Lures?

[Moodyboy]

Hello

 

Been a while since I posted, although can often be found lurking.

 

I intend to have a serious crack at lure fishing fishing over winter. Having already read advice on the rods & braid required I would like to know what sort of lures I should be getting to create a reasonable lure set. In particular any brands/styles I should look out for. I saw a previous thread that spoke very highly about Ondex

I will mainly be fishing a small river(quite snaggy in places)containing perch, plenty of jacks and the odd double figure pike, although may also have a go on a small resevoir from the bank

[Newt]

That style of lure is excellent for catching fish but is also excellent at catching snags although the snags are lured in by the exposed trebles while the fish react to the spinner.

 

If you want to fish with 50lb braid like Powerpro so that you can pull loose from most hang-ups (the hooks will bend a bit which releases the lure) then Mepps or Ondex or similar designs will be fine.

 

I do this on occasion knowing I will hang and knowing that about two or three times pulling loose will call for a new hook but it may not be your best option in snaggy locations.

 

For those, the style of 'spinner bait' that is more often used in the States than the inline style would probably be a better option. They are much less likely to snag. Something like these.

 

 

Another option would be a weedless spoon with a piece of springy wire protecting the hook until a fish clamps down on the lure

 

 

 

Lipped crankbait/jerkbait style lures can also be good since while they do have exposed treble hooks, the first part that contacts a snag is the lip so they tend to bounce off the snag rather than hanging.

 

[Anderoo]

Sorry to go a bit off topic, but one thing has always confused me about the advice to use such strong braid for lure fishing. It sounds like good advice to use 50lb or 80lb or whatever breaking strain so you can pull expensive lures from snags, but aren't most wire traces about 30lb tops and often lower (especially taking into account knots and crimps)? If the trace doesn't break, do you need to use braid any stronger than, say, 25lb (leaving aside horrendous snags)?

[noodle996]

you wouldnt use 30lb wire generally im using for smallish lures wire between 40-50lb and am trying to ork out which would be best for me in higher strains (65-80lb multistrand or a single strand Ti leader)

 

as for lures what weights are you looking at casting?

 

general sort of sizearound the 1-2 ounce mark fir shallow water or over/alonside any srtructure try some of the long bombers or abu terminator in the largest size for crankbaits(plugs)

wouldnt be without a few soft plastics as well you can start of really cheap with these if you have any shops that do sea fishing stuff near you there are twintails shads grubs galore out there.

for deeper water you may want to look at some of the smaller sinking jerk baits or bucher depthraiders muskie innovations deep invader but these are getting big for general lure gear

[Steve Burke]

The 3 most important things in lure fishing can be summed up by the initials LSD. These stand for location, speed and depth.

 

One of the advantages of lure fishing is that you can cover a lot of water and hence finding the fish is often quicker and easier than bait fishing. Nonetheless certain swims will be better than others. Indeed, on many venues large sections will be almost totally devoid of fish in the winter. Having said that, this will be less marked on small streams than reservoirs.

 

As for speed of retrieve, the lower the water temperature the slower the retrieve you're likely to find effective. In fact in really cold weather you often need to go dead slow. It's worth bearing in mind that some lures are more effective than others at low speeds. Sometimes though even in winter a fast retrieve can be more effective, although this is relatively unusual.

 

Getting the depth right is vital. Indeed, fishing at the wrong depth is probably the single biggest reason for novice lure anglers struggling. For instance if the fish are 15 down they won't very often come up to say a Big S crankbait that runs down to a maximum of about 5ft.

 

As a very broad generalisation you need to fish deeper in winter than in summer. At this time of year though many fish will still be relatively shallow as water temperatures (in our area at least) are still fairly high.

 

Turning to the choice of lure, different lures are designed to work at different depths. It's therefore impossible to give specific recommendations without knowing more about the waters you're fishing. This especially applies to the depth.

 

I can't stress this enough. Time after time well-meaning posters give advice here and elsewhere on lure choice. These lures may have worked well for them on their waters. However these may be totally different to your's.

 

In other words, whilst it's possible to recommend a particular type of lure (say a spoon or a crankbait), recommending a particular model is impossible without more information about your waters. The more you can tell us in this respect the better.

Edited November 25, 2008 by Steve Burke

[Andy_1984]

have you fished for pike before moody ? if not id advise you to visit www.pacgb.com and read about pike handling, unhooking before you do anything, if you do know how to fish for pike then my appologies and please continue.

 

definetly get some little shads, there such an under estemated little lure, i especialy like the Storm WildEye Rippin Shad

 

 

this one caught me my first pb and always has a place in my tackle box, they also have a rattler inside

 

my advice on this one (given to me by andy macfarlane) is to remove the bottom treble in snaggy waters, it also gives the added benefit of bouncing it on the bottom without much hassle from snags and does not hinder your hook ups or catch ratio (ive been using it this way for 2 years)

 

 

 

Sorry to go a bit off topic, but one thing has always confused me about the advice to use such strong braid for lure fishing. It sounds like good advice to use 50lb or 80lb or whatever breaking strain so you can pull expensive lures from snags, but aren't most wire traces about 30lb tops and often lower (especially taking into account knots and crimps)? If the trace doesn't break, do you need to use braid any stronger than, say, 25lb (leaving aside horrendous snags)?

 

i think for the most part it is because there is no memory in braid so you can get the action you want from the lures getting your lures back is just a plus

 

the advice to use braid was given to me by andy macfarlane so ive never realy questioned his judgement as hes such an excellent angler

Edited November 25, 2008 by Andy_1984

[noodle996]

steve he does give an indication of the waters he will be fishing

 

I will mainly be fishing a small river(quite snaggy in places)containing perch, plenty of jacks and the odd double figure pike, although may also have a go on a small resevoir from the bank

 

now what is missing as you pointed out is the depth

 

If you were to be pegged on this what would you advise for a couple of shallow lures and then the same for deeper running lures

 

ive put in what i use on smaller rivers i know the two deep running lures ive listed probaly are better known for the trolling properties they have but when casting uptreamm and trying to work a lure i havnt found anything better yet that will get me past 10 feet when reeling from A downstream position

Edited November 25, 2008 by noodle996

[Ken L]

Best to give an idea about the rod and reel that you have before asking about lures. There's no point in having people point you in the direction of some great jerkbaits if you have an ultrlight outfit and vice versa.

The other obvious thing to say is that winter is a bad time to start off with lure fishing. It can be very hard work and it's very easy to give the whole idea up as a bad job.

[Neil G]

In my experience I've found the Ondex to be a pretty c**p lure, casts badly and hasn't caught me many fish.

 

I'd be trying smallish spinnerbaits and shads myself which cast better and can be counted down covering lots of water depths.

 

For perch slow and deep always seems to work, sometimes it's hard to reel that slow but the lure almost inching across the bottom really seems to catch the big ones

[grumpybum]

Mono has a stretch factor of approx 25%. Braid on the other hand is approx 3%. It wont take a shock load ie if the line catches round a rod ring on the cast. Thats why the breaking strains used seem so high.

 

A minimum of 30lb breaking strain is recommended for lure fishing using lure up to approx 1oz. As with most types of fishing the casting weight needs to be balanced to the rod used.

 

As to what type of lures, everyone will have their own idea.

 

As a very general guide a selection of mepps type spinners. In various sizes and colours. The same with spoons. A few plugs like the Shakespeare Big S. If you can afford, a few shads from the Storm range. Warning lures are like floats they are very collectable.