Set up question

[Bluevien]

I haven't been into fishing long and have only ever used prawns or chicken gut as bait with not much success in hooking a decent sized bream or flathead.

I want to give soft plastics and lures a good go to see if I can improve my strike rate so I picked up a pack of 3" gulp pumpkinseed minnows and some 1/16oz, 1/0 hook TT jigheads I read about on another thread here. I also bought a 1/8 TT switchblade metal vibration lure.

I plan on heading to either Nudgee Beach of Deepwater bend tomorrow to try them out. Now being new to all this my question is .. do I team these lures up with the same running ball sinker (size 2) that I use with bait or a smaller size one or non at all? It will be about mid morning on an outgoing tide with I'd imagine a bit of wind which may not be ideal but just knowing if I am on the right track will would be great to know.

So any suggestions or other advise about my set up or location will surely be appreciated.

Cheers,

Rob

[bootyinblue]

No extra weight at all for me.

I use some 6 - 12lb Berkeley Vanish as a leader (about 2 metres), as its a super thin invisible mono. Tie your jig head to the leader using a rapala loop so it gives a natural swimmin action. Measure your plastic and jig head by holding the jig head to the side of the plastic and note where the hook will come out presenting a nice straight lure. Feed the hook through the plastic bringing it out where you noted and you are away.

Remember with soft plastics you are trying to mimick an injured or dying fish which is what other fish prety on, so play around with different retrieving techniques. Even try your watching your lure in just a few inches of water to see how it swims both on the pull and the relax as different tails produce different results.

Good luck with it all...

[Old Scaley]

No sinker at all. If you are fishing on th eoutgoing tide at Deepwater bend, it might be worth having a flick around the mouth of the creeks entering the river closer to the old Hornibrook highway bridge for a flathead or two (if you are in a boat, that is). If land based, you might need to be up closer to the main highway bridge on the southside. Good luck.

[Bluevien]

bootyinblue - I was about 51% sure about no extra weight as I thought a sinker defeated the purpose of a lure but apart from that logic I had no clue, so thanks for clearing that up. I will use your measuring tip too.. I hadn't even thought of that.

Old Scaly - I am land based at the moment so am limited. I've tried off the rock wall closest to the jetty but was getting tired of snagging all the time and with a $10 + lure will stick to the boardwalk section where I haven't had a problem before. Is that where you mean?

Thanks for the advise so far guys... it's helping out this newby.

[Old Scaley]

When you say jetty, where are you talking about? I haven't been to Deepwater Bend for a while, but I don't remember a jetty on the south side of the river?

[Bluevien]

I've only started fishing there but I believe it's been done up recently... or I have my directions wrong. There is a small pontoon just west of the boatramp on the south bank. The boardwalk area is about 200m further west from that.

edit - i should have said pontoon in the earlier post, not jetty. My mistake.

[Bri The Pom]

Go on to youtube,great videos on fishing and rigging soft plastics.

Good luck and have faith don't take any bait.

Bri

[Bluevien]

Bri, I checked out youtube and found some good aussie info so thanks for pointing me to it.

I went out to Nudgee beach 3 hours before low tide this morning and didn't take any bait with me.. just a pack of 3" Gulp minnows and set them up like I have been told.

I could only spend 2 hours there and didn't have any luck this time. 3 of the SPs had their tails bitten off but apart from that I didn't get any bites worth mentioning. Nobody else there was getting bites either using baits or lures so I didn't feel so bad. So the fish live another day.... roll on the w/end.

[Cowfish13]

Bluevien wrote:

didn't take any bait with me.. just a pack of 3" Gulp minnows and set them up like I have been told

That's the best way to start with plastics. Keep that up and you will start to get good fish. Maybe have a go at Schulz Canal/Kedron Brook for a new place. This is where I begun my lure success. Since going there for a few trips, I can't remember the last time I've gone fishing, and not got a fish on a lure:)

[cpetrie]

Bluevien wrote:

Bri, I checked out youtube and found some good aussie info so thanks for pointing me to it.

I went out to Nudgee beach 3 hours before low tide this morning and didn't take any bait with me.. just a pack of 3" Gulp minnows and set them up like I have been told.

I could only spend 2 hours there and didn't have any luck this time. 3 of the SPs had their tails bitten off but apart from that I didn't get any bites worth mentioning. Nobody else there was getting bites either using baits or lures so I didn't feel so bad. So the fish live another day.... roll on the w/end.

about two weeks ago i went there and used 3" banana prawns, lost like three, landed one pike. now i know why they were getting bitten off. pike have pretty sharp teeth.

[Cowfish13]

Pike generally won't bite tails clean off, unless they are feeding in a massive school. Despite their sharp teeth, they are not inter-locking, like a Tailor, Mackerel or Toado. I would think that, if the tails were bitten off cleanly, it would be toadies. If the tails had many cuts in them, without taking a chunk off the plastic, then yes pike were probably the culprits