Barra gear questions.

[sehrguht]

I have a 6-10kg berkeley diablo spin rod with a 3000 Sol on it. Basically i am wondering if i spool it up with 30 or 40lb will i have a chance of pulling a barra up or am i dreaming?

Also going to troll with a 6500baitrunner with 50lb probably. Not sure what rod yet.

I know most people use baitcasters but i have little use of them yet so i am hesitant to drop a bit of cash on a decent one.

Any tips for lures appreciated too, im just going to find gold ones around 125-150 and hopefully they will get something

Plans in place for a trip to Awoonga in mid january. not far away now!

[fishingnut]

pm sent

[pondo]

gday mate,

Everyone uses different pound line to chase barra. Personaly i use 30-40 pound braid. But some impoundment guys go as low as 20 and bellow. However these are heavy hard fighting fish and you would hate to lose a big girl due to line breakage. So i would probably recomend using as heavier line class as you can get away with on your Sol. Beef up your leader as well. And you shouldnt have to many dramas dropping fish! Hope you get into some big chromies mate!

Take care

Matty

[Brian D]

Mate I use bait casters for barra but young Ray uses thread line only and he catches more barra than anyone else I know.

He uses 50lb braid with twisted leaders on his big guns and never has a problem. In fact he is usualy confidient as apposed to doubtful when it comes to fighting metre plus fish. He uses a range of 3500-6500 reels. I landed a metre plus on his 3500 shamino and I think the braid was 50lb.

You should be OK with the 3000 as long as you get the braid size up and it's a fair open water fight.

My last trip I lost top barra to undersized line and leader on bait caster while throwing hollow body plastics. I'll never do that again, it hurts too much.

[sehrguht]

Im definitely going to look into some 40+ lb braid. possibly some powerpro or tufline, choices galore.

Wind on or twisted leader seems to be fairly important, would this be in a another line class up a bit higher? i presume barra have small teeth that would rub on the leader if not hooked perfectly. Would 50 or 60lb mono leader be alright?

If i hook something i want it coming up, so i want to get it right first time. Barra has been on my dream list since i was 12.

[Yellow Peril]

Depends a bit whether you plan to cast lures in heavy timber and need to stop fish fast, or whether you plan to troll in open water. I reckon most people go way overgunned on barra gear, and honestly it is not necessary. Same goes for leaders.

The main problem you have in using a little 3000 size reel is line capacity, you might only get 100-150 m of 40 lb braid on it.

To give you an idea of what is easily possible, I caught 6 barra in 3 days from around 70 cm up to 97 cm trolling lures on 6 and 4 kg mono in shallow water close to weedbeds. I was using 60 lb black magic leader. I lost 2-3 other fish all due to them throwing the lures. None of them busted the line or took me around any trees.

Point I am trying to make is - you don't need heavy braid and heavy twisted leaders to land barra - unless you are in heavy timber.

"Don't believe the type"

Jeremy

[Feral]

That setup is more than good enough. The only time you would want bigger is for impoundment barra in heavy timber, then you want a broom stick with somewhere between 50 and 80lb braid. The reason for that is you need to skull drag the barra out, if it takes any sort of drag your gone.

3000 series is big enough, as Brian said seen metre plus barra landed on one no worries. Had to back up on a 110cm model last trip for insurance, but I think that was just Ray being slow to get the rod out of the holder and apply the hurt!

[HookedOnTackle]

i've never caught a big barra, but on allll the shows i see, barra are powerful short run exponents,to get into weed or trees.

about the only time i hear of a need for a lot of line is when trolling, as barra get spooked by the million boats with rattling fish chasing them every day, so switched on anglers were trolling their hardbodies at least 50m back.

spin vs bc reels is personal choice really. you can apply extra drag via your thumbs on the spool of a bc, an educated thumb can feather the spool to reduce casting length and get your lure to land in an exact spot (with lots of practice) and when casting all day it is a lot easier to just flick the thumb gear release than opening up a drag arm over and over.

spin reels cast lighter weights, hard to birds nest your line and now can handle heavy drags and have heaps of braid line capacity.

if you are taking one outfit, probably better to go heavy but you also have two spools and can take several strengths of leader.

could try visiting the local tackle store when you get there, have one spool spare and take their suggestions on line, leader, lure.

[fisherjack1394]

Mate i was just watching the AFC and in the bass round they dident catch any bass but alot of barra. they were getting meter pluss barra on 10lbs braid and tiny bass rods.

but when it came to the barra round at awonga dam they were all using 40lbs braid witha wire trace.

[Feral]

Barra have no teeth, but they have 2 sharp boney gill rackers each side that will cut braid like a hot knife through butter (and you if you handle the fish incorrectly)

I generally use 40lb flouro, although last trip I upgraded to 60lb, as the 40lb had gone hard and the knots were showing signs of slipping (the 40lb was 2 years old, the 60lb new) Ferg used Platypus low stretch mono. If your fishing over weed banks I have seen 80lb gray fireline used as a leader, it cuts through the weed, the normal leader just hooks it up.

[sehrguht]

One spool on my sol will have 15lb, the other probably 35 or 40 for security.

will have a baitrunner by then spooled with 50lb that i will troll with as well.

will be trolling and will be flicking not sure how much of each, will depend on what we feel like etc etc.

other rods will be brought in case there are some toga or jacks showing up.

Just picked up a classic f18 2.5m+ in mullet gold dazzle and a scorpion 3+ in green gold and red colouring. Also a packet of squidgie pro evil minnow 110mm.

Any other favourites?

[Feral]

Barra Classics and Scorpions are all I use for barra. Its just getting the colour, depth and size that works on the day! Those two you have got - Gold and Guns N Roses by the sound of it are good starts.

If your after a few more lures have a look at Foxies on line site, they quite often have the scorpions and barra classic on sale for $10 each, unfortunately not at the moment! I got half a dozen scorpions a couple of weeks ago off them.

[sehrguht]

Feral: Good to know about that site, might save a few pennies of my apprentice wages, might check some more out for depth variety, a couple 5+ and a couple 1.5 maybe wouldn't go astray.

Thats interesting that the fireline would be used as a leader, i will definitely consider that if we fish over some banks of weed, does braid not do the same thing?

I read that fluoro is quite hard to tie in the 30+LB categories?

Almost picked up some penn 10x 50lb but i might look for some 50lb fluoro for the extra hardiness.

Thanks for the help guys:)

Will ensure a detailed report happens.

[Hellcat Dan]

i fish 30 pound main line with a 30 cm to 50 cm 80 pound leader ,i have not lost any fish from line braking. i have caught fish from all over awoonga and monduran in the sticks in weed beeds and in the depths of awoonga, the only thing that will go wrong with tackle is hooks bending .as for fishing in timber free spool fish if it runs around trees then follow them taking your time ,you will have a good chance of getting them as for knots try a slim butie and then supper gule you knots also never cast leader knot through gides as it weakens knots i hope this helps

[Landis]

3500 reels are no good in small mangrove creeks especially off the banks if u catch a barra over metre in size which I've tried they completely smoke you the weight and power just abit too much for the reel and 40lb leader is to light in those situations you cant afford to play them like open water as there is too many snags, suggesting 50-60lb leader on 30lb braid just to play it safe guys

[GregN70]

I've mainly stuck to 20lb braid for most of my Barra fishing, going up to 30lb when chasing some of those big Male Barras you find in the dams as they are more likely to be caught in some pretty tough country that requires more "come here power". But the outfit you describe will do most things ok.