Well its that time of the year again, when a young mans thoughts turn to the angry red fish. I don’t profess to be an expert, and there are some better jack fisherman on ausfish that me, but I do know enough to help you get your first one if you are a jack virgin. Someone helped me once, so Im helping you. I kept thinking about not posting this post cos I dont want people thinking I have a big head, but theres a lot of guys who want to break their cherry. If you can already catch jacks then this post isnt for you.
These tips ARE in order of importance.
1-Stealth. Jacks spook easily, so don’t make any noise, and keep light to minimum. I will cut my motor and glide into a spot from 50m out, or use the leccy, then I drop my anchor without letting the chain hit the side of the boat. I leave my nav lights on of course, but I don’t let my headlamp hit the water unless the fish is ready to be netted. Find a way to make your anchor light shine up and not down, I use a rag around the bottom of it. I use a bow mount leccy to sound out new spots. If I have made a bit of noise by accident, then I expect it to take 20-30 mins before the fish come back out to play. Don’t let rods hit the side of the boat when you move about the boat, Im really fussy about this sort of stuff. So are the jacks……
2-Night time. I start at sunset and fish thru to midnight or later on most sessions. Jacks don’t hunt in gentelmans hours and neither should you. Dawn is an even better time (think 3.30am in summer), but they are usually off the bite by 6-7am, and the latest Ive caught em is 9am. Don’t bother fishing for em in the day as a noob, unless you’ve caught heaps of em and wanna make it a harder challenge for yourself. I do 6 hr sessions, and change spots every 2 hrs or so when working new locations. Just because you haven’t had a bite for an hour, doesn’t mean you wont get one in the next hour. Although jacks are territorial, they will move about a lot at night, and will follow bait schools up a river. If I know the location has produced jacks in the past, then Im happy to spend the whole session there waiting for just one jack to come by.
3-Locations. Fish near rocks, rocks, rocks. I cant stress this enough. Tree snag locations will hold jacks in creeks where there is no manmade structure like Nth Qld, but if there are rocks in your area, it will win hands down every time. I like canal walls best. I look for newer canals, because at the bottom of the smooth concrete wall, lies all the granite boulders that stop underwater erosion, and this holds jack food and jack cover (and vermin). Canals with sandy or muddy walls are out, I don’t bother with em. Next choice is underwater rock bars, that coffee rock reef that most people never find unless youre watching your sounder. If you know where that type of spot is, it will also hold jacks at night. I like bridge pylons, too, and drainpipes that run into creeks, but I don’t chuck much at sunken trees, Ive lost too many lures doing that. If youre gonna chuck at snags, you need to be landing it within 2-3 feet of the snag, or even closer. DONT ask me for spots cos its not gonna happen. Learn to find your own locations cos it will make you a better fisherman. Understand the theory instead of looking for a handout. Research is fun.
4-Where would the baitfish be? Look for back eddies. Fish are lazy, and will hold where they dont have to use much energy swimming against the current. I like intersections where a canal meets a river. Its especially good if the canal is not a dead end. So a canal that joins two rivers will always have a current feeding bait into the river. A canal that’s horseshoe shaped will also do the same thing. Now at such an intersection, the river will have the main current, so the 2 points of the canal mouth will have totally different characteristics. One point will have an eddy formed by the current rushing past it, sort of like a vacuum effect just inside the canal mouth. This eddy is where the lazy fish will hold, be it baitfish or predator. The other point of the same canal mouth will have the current from the river hitting the point ‘face on’ forming a sort of bow wave or pressure wave . Jacks will also hold in this area, and go for runs out into the eddy and back. Sort of like sitting in front of a bridge pylon and racing around the back for a feed. On low tide, the baitfish will be lower in depth around 10-15ft, and on high tide they will be closer to the rockwalls, and may be in as little as 2-3 ft depth. More lost tackle!
5-Lures or bait? I like both, so that’s your call. All I will say is bait is easier to get results on, and lures are harder and take more skill. For bait, my number 1 choice is mullet strips. I buy em whole at the servo in a pack of 2, and cut the fillets off, then I cut a fillet in half diagonally to make 2 triangles. I use a 4/0 or 5/0 gamma circle hook with 2-3 ft of 40lb trace. Mono trace is fine, I don’t use fluro at night. The hook is threaded thru the top of the fillet, then thru a second time in the middle. The hook is half exposed. Other strip baits that work are Tailor, Bonito or half Pillies. Ive even seen a guy throw a bit of sausage on and catch a jack. Live mullets around 5in are fine, and herring is fine. Feel free to butterfly a livie, that can work even better than whole livies, especially on herring. For lures, try any soft plastic in a prawn or shrimp shape, or minnows with twin tails. For hard bodies anything in black and gold color is fine. They will hit HBs up to 6in long no probs, and don’t forget trolling near rocks.
6-The Fight. Its all won or lost in the first 2 secs, no joke. Youll be left wondering WTF was that?? And looking at a shredded leader, thinking it must have been a shark or something……” It wasn’t a shark, it was a jack attack. I don’t lock up the drag 100% but I do have it set so that I can just barely peel a few inches off by hand. Whether you want a rod with some bend in it or heavier is up to you. Just fish ONE rod, and have you hand on it at all times. If you the rod is unattended the jack WILL shake its head and get the hook out of its mouth before you get your hand on the rod, so if you roll your joint or recycle a VB, do it while your rod is out of the water rebaiting. They don’t bite thru the line, most times they will rub your leader off on structure, and they will do it one 1 sec flat. If you hook one and give him some stick you can turn his head and get him away from his cover. Keep him away from cover in the first 2 secs and you will land him. Loosen you drag a little as you get ready to net him, cos he will go ballistic at this point. They have an intense dislike for nets. And fingers. I land about half of the jacks that I hook, so don’t feel bad if they get away, it happens to us all. It will just keep you keen to keep coming back.
7-Weather – who cares? Don’t overanalyse weather. I fish when I get time off. I don’t worry about wind direction, barometer, water temp, moons or even tide times to set a jack trip, but I do change locations based on tide times. If you fish at night near rocks between Sep and Mar, then youre in with a chance, its that simple. That being said, I pay careful attention to weather patterns, I just dont set my trips by it. I prefer half moon tides to full or new cos I think the fish hunt further from their lair when the current is lowest strength. If it’s a full or new moon, then they will bite best an hour either side of the high tide or low tide. Theres plenty who think the big tides are better, and that discussion will go on for a long time. I like runout tide better, but Ive caught my biggest jack on run in tide, so go figure. I once asked an ABT pro what conditions he preferred for bream trips, he said “Sundays” (his day off), that’s about my attitude too. Fish anytime you can. I reckon fishing in different conditions is like playing a new golf course, it makes you think about what your game plan is.
This how I do it, Im sure others will have different ideas that also work. If you do it different, feel free to contribute. Its not my thread alone, its just a summary. All this stuff was found with the search function, I just put it in one spot. I learned a lot about jacks from ausfish, so in the spirit of helping others we should all be passing a bit on. Isnt that what ausfish is all about?
Its ok to keep one now and again, but please consider releasing the majority of these magnificent fish. Let someone else catch him again and think about the future. A pic on a brag mat gets a huge amount of respect on ausfish. Good luck to the noobs, lets see them pics…….
Cheers
Andrew
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and can be a jack virgin no more!!
