed but the weather patterns these days a crap. You cant bank on weather reports being correct, wind forecasts are just plain outragous and even tides are inconsistent.

Pretty much what this equates to is crap fishing conditions. Now only a few blogs ago i wrote that if you waited for the ideal conditions to go fishing you probably would never get out on the water. So in this inconsistency and ill-advice why is it that the Hawkebury Classic, always held on the first full weekend in November has rained 5 years in a row???? Sweet Jesus, give me some respite please. I only have a bass/bream boat, so no cover. Its not the ideal rig for over-nighters, especially in torrential rain. Last year we took on over 200 litres of rain water in one night.

To cut a long story short they have predicted rain again. How can it be that the only week of the year that has any consistency in weather is this one...anyway...enuf whinging!

So whats the battle plan??? I have always held the desire to beat the live baiters with lures. The Hawkesbury Classic is a gut and gill comp. All fish are weighed gutted and must be in edible condition. All the gun local jewie fisho's come out of the woodwork this time of year. Ive heard some absolute crackers being caught too in the river...some around 25kgs plus an 18kg jew caught on sp's while the rod was left in the rod holder...gotta be joking.

So this year i will be doing a combination of both live baiting and flickin sp's. I will eventually get to the point where i will only flick lures but my fishing partner is a die hard live baiter. This will change.

Anyway it starts on Friday and weigh in is 2pm sunday. I'll report the comp first thing monday morning, and highlight what techniques were supreme and how many fishos scored good fish.

New Lures Old Techniques

Fishing is a unique sport. Technology plays a huge part in the overall popularity of what's in vogue, what's considered old and what is determined a must-have. Lures are probably subject to most of this hype. Now i say hype cause thats exactly what it is. In my opinion all lures catch fish, in the right hands of course, but lures are not all created equal. Lets see what i mean...

First of all most lures that are becoming the modern go-to lures, and especially so in tournaments, are really only a rehash of an old design. Add a new rattle, some holographic colours and new packaging and 'wallah' new gun lure. This is typified by the current bladed lures on the market now e.g TT Lures Switchblades and Ecogear VX-35's... These things are the must-have in the arsenal of a bream luring fisho. The fact is they have been around since adam was a boy. Bladed lures were somewhat more 'agricultural' than what they are now. But as i suggested thats the whole premise. Get an old design and tweak it a little then market it as the latest and greatest.

What extent is this hype manufactured and what is real??? Do they really catch more fish than the lures that came previous??? My theory is that a successful lure is always a successful lure. By that i mean no lure dies in potency. It's all about ratios. If three quarters of the fishing population start to use a hyped lure most of the time the reality is they are not using another lure most of the time. Remember this point, you will catch most fish on a lure that is in the water the most time. Simple. A successful lure will never be the one gathering dust in your box. But pull that lure out and fish with it most of the time and see what happens.

Same with plastics. The sp's i was using 3 years ago will still work today. Just that since then i have acquired other gun sp's and rarely dig around to the older ones. Give a lure time to work and it will work.

These ideas do come with some conditions of course. Dont pull out a lure meant for flatties and try and catch a bream. It will eventually work but not the same as a lure designed for a certain species.

Its not all marketing though. New lures do come along. The new hybrid lures that utilise both hardbody and soft body ideas are an interesting phonomenon. Still getting my head around it all. Not convinced.

So don't get caught up in the tackle industry machine...its hard to get out, trust me i know better than most. Don't try and keep up with the Jones', who cares if high profile fishing 'experts' are raving on about this lure or that. Take it with a grain of salt. Work it out for yourself. Otherwise you just end up having a great collection of redundant lures capable of catching fish yesterday!

Soft Plastics

There's no gold medal for realising i just LOVE soft plastic fishing. It has totally revolutionised my fishing. Dont get me wrong. I fish other techniques too but none quite have the possibilities and versatility of soft lures. Take for instance the ablility to work the whole water column, re-size heads to suits current, depth, species, line class and catsing distance, or perhaps change plastic to suit all of those same conditions!!!

The versatility is astounding. This can be a drawback for a novice as knowing where to start can be a little confusing. The tackle stores dont help either. Walls are lined with so many brands, colours, sizes and patterns that sometimes for a greenhorn its easier to buy that old packet of pillies than to try and de-code the soft plastic puzzle.

All that aside, why are soft plastics so successful? A million new soft plastic anglers can't be wrong about em. They really have entrenched themselves as a must-know technique to catch fish. So why are they so deadly??? What is the catalyst? Can anyone pick up a rod and be successful???

First of all soft plastic fishing, like any other form of fishing, is subject to the current conditions. You cant catch fish that simply are not there. No use trying to catch a whiting in winter for example. It can happen but the odds are stacked against you. Knowing where to fish and what fish are available will assist in applying a gameplan. Bait fishos transitioning to softies will find the transition fairly easy i would assume. All the same priciples apply to baitfishing as plastix, fish the same gutters, structure, eddies etc. Also baitfishos will have an understanding what food fish eat. These items can be replicated using softies..

But knowing fish behaviour and diet is only part of the success. The most important aspect of why softies are so successful revolves around the method or delivery of such lures. By this i mean plastix fishing is sedentary. Its an active form of angling that requires in the most part for the angler to be active and cover a heap of water. In a given session you might cover an area 20kms long. While you wont cover all that with a fine tooth comb, you will pick out the hotspots in that area and cover those more thoroughly.

A bait fishing, apart from drifting, will anchor up somewhere and wait for the fish to pass thier boat. The use of berley can assist in drawing the fish to them, but really are subject to fish picking up the berley trail for success. The effective water they are fishing is a radius of perhaps 20m around the boat. Now you cant really compare 20m to 20kms of water coverage.

The whole premise of why plastix fishing is so successful is cause the angler hunts the fish, covers a stack of water and presents an offering close to the natural food item of the fish. Sure its not a live bait, or not even a real food item, but its all about the deception. This usually takes some getting used to. Rod manipulation is very important and will develop over time. Once fish are located, stay with em.

For the novice, just drift. Use drifting as your means to cover water and eventually you come across fish. The other benefit of drifting is that your lures are continually in the strikezone unlike cast-and-retrieve where you cast, wait for the lure to touch bottom, then commence the retrieve to the boat. While i prefer cast-and-retrieve cause its more active, and if done right can actually cover more water than drifting, it does require some ability to know where your lure is and deal with the slack line that happens on a retrieve. The biggest issue i see with novices is a lack of patience, not allowing the lure to sink to the bottom. Thus the retrieve is done mid-water, and usually no fish.

Due to being active we come across alot more fish. Our catch-rates on plastics are far exceeding those on bait. Im not trying to say lures catch more fish than bait but moving your lure, or bait for that matter, past the nose of as many fish as possible can only increase your catch rates. Sitting back and waiting for fish to come past your boat is a thing of the past. You've gotta go to the fish.

So to reiterate, be active. Its the biggest factor for success. Move around, try different spots, different depths, different structure. Find the fish and then try and deliver what the fish may want to eat. Its a simple philosophy...but sometimes alot harder to put into practise.

Fishing the Right Conditions

You hear all kinds of myths in fishing. Its one of those sports where people have thier own idea just where and when is the best time to go out and catch thier fish. The variables in fishing, but more so in the conditions relevant to fishing, make putting it all together a litteral jig saw puzzle, to use a well coined cliche. Trying to make sense of it all makes your head spin.

I liken it to horse racing. You can study all the variables like distances run, wet weather galloper, favorite tracks etc and can and over think the whole issue. Then a woman who knows nothing rocks up and selects a horse based purely on the cool name and picks the winner paying 20bux. Does you head in!

So lets look at all the variables in fishing and try to put some sense into all the mystery.

Tides
Probably the most contentious topic in all of fishing. I hear agruements all the time whether a fish bites best on the rising tide or on the falling tide. Sometimes its the slack water at the bottom of the tide or the slack at the top??? What complicates things further is that the same species can bite better on different tides in different waterways...the mind really can boggle.

Time of te tide can be dependant on the food sources available too. If your targeting bream that are feeding actively on the prawn run, an outgoing tide will be better. If your chasing bream feeding on crabs, then a big high tide will give the bream access to new water anavailable at low tide. Either can be targeted to good effect. So perhaps knowing what the bait movements are can help decide what part of the tide you need to fish.

There are however some traits on fish that can give a relative idea about where fish will be and when they'll bite best. use flathead as an example, you can bank on em feeding more aggresively when the tide runs out. As an ambush predator they use the outgoing tide to thier advantage. As flats drain all baitfish HAVE to exit the flat...in comes the flathead. As i said though, its not always the case. Some of my hottest flatty bites hve been on the incoming tide. It pays to be reactive to the situation at hand.

Low Light
Some people put stock into the low light periods of the day; either sunrise or sunset. The theory being predatory fish hunt more actively on the dark than at full light. Also the baitfish seem to be less flighty at low light too, so they can be hunted better. This can be true for Jewies who's massive pink eye is suited to seeing in low light. But dont fall into the trap of thinking jews can only be caught at night. Daytime is my preferred time.On the flats or in shallow water low light can be a blessing too as fish will cease to be timid.

The drawback with low light is it doesnt hang around long enuf. If you based your fishing purely on this you would fish 3 hours in a day! Sure its beneficial to fish sunrise but its the starting point of the day. fish caught at this time can set the tone for the day.

Moon Phase
this can go hand in hand with low light at times. The moon phase is another hotly contested fishing variable. Some old salts swear by the 3 days leading into the new or full moon and the 3 days after as the prime time to chase Jew. I've heard that the actual day of the full moon is very poor though...too much light??? Who knows. Fact is the lunar cycle definately has an effect. That's about as much as i can relate. Once again i've caught fish thoughout the lunar cycle so no time for me seems to be obviously better.

It's more likey the effect the moon has on the tides than the moon itself. The moon does produce light though, so the theory of low light does have merit too.

Barometer
This one can confuse me at times. Bass fishos will swear by a rising barometer over 1015 (i think)and if it falls under 1010 they wont bother going out for a fish. Other theorys ive heard say a falling barometer is better for fishing, especially after a thunderstorm. I can certainly agree that some our best days fishing have been in the build up of a storm, which indicates a rising barometer. Some days killer days have come preceding a storm and a get a few days consistent rain. This indicates a fallen barometer then a levelling out, perhaps at, say, 1000.

So no categorical evidence there to suggest you should live and die by the barometer too.

Seasons
Perhaps the only thing you can probably bank on is time of year. although global warming is having its effect. For example the annual summer whiting run, which typically started in Nov every year now commences in Feb. The transitional months of autumn and spring seem to be the best producers of fish numbers, most prob due to change over of species. The winter fish are moving in while the summer fish are moving out. The demarcation is not sudden so autumn and spring allows you to catch good mixed bags.

In a nutshell, dont bank on anything. If you live and die by any condition you may as well not go out. Any time is good time to catch a fish. Only requisite is you need to have your line in the water!