Knot Happy About Losing Prize Catch
Central Coast Herald
Friday September 5, 2003
LOSING a big fish has to be one of the most frustrating parts of this great sport of ours.
And when knot failure is to blame, it really does rub salt into the wound.
I was recently spinning for bream in a local creek with some small soft plastic lures and a 1.8kilogram spin outfit.
A snagged lure meant a quick re-rig, and as I was only catching some smaller bream at the time I decided against tying a double, as I normally would. Instead, I tied the ultra-fine diameter fireline directly to the fluorocarbon trace.
Sure enough, my very next cast was hammered right next to the boat, and the next few minutes that followed were absolute pandemonium. The massive fish took off, peeling 20 or 30 metres of line with ease, stopping only to produce a series of head shakes as it tried to rid itself of this slight irritation in the corner of its jaw.
Then, pop. No fish.
A quick examination of the line revealed the remains of my leader knot, and I was left to ponder what fish it was.
A nice jewie, I suspect.
I guess the moral to this story is always pay attention to detail, and don't take shortcuts with your knots, or you will have your own tale of the one that got away.
The creeks are producing some nice catches of bream at present, mainly in more brackish sections.
The oyster leases are also producing some better quality bream, especially early in the morning.
Spring is also a great time to catch a big flathead, so don't be afraid to do some drifting with some live poddy mullet.
Salmon are still in plague proportions, as well as the odd tailor along the beaches.
This time of year is traditionally a great time to start targeting the large jewfish which patrol the deep gutters on the more open beaches.
A good tip is to spin with a 15centimetre Storm Wildeye Shad. These lures are all the rage at the moment, and the amount of large jewies that are falling to them is quite amazing.
A few anglers believe they actually outfish live bait.
Offshore, one angler reported tonnes of small perch on wide grounds off Terrigal, although most boaties have reported mixed bags of smaller fish like snapper, morwong, nannygai and the odd rat kingfish. Good fishing, and don't forget to check those knots.
© 2003 Central Coast Herald
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