Ending yak fishing frustration

Author: Carl

Category: Kayak fishing tackle

Created on Wednesday, 11 January 2012 18:00

Written by Carl Holland

Why do I kayak fish? For me it's about many different aspects like: having fun, the thrills, the enjoyment, relaxing, it's challenging and it expands my comfort zone. All these things and more I experience when I head out into the deep blue with a full sail. Personally the AI is a wet dream come true, as small boat/cat sailing and fishing are my 2 favourite pastimes/recreational/sporting activities I undertake. However there are 2 things that really throw me and this often leads to me losing my cool. These things are: treble hooks and braid line.

Rather than whinge and bitch listing examples of times they caused Expletive Explosions I will go into how I fixed it. Trebles have simply come off my trolling lures and have been replaced with a single on the rear and a double hook underneath. Personally I would prefer just a single on the back but the lures don't swim well at all. Over my last 3 trips I have used this configuration and my results have pleased me enough to go this way.

Here is a run down on what goes where, lets start with the big boys. Both the CD18 and F18 (red) have single 7/0 hooks turned up at the rear and down underneath. On the CD 14 and F18 (green) there are 5/0 singles on rear and 4/0 doubles underneath. The little CD11 also has a 5/0 on the rear but carries a 2/0 double underneath. These lures are the only hard bodied trolling lures I use and are lollies for Godzilla rig. 

I used my time during the shark-a-thon and Mackay Mayhem to analyse how this system works. Here is what I found:

Once a fish was hooked, single or double I didn't lose it by pulling the hooks

Most fish (80%) were hooked on the rear single

I did miss some hits, but that happened with trebles as well

No fish was pinned by both hooks it was either rear or bottom hooks never both. This means less damage to the actual fish as the free set of hooks couldn't/didn't randomly snag the fish during the fight

Much safer, easier and simpler dealing with the fish either to release or keep 

The safety thing is the real clincher for me. It was just so much easier to manage those sharks then before. Look at the photo below. I have the double folded up so it is secure and completely safe to handle. There is no way the shark can bite or pin me with the hook. For those fish hooked by the bottom hooks I found by simply grabbing the rear single with my pliers and lifting the fish all just fell off. None of the fish were 'just' or lightly hooked all were pinned solidly again just like in the pic.

I have swapped over most of my blades to singles or doubles already and will look at swapping over my metal slices to either doubles or singles in the future. Over the last 3 trips of between 18 - 20 hours on the water time has only resulted in one hook getting caught on a rear rudder line. Maybe I am just a bit uncoordinated but previously I would have multiple treble snags.  

Now for braid, it's ironic that the person that was instrumental in me changing over to braid is now a dedicated mono man like I used to be. Yes Josh I am looking squarely at you….  :

I have 3 rigs that I will now top shot: the Godzilla which carries a Penn 850ss reel loaded with 50lb braid will be topped with…wait for it…50 metres of 60lb Jinkai Plus leader. I fondled a lot of leader material today and this one come up trumps in regards to texture and pliability. Why go all leader? Because I can…and I rarely ever cast this rig it simply drags lures around. Now I can easily tie a lure on and have no other joining knot in the water or I can up grade to heavier mono or wire without dealing with fiddley braid.

To top shot the Viper/Certate and Magnum Butt/Sol rigs there is for me only one choice in mono and that's Platypus. I have over the last few weeks looking at various mono options and nothing I have sampled seems to surpass Platypus. For the Viper rig the Certate 4000 is currently carrying 30lb braid which I will cover with probably30lb Platinum. The Sol 3000 on the Magnum Butt will get 8kg Platypus Pink or Lo Stretch as they now call it to top load the 20lb braid it currently carries. 

These two changes I know will improve my time on the water and the satisfaction I get from what I consider being the most exciting type of fishing. Catching often big feisty fish when sailing a sexy bit of plastic is just way too much fun and for me it just got better. Tight lines and big fishes people…