8/3/13 - Mixing it up jigging style
Aug 5, 2013 8:28:53 GMT -5
jb4sml, grasscutter, and 8 more like this
Post by mwardncsu on Aug 5, 2013 8:28:53 GMT -5
Weather: upper 60s to upper 70s, low humidity, overcast most of the morning - beautiful morning to fish
Water: 81-81 - visibility of 5'
Techniques: Jigging - flukes and the "JD rig" (see below)
I drove over and met my buddy Mark about 6:45 and we were on the water at 7, headed out in search of some schools to jig on. We thought it was time to mix up it, try some jigging on light tackle for a little challenge knowing we'd cut out catch rate way down and could hopefully get a few for the table. There were about 8 boats already in the area all looking - seemed the big school was not showing itself yet.
Talked with a few other boats that had been seeing some scattered fish - since we were going to be jigging we needed to find some decent piles of fish, so we kept roaming for a while looking in different parts of the creek, keeping our eyes tuned on the sidescan. We checked the back part of the main creek and did not find anything, so we headed back to the main part and over towards one side where Mark had found fish in the past - and several boats were congregating. Sure enough there was a decent school in the area and one of the guides we know what was fishing live-bait had picked several up already.
We got on and off them, but they just did not seem all that interested in jigs this morning. Mark did manage to hook into one that went into the livewell to later make an appearance on the dinner table.
We did get on and off the fish for a while, but they were never super thick and just did not seem overly interested in eating - at least not eating the jigs. The fish were mostly 30-50' deep over a varying depth of water.
I fished the "JD" rig, named after "J.D." that used to be on the forum and introduced a lot of folks to this rig - basically 3/4 Kastmaster spoon with the hooks removed, tied to your leader and then 12"-18" of leader to a fluke jig (1/2 or 3/4 oz head). Mark was jigging a round head jig with a fluke. I had one bump on my rig before I hung it in the tree - the 1st time I lost only the jig and got the Kastmaster back - the 2nd time I hung it up I lost it all. Just tied on a fluke jig after that. I need to make sure I use heavier leader - maybe 25 lb - on the section to the Kastmaster and then lighter leader between the spoon & the jig so that I only loose part of the rig next time.... those Kastmasters are too pricey to lose too many...
I did finally to hook into a small 3-4 lb striper to avoid the skunk
Live bait was the ticket today it seemed - The guys with bait were generally hooking up.... Got to see SeaJay in some action. Sorry about the poorly framed picture there Jay - was almost a great Kodak moment
We fished till about 10 or 10:30 - could not believe the jet skis & waterskiers stayed away that long - guess it was the cloud cover. Would have liked to hook into a few more, but still, I won't complain about an August morning when the temps had not hit 80 by the time we got off the water......
Water: 81-81 - visibility of 5'
Techniques: Jigging - flukes and the "JD rig" (see below)
I drove over and met my buddy Mark about 6:45 and we were on the water at 7, headed out in search of some schools to jig on. We thought it was time to mix up it, try some jigging on light tackle for a little challenge knowing we'd cut out catch rate way down and could hopefully get a few for the table. There were about 8 boats already in the area all looking - seemed the big school was not showing itself yet.
Talked with a few other boats that had been seeing some scattered fish - since we were going to be jigging we needed to find some decent piles of fish, so we kept roaming for a while looking in different parts of the creek, keeping our eyes tuned on the sidescan. We checked the back part of the main creek and did not find anything, so we headed back to the main part and over towards one side where Mark had found fish in the past - and several boats were congregating. Sure enough there was a decent school in the area and one of the guides we know what was fishing live-bait had picked several up already.
We got on and off them, but they just did not seem all that interested in jigs this morning. Mark did manage to hook into one that went into the livewell to later make an appearance on the dinner table.
We did get on and off the fish for a while, but they were never super thick and just did not seem overly interested in eating - at least not eating the jigs. The fish were mostly 30-50' deep over a varying depth of water.
I fished the "JD" rig, named after "J.D." that used to be on the forum and introduced a lot of folks to this rig - basically 3/4 Kastmaster spoon with the hooks removed, tied to your leader and then 12"-18" of leader to a fluke jig (1/2 or 3/4 oz head). Mark was jigging a round head jig with a fluke. I had one bump on my rig before I hung it in the tree - the 1st time I lost only the jig and got the Kastmaster back - the 2nd time I hung it up I lost it all. Just tied on a fluke jig after that. I need to make sure I use heavier leader - maybe 25 lb - on the section to the Kastmaster and then lighter leader between the spoon & the jig so that I only loose part of the rig next time.... those Kastmasters are too pricey to lose too many...
I did finally to hook into a small 3-4 lb striper to avoid the skunk
Live bait was the ticket today it seemed - The guys with bait were generally hooking up.... Got to see SeaJay in some action. Sorry about the poorly framed picture there Jay - was almost a great Kodak moment
We fished till about 10 or 10:30 - could not believe the jet skis & waterskiers stayed away that long - guess it was the cloud cover. Would have liked to hook into a few more, but still, I won't complain about an August morning when the temps had not hit 80 by the time we got off the water......
- but I did some some "knockoffs" that were a little cheaper. At *bleep*'s Sporting Goods I found the Johnsons (yes, you can't make this up...) Splinter Spoon, and then at Dunham Sporting Goods I found another similar knock-off - slightly wider body profile but overall similar. One nice thing was that these "knockoffs" had split-rings on both sides of the spoon where I don't think the Kastmaster did out of the box.... given you remove the hook in this application it does not matter the quality or type of the hook (some have a single vs. treble hook, some have a little bucktail, etc).