WHICH LURE WHEN?

The evolution of fishermen is classically from bait fishing with very simple tackle through to lure fishing with the latest technology and equipment as we increase in age, experience and means.

Bait fishing remains the most effective way to catch a fish with no particular size or species discrimination. In freshwater, a humble bunch of worms cast into almost any waterway will attract attention from some sort of creature. This style of fishing is ideal to teach children (and newby adults) about where fish live, how they bite and importantly how to play a fish on the rod. These grass roots skills provide a base for anglers as they grow in skill to be able to take on more challenging fishing options and start to target individual species using specialised lures.

Once a fisherman becomes fixated on a species the drive to optimise the fishing methodology to catch that fish can become all-consuming. In salt water, you have specialists for luderick with green weed, mulloway on soft plastics, marlin on fly, but in freshwater (southern) the pinnacle of fishing is Murray cod on lures.

If you walk into any large tackle shop in the Murray Darling Basin, the selection of hardware designed to tempt the big green fish is boggling. The walls of most tackle shops are packed with hard body lures of all shapes and sizes, more soft plastics than you can count and spinnerbaits as far as the eye can see. The big questions are what lure do I need to catch a Murray cod? And how do I fish it?

Unfortunately there is no simple answer as every lure in the shop has the potential to catch a fish if it’s fished in the manner for which it was designed. You need to be able to know what lures are designed to work in different situations.

Choosing Lures

Usually the staff at bigger tackle shops are skilled anglers and it pays to chat with them before you purchase a swag of lures that may look good but be inappropriate for your needs. If you ask the right questions you can usually find the ‘gun’ anglers amongst the staff. Grill them for info and if possible have a look through their own personal lure collection to see which ones have the most teeth marks on them.

Also ask which lures are popular sellers. Word soon gets around about lures that are effective and quite often these are not displayed in shops as they are usually on back-order from the manufacturer.

If you want to go it alone, look for lures with quality fittings and don’t go too radical with colour or design. When you are starting out its best to keep things simple.

Master each technique

Now that you have a selection of lures, the next step is to head out on the water and master the use of each lure type. The best way to see how a lure should work is to be on the water using it. Unfortunately Murray cod are generally difficult to catch and you don’t get many chances to experiment with new techniques to assess effectiveness.

What I do when trying to master a new lure type, is to only take that type of lure with me. This forces you to persist all day. During the session you will vary retrieve speed, action, and all manner of options to try and get a fish to bite. If the fish are cooperative and you are able to assess the effectiveness of each action, this is ideal, but at least you will have the knowledge of what that lure does in certain circumstances.

If you pick up that lure in a months time, that ‘flick and wind’, ‘burn and stop’ or whatever you practised may turn the trick on a fish. No fishing trip is ever wasted – it’s all experience that you use on future expeditions.

When to change technique

A typical scenario is that you arrive at daylight, troll up a few cod in the first two hours, and then nothing for the next three, four or five hours. The questions start to mount up – Have the fish stopped biting? Do I need to change techniques?

The answer is that it may be both. In this scenario, I would probably change to casting spinnerbaits into heavy timber. The fish may be used to the constant drone of hard body lures and retreated back into their hides, but the flash and jiggle of a spinnerbait cast right beside the cod’s house may spark them into biting.

The decision to change techniques is always difficult. I always have at least two rods rigged up. One has a hard body, and the other generally a spinnerbait. This means I don’t lose any time re-rigging and can stop a troll to cast at structure that may be inaccessible to the trolled lure

Conclusion

Unfortunately, I’m unable to pass on a simple magic formula for Murray cod on lures as it’s such a difficult art form. My recommendation is to have a selection of lures that you are comfortable using, train yourself how to use each lure type under varied circumstances and be vigilant in keeping the lures in the strike zone for as long as possible.

If you have the opportunity, the money spent on fishing with a local guide is well worth it. A guide will know what lure system works and through the course of a day you can ask a million questions to a professional fisherman who has nowhere to go.

© Jamin Forbes August 2007