pinkenbar bream + an escapee

[yanjarra]

went for a fish saturday on the top of tide at pinkenbar wall and managed a few bream all around 20cm on an ecogear ck40 in the fluro color. Altough small these were my first bream caught and always good to get a first up, geez they have small mouths.

Whilst there i got smacked by something about 3 metres from my feet in say 2metres of water which hit the lure with power the likes of i havnt felt before and took off on a run of say 20 metres or so like a bolt of lightening straight out to sea and before i got the drag tightened up to any sort of resitance level(whether or not it would have slowed this thing down on max drag on an el cheapo silstar combo threaded with 6lb i dunno) all i had left on the end of my line was my lure which had some pretty bad ass bite marks in it upon retrieval. I guess it spat the lure out....... but when this term is phrased on here how does a fish manage to spit a lure ...i mean its hooked through its skin is it not? Is a fish much more easily able to do this if it gets slack in the line once hooked? I probably wasnt quick enough ot get the drag set and put presssure on the fish which would make it harder for it to dislodge the lure i guess??... im pooey though cause thats the second monster ive hooked of my fishing career only to have not landed it. Judging by the feel of 20-30cm fish this thing could have gone 60cm. Any idea what sort of fish that might be in that area? I was thinking tailor from what ive read...do they frequent the river much?
thanks
matt

[TonyM]

Great stuff Matt, sounds like you had a lot of fun.

You're right - when a fish "spits" a lure it basically means he's thrown it by shaking it off, or he's grabbed the lure and the hook/s didn't stick.

Having too much slack in the line most often means less chance of getting a hookup.

Cheers
Tony

[Jeremy]

why tighten the drag? IMHO, you should be fishing with a correctly adjusted drag from the outset. Maximum safe drag pressure for whatever line class you are using. Then the line should not break and the only way to lose the fish is to get rubbed off or the hook to pull (or spool job). Possible the hooks may have only caught a piece of skin annd might have ripped out. Nothing you can do about that.

Better luck next time.

Jeremy

[yanjarra]

jeremy
i wouldn't know how tight exactly i need the drag to be to be at that optimum amount just under the threshold of having the line breaking..... my reels drag doesnt have like a setting or lb increments on it or anything.....

i usually just set it to where it is hard for myself to physically pull the line out.......where i have had it set has been fine for all the fish i have been cacthing thus far so didnt feel the need to change....although now i will keep it a bit tighter...but its a catch 22 also cause i dont want to put it so tight that the line will snap and i have no idea or gauge on where that might be... i guess a more expensive reel might have increments to indicate this?

[Jeremy]

Yanjarra,

there are no increments on any reel to gauge the drag setting. You test it with scales pulling line through the runners. Generally, a drag set to 1/3 of the line strength is considered optimal. Most monos break close to their stated strength, while I have heard that braid generally breaks at about double its stated strength.

Another option is if a fish is running towards structure, you can apply extra pressure to the spool with a finger. I wouldn't bother with a fish running clean unless it looked like it might spool you.

I think people get more comfortable about drag settings with experience of catching larger fish which take line.

Jeremy

[simool-awiad]

Hey mate any chance you could post a pic or 2 of that damaged lure?might have more of an idea what it may have been by the teeth indents.

[yanjarra]

there yer go... dunno how much use it will be, tough to see because of the websites resolution limit..... the yellow bits r aobviously the chomper marks

[sharkymark2]

May be it was one of those luggage point snappers taken a wrong turn .

[simool-awiad]

there yer go... dunno how much use it will be, tough to see because of the websites resolution limit..... the yellow bits r aobviously the chomper marks

Hard to say but lookes more like chips than bite marks,never know maybe a good size jew or even a thready may have had a good hold on it and decided to take it for a bit of a sprint and droped it just as it was getting started.anyway thanks for the picks,i know what to throw now! just sh%$^G ya.keep trying mate it worked once it will work again,you will find out what it was soon enough.

[Langey]

good bream is my tip champ.those big buggers go pretty hard in the current around that area.only a guess but.could also been a jack,cod,thready,snapper,jew or a multitude of other species.really can get u wondering ..........

[Cobia Kid]

when setting line drag you should always set it to 1/3 of the lines breaking strain unless the lines breaking strain is under 4 kg,then you set it to1/4 of the lines breaking strain,you can easily do this with weights of milk bottles.
One litre of water is equal to one kilo.
anyways,im out,
cheers,
jamie