What line weight is best?

[MaxiTroll]

Have been fishing around middle harbour for kingfish lately and have been getting lots of bust offs recently. I generally use lighter line because I’m feel like it generally gets more bites. For bait and lures, I’m using 12-14 pound mono and for live bait I’m using heavy braid (not to sure on weight) but I do notice that it rarely gets hit and when I put live bait on 14 pound mono with 30lb mono leader I notice strike rate is higher but I lose the fish a lot more often. I’m wondering what you guys are using to catch kings and if I should go more heavy and whether braid or mono is the way to go, Thanks Max.

[bobthelob2341]

For live baiting kingfish I use 60lb braid and start off with 80lb leader and gradually go down as low as 20lb if i’m not getting bites and go up I keep getting smoked. For flicking plastics and small stickbaits i’ll generally stick to around 12lb leader. 

Hope this helps 

[Rebel]

Ask @Pickleshe is the Gru, catching Kingfish.

Cheers

[Pickles]

Hey Max, ( thanks for the encouragement @Rebel)

My general “all purpose” Kingie setup is 65 lb braid with an FG knot to a 2-3m 50lb fluro “top shot” leader to a good quality swivel (I like Shogun), then a short leader of 1-2m to the hook (I use Mustad Hoodlum live bait hooks in 6/0-9/0, size of hook isn’t that important as even a little rat will swallow a large hook without too much trouble.

HOWEVER , sometimes the Kingies will come up in the burley trail ( I always burley) and will only take little pieces of burley, Phillies pieces, tiny squid strips. Then drop down to 30lb fluro’ end leader on a Shimano Curado XG overhead reel on a”Black 13” , which ironically is lime green (don’t know who sells these or where to buy them as Ibought it 5 years ago on-line and it was only $130, but I wish I had bought several as they are not available anymore).

This little set up has accounted for well over 100 kings and several in the 90-100cm range. The way I fish this though is to “lead” the fish out into deep water with sandy bottom as with this light setup, I almost always land the fish. Using this technique requires patience as it’s a loooong fight., sometimes 10 minutes or so, but with no structure and good knots,the fish usually can’t win.

hope this helps

Pickles (Bob)

[MaxiTroll]

1 hour ago, Pickles said:

Hey Max, ( thanks for the encouragement @Rebel)

My general “all purpose” Kingie setup is 65 lb braid with an FG knot to a 2-3m 50lb fluro “top shot” leader to a good quality swivel (I like Shogun), then a short leader of 1-2m to the hook (I use Mustad Hoodlum live bait hooks in 6/0-9/0, size of hook isn’t that important as even a little rat will swallow a large hook without too much trouble.

HOWEVER , sometimes the Kingies will come up in the burley trail ( I always burley) and will only take little pieces of burley, Phillies pieces, tiny squid strips. Then drop down to 30lb fluro’ end leader on a Shimano Curado XG overhead reel on a”Black 13” , which ironically is lime green (don’t know who sells these or where to buy them as Ibought it 5 years ago on-line and it was only $130, but I wish I had bought several as they are not available anymore).

This little set up has accounted for well over 100 kings and several in the 90-100cm range. The way I fish this though is to “lead” the fish out into deep water with sandy bottom as with this light setup, I almost always land the fish. Using this technique requires patience as it’s a loooong fight., sometimes 10 minutes or so, but with no structure and good knots,the fish usually can’t win.

hope this helps

Pickles (Bob)

Thanks will give it a a try