Rigging Lures

Treble vs Single

This is the most important decision an angler has to make when it comes to fitting the lure with its hardware. There is a preference for singles rather than trebles for the following reasons. On smaller fish one is often faced with a scenario where the treble hook has embedded itself in both the upper and lower jaw making it extremely difficult to remove and causing a lot of damage to the fish and wasting time for the angler. Single hooks are obviously a lot easier to remove. A treble hook provides substantially more wind resistance when travelling through the air often causing the lure to pull to one side therefore decreasing distance and once in the water it has more of a parachute type effect on the lure than a single hook will have. The bite or distance between the point of the hook and the shank is significantly smaller when it comes to a treble than if a large single is used on the back of a spoon, for example. Bite is particularly important when a lot of pressure is going to be put on a fish as it significantly increases the holding ability in a fish’s mouth.

Connecting the hooks to the lure

There are some really good quality split rings in the market. It is worth paying the extra money to ensure the extra strength. The size of the split ring should be determined by the amount of pressure that it is going to withstand and also the size of the eye of the hook that it is going to have to pass through. It is very important that the split ring can move freely through the eye of the hook. A good quality split ring would normally be stamped. This can be seen by the slight kink where the two ends meet keeping the wires in line. It is often a good idea to incorporate more than one split ring between the last eye on the spoon and the eye of the hook giving the hook more freedom of movement to fold back during flight in the cast and also to provide the whiplash stinger type effect when the fish hits the lure from the side. Should one want to create a parachute type effect to give the lure more stability at speed in the water, a bigger hook can be used and one can also incorporate a “split ring, swivel, split ring” link between the hook and the lure. This helps considerably when top speed retrievals are necessary. It is very important to make sure that when you work with split rings you do not stretch the wires apart. This often happens when somebody tries to open a split ring with split ring pliers but there is already a small swivel on the ring. It bends the wires and leaves a gap where a swivel or hook can slip in between the wires and work its way loose. We have spoken about the conventional rear rigging of your iron or metal lure. There is a very effective alternative which helps incredibly from a long casting perspective and also from a jigging or working the lure perspective. If you rig a stinger type hook to the front end of your lure, preferably by using a swivel onto the lure’s front split ring, a stiff wire rig off that onto a stiff hook rig, making sure that the hook you are using has a wider gape than the width of the spoon and hangs ever so slightly over the back of your spoon. This method of rigging is ideal for jigging or working the spoon, when a conventionally rigged spoon would normally “box” (this is when the bottom hook on the lure hooks the line above the spoon causing it to come sideways through the water). You will find that “stinger rigging” your spoon gives it a lot more action or kick in the water and really does wonders for long casts. The same sort of rigging technique can be used on surface plugs like GT Ice Creams especially when one is looking for a lot of movement on the surface and/or long casts. Next article will continue with various ways to fish with lures and how to look after your lures.

WOW – after a record number of votes last month we need to go through and validate all the votes. Same drill as August people: upload a catch and win awesome prizes! All you need to do is follow these steps in order to win prizes worth over R3500:

1. Register on the site HERE. Then Login.
2. Goto the Upload A Catch page.
3. Click the link “Click here to upload your catch” which will show a popup where you can upload your catch.
4. Thats It! Your picture will be moderated and you will be notified as soon as it is live.
5. Email your friends and family and tell them to vote for your catch!

The winner gets these awesome prizes:

• Garmin Fishfinder 90 – courtesy of Resolution Health (worth R1500)
• JEEP clothing hamper worth R1000
• Basil Manning Voucher worth R1000

So the choice is quite simple really… UPLOAD YOURS NOW!!!