BLOG: A new bag of tricks

I don’t know if fish wise up to certain techniques or whether they switch on and off to a particular lure depending on time of day, tide and prevalent food source.

Regardless of the actual reasoning behind why fish bite, my fishing results have suggested a cycle of diminishing success as fish become saturated by whatever the current fishing fad may be. Whilst I’ve been catching a swag of snapper on soft plastics, in recent times the fishing has been a little erratic. Rather than persist I’ve moved on to using a different type of lure and alternate technique to target reds off Sydney.

Switching from plastics to hard body vibes has seen my snapper catches improve somewhat – just the other week I caught a 6kg red with lure maker Patrick Sebile on board whilst testing some of his lures that are currently being brought into the Australian market. It was a day where the current was trickling uphill which generally means slim pickings off Long reef, however, there was a little bit of bait holding over a few marks that have produced previously and rather than show the fish plastics, I pelted out a vibe and was clubbed by a solid fish on the drop.

That turned out to be my personal best red off Sydney in conditions that historically haven’t produced too many fish on soft plastics. Whether that fish was a fluke I’m not sure, what I do know is that mixing things up when the fishing is adverse has yielded some interesting results. It isn’t the best time to experiment when the fishing is slow however, what you really need is a high probability of a bite using a known technique to test out any new tricks – if the fish are there and eating your regular lures why not throw something different into the mix to see if a new top shelf lure can be discovered?

If a bream will eat a dropshot soft plastic why won't a snapper or even a jewie eat one? I have also recently been throwing deep running minnows at jewies along with blades and vibes, which has resulted in catching those annoying fish that are marking but not necessarily hitting my old favourite plastics. Jigging soft plastics down deep rather than heavy metal is also another little trick that can help get the kings going when they're not hitting metal jigs.

Rolling the dice and having a gamble when the fishing is red hot can uncover lures and techniques that you can use to show the fish something different if the fishing is tough – it’s always good to have a few tricks up your sleeve!