Posted by Phill on 29/7/2014, 9:08 pm Tackle Tactics
A good friend of mine who fished along Matata , Pikowia and Thornton area found that in certain conditions the Snapper were very shy on the bite and quite often picked up the bait only to drop it when they felt the pressure of the breakaway sinker came on . He used a beach comber sinker when there wasn't to much surf which improved the hookup rate but suffered from side drift . The solution was the birth of the Scud sinker . The Scud makes the best of all worlds with the wings slowing the side drift and allowing the Snapper to pickup the bait with little resistance . They are available in 3-4-5-6oz, so if you are heading to the Bay of Plenty they would be worth a try. We have also had an increase in sales to the Wanganui area of late which is a bit interesting. So there you have it , a bit of history a bit of knowledge and a bit of a plug.
Re: Scud sinkers
Posted by Hangler on 30/7/2014, 12:38 pm, in reply to "Scud sinkers "
Whoever gave you that information was right on the money. By using the scud sinker I would make a cast up tide (toward the wind drift) then give out a few metres of slack line. The side current quickly made the line taught to the rod tip and this would have a slight bend towards the end gear. Now all you needed to do was watch for a slack line take. The rod would suddenly straighten and the line would go slack. This was the time to take up some slack as quickly as possible, then strike and set the hook.
This didn't always work but it was far more successful than hanging on to the rod waiting for a run. Frequently a snapper would have removed the bait on the initial take, especially as I was using whole anchovies, a notoriously soft bait once thawed from water immersion.
on 29/7/2014, 9:08 pm