The best thing about this job is the fascinating stories I hear from clients and friends fishing all around the country. A classic case came from a knife jig client around this time last year. I’m going to share it with you. To explain, the north coast of NSW has been heavily affected by marine closures, mostly to protect grey nurse sharks:
Most fishing effort focuses on prime eating species, or what we call ‘pinkies and pearlies.’ Many blokes focus on snapper in winter, and mackerel in summer. Both are delicious so that’s a commonsense choice.
Anyway, one of the best snapper spots on the North Coast was closed to bait fishing. Fishing with lures, still okay. The thought was that grey nurse sharks will eat bait, but not lures. Because almost all fishing at this spot is with floater pilchards most of the regulars bailed. The spot which had once been covered with boats in good weather was now deserted.
That presented an opportunity for one of our keen jigging clients. He now had the place pretty much to himself. And he knew that, as well as snapper, some big kingfish roamed the reef. The first I knew that the fishing was red hot was when repeated orders started arriving for our 420 gram jigs:
This size knife jig is usually ordered by blokes heading to New Zealand chasing XOS kings, who know the old saying that ‘big jig equals big king’ is true:
But in this case orders were pouring in from the north coast, not NZ. I called the buyer to find out why. Turns out there he was hooking up giant kingfish – 15 kilos and up - on these big jigs. And doing it in just 20 metres water. These shallow grounds swarmed with kingfish, mostly small ones around legal size. The big jigs sorted out the men from the boys. Soon, the word was getting out. Note these Instagram comments are from last year, when a friend was managing our page:
The jigs themselves are fantastic. Here’s specs:
I was reminded of all this today when some feedback arrived from a happy user. That’s a good king:
"Hey Andrew, thanks for the Texas reef marks...the pic attached was on the first drift...only had your 400 gram jigs so getting to the bottom was no issue but they worked a treat with fish on every drift and a fun double hook up."
How good is that? I reckon, very good. Like to know more, or place an order? Click this link:
Click here to see our 420 gram jigs
I should also mention these jigs are deadly on gemfish and blue eye in 400 metres. Particularly when the current is running, because their narrow profile means they sink fast. Get back to me with any questions? Thanks for reading,
Andrew Hestelow
Managing Director
http://www.downriggershop.com.au/
Tel. 0402075000
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