Kingfishing By The Book....no Result Though

[Byron]

Just a quick snapshot of a yesterday on Middle harbour.

On water with Swoffa before 6am and headed out with high hopes of a few fish, and some sweet squid for supper.

First plan was to head out to Balmoral and work the shores for a few tasty cephlapods. Not sure what the problem was, but the squid were not in any mood to play. Jigged shallow, jigged deep, jigged small and large jigs in a variety of colours and styles for absolutely nothing. Unbelievable.

Headed back upstream to the Spit and had a few more casts for squid, before taking a break on a mooring. As I rigged up anew, Swoffa was pitching a shad around in the deep water and had a squid follow it up. A quick flick of my jig over the side and we were in business. Rigged up a twin hook rig a deployed the squid.

This is where the kingie plan began. All the ingredients were right; fresh live squid, first hour of the run up and not too much boat traffic.

Well it took less than 5 minutes for a kingfish to complete the plan. I noticed the touch-up and free spooled the big Capricorn, in time to see line zip off the spool. A quick gear engagement had me ready and as the line pulled tight a succession of heavy head shakes signalled that we had a hook up!!

Well it was touch and go at the start with boats on all sides, so I got Swoffa to cast off the mooring in case we needed to give chase or manouvere around. I slowly pumped the fish up, only to lose line again and again as the big fella continued to shake his head and blast off with powerful runs under heavy drag. I was however confident we had him in the clear and it would only be a matter of time before we would be attempting to land him.

As soon as this thought entered my head, the fish powered off again only this time I felt the distinctive pop of line parting and wound in to find the trace had failed at the hook. Looked like it might have been squeezed in under the eye of the hook and finally parted under the strain.

Well, there was plenty of excitement for all concerned including our spectator fleet, though I was disappointed not to get my first big king of the season. In hindsight, 40lb leader was a mistake. Should have opted for 60lb as a minimum. Will be crimping next time as well!!

The remainder of the day saw us catch very little. We mainly stuck at breaming in preparation for the Roseville Social day. If our results were anything to go by, it will as tough as Cowan.

Cheers all,

Byron

[inspin]

Unlucky Byron, great read as always. Sounds like you got done on the eye of the hook as you stated....crimping sounds the way to go but if you can get your hands on a solder try and use it to close the eye of the first hook in the double....i do this for all my doubles and havent been done on light leaders for a while.

[Bashir]

Crimps would really be a weaker link, especially in 60lb leader. For my live bait traces, I tie knots up to about 120lb leader. A 4-5 turn uni knot will give you no problems at all.

[Matrix]

Shame abt the lost fish Byron....fancy hooking on to a stonker only to have it slip off the eye of the hook! At least we know now there are decent kings around. Mind if I ask what kind of rig were u using aside from the Cap?

[LEELEE]

Unlucky mate.

At least you were out there giving it a go. Well done on the hook up and its a shame about the tackle failure. I have had so similar failures on small gear recently that seem to be an exact carbon copy of what happened to you.

What brand of leader were you using?

Cheers

Lee

[Kingy]

Nice report!!

How were you fishing? Live baited under a float or downrigger trolled? Little monsters aren't nice at all!! If he hadn't snapped you off, I'm sure he would have tried rubbing you off on any mooring rope he could get to.

K

[Martin]

Great report. Sorry you lost the king, sounds as if he was a good fish.

Did you get to see the king and what strain line did you tackle him on.

As a point of note I have used 15lb leader on kings in Pittwater and had no problems. It all comes down to that knot. Id stay with the light trace if your reasonably confident there is minimal chance of being reefed.

Cheers

[Guest hottuna]

Bad luck re the quid guys, Spoke to a few mates who really havnt got a clue on squid and they got 3 there at balmoral on sunday morning! Go figure.

I used to use crimped 80lb jinkai but in the last 2 seasons have gone down to 40lb -60lb tied as Bashir stated. I reakon if you up that leader size especially in the harb you can kiss good by most of these smaller rats to 70cm. Which can be a good or bad thing.

Id love to join you one day, it WILL happen

DAN

PS Bashir i cant see crimping as a weaker link. can you please explain. Reason i loved it was the hook was free swinging thus "i think" it improved my hook up. i just got sick of crimping leaders for rats. Oh and i use a single hoodlem 5/0

Dan

[Byron]

Cheers all for your comments. let me see if I can put a quick response together.

Bashir - like Dan, please explain why crimping 60lb leader would be a weak link. I thought it would help the situation, but keen to hear your thoughts on this (btw GO THE FREAKIN TIGERS!!)

Inspin - I like the solder idea, may need to look into this.

Matrix/Leelee - Had my 10kg Allen Glover Mega Spin with 20lb braid on the Caps, and a 40lb Black Magic leader. 2 hook Gama rig knotted with fixed snells.

Kingy - Live squid on the 2 hook rig; one through very tip of mantle and one lightly pinned in the mantle base. Small ball sinker and lumo bead. Just flicked out in about 20M of water near the Spit. Got the hit mid water.

Martin - Cheers mate. Never saw him unfortunately, but 20lb braid and 40lb trace.

Dan - yeah I expect theer must have been a few around, but maybe we fished spots that had already been hit. Saw a boat with 3 guys in it at Balmoral who were squidding but they left as we approached. I think they got chased off the Naval Wharf!! As for our session, it is only a matter of time mate. As the water warms, things can only improve and we will put a plan together.

Cheers

Byron

[Martin]

Byron, if crimping it is important to only apply pressure to the crimp in the middle. If you crimp the ends of the sleeve you run the risk of cutting into the mono leader and as the fish does its thing the mono works at the end of the sleeve sawing into the sleeve.

A fixed hook is also better than a swing hook as the eye of the hook will wear away the mono over time. Hence need to always check.

I am a fan of crimping the larger traces, as it’s too hard to tie a good tight knot on mono from 80lb and up.

[REKLESS]

I have always made a snood for the top hook and then used a uni knot that was tied off the tag end .

No failures yet.

Just something else about the eyelet,we used to use dental floss to wrap around the base of the eyelet ,this prevented any problems with line fatigue and knot failure at that point.

Sorry to hear about blowing the fish,better luck next time eh?

Simon

[patl]

With a two hook rig and the top hook snelled I sometimes use a piece of tube over the mono where it goes through the top hook eye.

I plan on this year fishing a lot lighter leaders and will use this to protect the leader from wear and tear.

Patrick

[Guest]

Hey Byron why not use soldered eye hooks then u wont have a problem like seamasters or sea demons i used em off the rocks for years LBG and never ever had that problem on kings or any other large pelagics

[Byron]

Thanks for the tips guys!!

This is what makes this site so awesome. The sharing of ideas!!

Cheers

Byron