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Can anyone give me some advice on what lures and what trolling speeds work for spotted mackeral in the bay. Is this a productive method? Are the 160mm halco laser pro type bibbed lures any good. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Steve
i havent don any fishing in the bay personally, but from what i can gather not alot of people troll for the mackeral apart from those using spoons and downriggers. for the spotties on the sunshine coast trolling works a treat. lures that have worked really well for me are the junior blue pilly, CD9 and 11 in "blue mackeral" and the orange and white halco.
G/ day steve ive had good results trolling in the bay with triple gangs on heavy mono leader with a fluro pink skirt over the top macks love em ! PS JUST CIRCLE THE SCHOOL !
Ok sounds great. I've used spoons behind paravanes before but only got grinners or weed. With pink skirts or spoons what depth and speed works. Sorry if I sound dumb but I just haven't been able to get a Mac to strike at anything so I reckon I must be doing something wrong.
I don't know the Bay at all - but from what I gather its not too different to anywhere else and most trolled baits and lures are productive. For trolling, different speeds are required for different lure types and most people don't talk about this when they recommend a particular lure: Live baits are trolled as slow as you can get your boat to go - less than walking pace is good.Not many boats can go that slow, so livies are often just drifted. You can get ganged rigs ie a weighted head with gangs that will hold a dead slimy or tailor or mullet or pilchard without spinning and these are trolled at about 2 -5 kph - about a brisk walking pace. Bibbed lures will work - those you mention are fine - everybody has their favourites- they are trolled at up to 12kph - or until they start blowing out of the water(some won't go more than about 5kph). From 10-15kph people tend to use bibless lures or slugs of various kinds.
The jury seems to be out on whether to use wire or not. use wire and you will get less takes. don't use wire and you will get more takes but more bite-offs. If you are using $12 bibbed lures it doesn't take long to sort out which is the more viable option .
Hope this is of some help - NB I have never fished the Bay - just thoought some idea of the speeds might help. Others will have their own ideas about speeds.
Got to agree with rakinray's "just circle the school".
The pro's do this with 2 handlines on the back (bike tube attached for stretch/bungy action) and troll spoons. Remember you can troll alot faster when circling , because the spoon will circle a smaller distance in circumference, if you circle in one direction.
Thanks Tony, as I said i dont Know much about this an find it really fascinating. I'll be out early Saturday and see how we go.
If using wire what is best single or multi strand?
FWIW I use Mason single strand #5 = 44lb b/s. using haywire twist and barrel roll. I don't seem to be able to get a decent knot in multistrand and I dont have crimping pliers. i think the multi needs to be thicker than the single to avoid being chomped through and there is no advantage of the m/s unless you are live baiting.
mate u'll be lucky to be out there saturday, blowing 25nts at this stage. The bay is a nasty piece of work in those winds
As for the trolling, the bay spotties wont touch a big rapala or a blue pilly or a haco laser pro ever.. they arnt interested in anything bigger than the size of the bait which is generally the size of a 20-40gram raider. Best bet is a spin outfit and to cast into schools of fish that are busting the surface under birds. Other option is to floatline the beacons with half pillies (tends to get more doggies than spots).
Good luck mate, no doubt you'll run into a hungry school soon enough.
Oops - yeah JB is right, I got that a lot wrong. I'm reading spotties and thinking mackerel (I mean spaniards). The great thing about this site is that if you stuff up, someone will quickly put you right.
(can't find a smilie that looks embarrassed enough)
Tony
JB is spot on there. Dont waste youre time trolling around for Spotties in the bay unless you set yourself some sort of goal to catch one trolling. Much better to find a school working and cast slugs at them. Just look for the birds initially but I tend to watch the surface more closely before casting (not wasting time on Mack Tuna if Spotties are about). You will notice that the bait schools tend to react differently when spotties are attacking them - as you would - and will jump the surface regularly to escape.
Steve i know most guys tell you that this will work and that will work but i always like to have options especially when it comes to spotties, one day they take slugs the next they take baits the next nothing at all so all i say is keep your options open to troll,cast ,float or what ever works on the day mate.
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