THE LOVE OF LURES

Like many of us, Steve Hunt is a lure fishing fanatic. Here’s a round up of the lures he loves for the species he likes to chase.

As we rounded the last bend, there it was, the biggest school of salmon we all had ever witnessed. We were at Picnic Beach, lower Eyre Peninsula, and the glorious surf beach in front of us was dominated by a huge, heaving black mass that was in so close to the beach you could almost touch the fish. And keeping them there were at least six large bronze whaler sharks, hunting the school at close quarters.

Luckily, I already had my rod rigged in the back of the car and, despite having dodgy knees, I had made it down the steep sand dune and to the water’s edge first. I launched my brand-new Daiwa OT Jig in the Sardine Glow pattern at the massive school of salmon just as the other guys started to filter down onto the beach. The response was immediate as my rod lunged forward and I loaded up on a great fish.

The salmon erupted from the calm surface with several spectacular leaps and as I looked around, I could see Nasa, Wally and Garry were already hooked up as well. As we subdued our fish, then released them to fight another day, Doug and Skinny waded in on the fun also, and it wasn’t uncommon to see six hook-ups at any one time. It was absolute piscatorial mayhem for the next two hours.

The bronze whalers, up to nine feet long, were a constant threat, herding the school on the seaward side, then charging through them on the beach side. As I waded out for another cast, I looked back and saw a dozen injured salmon in the shallows, flailing around with half their bodies out of the water. And the switched-on bronzies knew this, as they were hunting often with their backs out of the water. As the massive school of salmon split and drifted a little further offshore, this presented more of a challenge, with lit up sharks cruising the same waters we were standing in. We set up a bit of a look-out system and took it in turns casting to the school, which by this stage was drifting about 80m offshore. We already had caught and released several fish each, but the opportunity was far too great to pass up.

Despite the aching knees, I waded out again into the surf and let fly again, only to hear that dreaded ‘ping’ as the braid parted. At least it gave me a chance to grab my phone and take some action shots in and around the water, and it was great just watching the boys have so much fun. There is literally nothing better than to have a hungry school of salmon going nuts within casting range.

I got itchy feet again, borrowed a Halco Hex lure from Nasa, and waded back in for another couple of casts. Again, the hit was instant as soon as the lure touched down, which raised an interesting point. There were six of us fishing and we were probably all using different lures, yet it didn’t seem to matter. Everybody was hooking up instantly, no matter what lure they were using.

Hence my obsession with lures. Salmon would be the number one land-based target for the lure fisherman, as they are voracious, speedy hunters that are always on the lookout for a feed, even when, as at the start of this article, their own lives may be in mortal danger. So, it pays to always carry a variety of spinning lures when visiting a surf beach or exposed rock spots.

Salmon are among our most popular lure targets

Metal baitfish profile lures in the 30-60g size are probably the most suited to salmon fishing, as they are streamlined and cast like bullets, plus the fish love them. There are so many brands out there, so I won’t go naming them, but I prefer my lures to incorporate a bit of silver in the colour scheme to get that all important flash of a fleeing baitfish in the water.

Hex and Twisty style metal lures by Spanyid and Halco are probably your next best bet to reach those fish holding just offshore. They are slightly less aerodynamic than the metal baitfish profile lures, but sizes in the 40-80g range will soon get you amongst the fish. If you are into catch and release, the trebles can be changed to single hooks to make this task easier.

It also pays to carry some stickbaits, both sinking and floating, if you get the ideal situation like we had on Picnic Beach. Salmon love this style of lure and will climb all over it in their attempts to chase it down. This is especially so with floating stickbaits, and there is nothing better than seeing a big salmon launch itself into the air with a spectacular surface strike.

Lure fishing for any species really gets me excited, so much more so than bait fishing. Put simply, it is much more fun and seems so much more rewarding when you trick that trophy fish into believing that pulsating piece of metal or plastic is a fleeing baitfish. So, over the years I have built up a ridiculous sized lure collection, and for the rest of the article will run through my favourites for popular species.

SNOOK

I really enjoy casting lures for snook from the shore, and from the boat. They are stealthy hunters, usually lurking near seagrass beds, that put on a quick turn of speed to catch their prey. But once you introduce some pilchard berley into the mix, they will turn into ravenous killers ready to hunt down anything in sight. This usually lends itself to boating, but also works from jetties and rock locations.

Once you have them switched on, snook will be ready to smash most small to medium sized lures you twitch through the berley trail. My favourite is the Daiwa Pro Double Clutch in the 60cm and 75cm sizes, a wonderful suspending twitchbait that lends itself beautifully to this style of fishing. Favourite colours are Blue Smelt, Ghost Wakasagi, Lazer Wakasagi, Lazer Perch and Lazer Ayu.

Rapala X Rap Deep in the 10cm and 12cm size have always been very good also, especially in Glass Ghost, Olive Green, Blue Silver and Silver. These lures are also deadly if trolled in waters less than 5m deep, as are the more traditional Halco Twisty, Hex and Spanyid Raiders. Soft plastics like Squidies and Daiwa Bait Junkies are also deadly when worked through a berley trail, especially in white. One year at Streaky Bay near The Bushes there were that many snook around, you didn’t even have to troll. The water was only 5m deep and so clear you could clearly see individual fish hovering above the bottom. We would cast our lure to whatever fish we chose, twitch it a couple of times and bang! I even had a couple hit the lure at the side of the boat as I tracked it in a figure of eight pattern with the rod tip.

FLATHEAD

Flathead are the ultimate stealth hunters. They are usually found lying on the bottom in shallow water, often around weed edges, rocks and sandy drop offs, waiting for baitfish to wander into their personal space, before bursting from cover and smashing them at close range. There are three styles of lures that suit this terrain perfectly — soft plastics, shallow diving minnows and bent minnows.

Soft plastics in the 50-110mm size are perfect for twitching around the shallows, especially if rigged with weedless hooks. The better brands include Squidgies Whip Baits and Flick Baits, Daiwa Bait Junkie Minnows and Jerkbaits, plus Z Man Minnowz and Streakz. Flathead love prawns, and I am now trying the new generation prawn imitations like the Steez Soft Shell and Berkley Shimma Shrimp.

Shallow diving minnows can also work well if you are fishing around reefy, coastal areas interspersed with sand patches in depths around 1.5m. Floating or suspending minnows in the 80- 100mm size, twitched around the edges of these patches, can be deadly. And another lure to include in your tackle box is the weird looking OSP Bent Minnow; they’re brilliant and flathead love them.

FRESH WATER

I don’t get up to the river all that often anymore, mainly because I have an open ocean water boat, but for some reason I still have hundreds of freshwater lures. This situation was made even worse when I bought a heap of lures off a guy on Market Place — literally thousands of dollars’ worth for $500, including slide baits, diving lures, spinnerbaits, large soft plastics, and mostly all brand new.

My main fishing exploits have been for yellowbelly (callop) trolling and casting medium sized Stump Jumpers, and these trusty old lures are hard to beat. Spinnerbaits in black/purple, orange/black, and yellow/green are good when cast in and around snags, as are vibes jigged around the submerged branches. And now I also have plenty of quality deep divers to properly target Murray Cod.

Flatties will chase a variety of lures

Callop are fond of spinnerbaits

I went to Tasmania several years ago armed to the teeth with hundreds and hundreds of dollars of smaller trout minnow lures, including all the name brands like Rapala, Daiwa, Yo Zuri and River2Sea. After two frustrating weeks of donuts, even though I had seen plenty of trout swimming and jumping everywhere, I went to the local tackle store to find out where I was going wrong.

We walked over to the soft plastics section and mentioned that we use these everywhere in the rivers and the dams. The salesman was pointing at a packet of Berkley Powerbait 6cm grubs that were black with gold sparkles. Not really knowing if he knew what he was talking about, I shrugged and bought a packet. The next morning, on a little river not far away from where we were staying, I landed three trout within a couple of hours.

Lesson learnt!

TUNA

I simply love trolling and casting lures to southern bluefin tuna, and this is when my real obsession with lures began. When the tuna started returning in good numbers right across the state, I went nuts stocking my armoury of trolling lures. At one stage, before the new colour range came was released, I had every size in every colour of the Rapala X Rap Magnum series. These are still my favourite trolling lures, as they swim straight and true, are very durable, even with the original hooks, and tuna simply love them. Although the new range goes up to the deep diving 40 and I have plenty of these, I tend to stick with the smaller sizes during most of my tuna exploits. I usually use an X Rap Mag 15 or 20 if the tuna are up and about on the surface.

My all-time favourite colour, and the one most likely to get smashed in my opinion, is the Bonito pattern. Time and time again, with three lures out the back, this is the one that will get nailed. It is a real bluefin tuna lolly, mainly silver, with purple head, green to blue back with black horizontal lines. I have a couple at home that have so many teeth marks, they are almost devoid of paint, yet still they catch fish.

Other great colours are the Red Head UV, Flying Fish, Real Red Bait, Lime Light, Glass Ghost, Wahoo, Purple, and there is now a new version of the Bonito. This size is great for when the tuna are busting through the surface chasing small baitfish. But this is not always the case and, on some days, you may need to change to XRMAG 30s 0r XRMAG40’s to get down deep at places like Sanders Bank.

I do own plenty of tuna skirts, but as mentioned, I still mainly use the smaller diving minnows, probably because I trust them to catch fish. But on one trip to Coffin Bay I started off using a yellow and blue feather skirt and had as many hook-ups as anyone else, so I think it is a matter of what you get used to. Other colours that work are yellow/green, red/white, pink/white, purple/black and orange green.

Strongly-built deep divers are a must for tuna chasers

Carry a range of colours when targeting bluefin. They can be fussy!

You will also need casting lures from a boat to reach that skittish school of tuna that has been flogged by constant boating traffic. It may entail casting lures up to 80m away, so the lures need to be heavier casting types like the Rapala Cast Rap, sinking stickbaits, metals and heavy diving lures like the SFT Takumi 75mm lures. They need to cast like bullets.

This is especially so if those smaller bluefin venture north into the lower gulf waters as they did last year. They became boat shy, skittish, and sounded at the very thought of a boat coming near them. Anglers needed small casting lures with smaller hooks to be in with a show of hooking one. To this end I will be excited to try the new Daiwa Sarawash 110HS weighted diving minnow this coming season.

OFFSHORE

Offshore lure fishing around the deep reefs consists mainly of casting stickbaits into the white water for pelagics and jigging knife jigs in the deep water for samsons, kingfish, nannygai, and others. We have also successfully used large soft plastics on nannygai and snapper, including one Berkley fish that was bitten in half. We did another drift and I landed a nanny that coughed up the other half!

But recently there have been several new jigs come out for Nomad Tackle in the form of squid imitations and fish vibes. The Nomad Squidtrex looks unbelievable; it’s tough, ready rigged and comes in four sizes. I bought a heap, as well as some Vertrex Soft Fish Vibes to jig around the offshore reefs of Coffin Bay. They did do OK, but this is definitely something I want to explore more in the future.

Recently I did a trip with the doyen of offshore fishing, Ash Smith, who is renowned for being the most reliable charter offshore from Coffin Bay, for heavyweights like samson fish and kingfish. We had a great group aboard and it was a wonderful day weatherwise, with a small swell and light and variable winds. Some lovely tuna showed up and could not resist our skirted lures.

Then we moved on to the wash areas around several offshore islands and cast stickbait lures for kings. We had several follows, but no hook-ups. Then we cruised to some amazing reef systems that not many people know about to jig for samsons with knife jigs. It had been a while since I had caught a samson, and I was well pleased when one climbed on board. I can thoroughly recommend this charter.

In summing up, I must add that I am an absolute lure addict, some may say obsessed. Because after all, it defies logic to carry hundreds and hundreds of lures, especially when you can only use one lure at a time. But I don’t care, I love lure fishing, and I will quench my thirst for it however I see fit. They say most lures catch more fishermen than fish, which is probably not far from the truth.

No doubt the next time I visit my local tackle shop there will be dozens of shiny new lures just waiting to have their evil way with me. I will walk out, smile on my face, content in the knowledge I have just purchased the latest and greatest lures on the planet. I will feel satisfied for a while, but the yearning will start, new lures will be released, and they will be the ones I simply must have.

It is real! It is a sickness!