Soft Plastics

[Lasty]

I have been reading about you guys catching lots on SP and have decided to have a go myself. However, having never used them before the range of sizes, colours and jigheads available has confused me (a very easy thing to do).

Can anyone offer me some advice on what I should start with. I mainly fish Botany Bay.

[mrsswordfisherman]

Hi Lasty, I am sure you will get many replies here.

Check out our articles section also or use the search engine for a wealth of info.

http://www.fishraider.com.au/articles

Cheers mrsswordfisherman

[Guest madsmc]

I'd suggest that you start off with the humble flathead as a target species. They are fairly straight forward to catch on soft plastics, and probably the fish that 99% of people catch as a first fish on plastics.

The articles that mrsswordfisherman has pointed out, and some of the posts in the Lure and Fly Chat section should give you some good information to get you going.

For flathead, my personal preference is the larger sized Squidgy Fish (Size #3 and up), Berkley Power Minnow in 3 and 4 inch sizes, and another that I've started using recently is the Atomic Jerk Minnow in 3 inch. As far as colours go I try to stick with the natural looking colours, greens, blues, greys etc.

With jigheads, it pays to get a range of different sizes. Depending on the depth of water and how much tidal movement you have to deal with, the right jighead to use could range from 2 gram to 12 gram, but try to fish as light a weight as the conditions will allow.

If you want to get off the ground quickly with plastics, I highly recommend hooking up for a fish with someone who knows what they're doing. I'm sure one of the Sydney based Raiders would be able to help you out with some tuition.

If that's not possible, or if you want additional info, then there are a number of DVD's on the market that give a good rundown on how to start off using soft plastics. The two that I used when I started were the Squidgy Secrets DVD (part 1 and 2), and the Berkley Soft Plastics DVD.

Good luck with it mate. Hope you have some success on the plastics. It's great fun once you get the hang of it.

Shane