Gulp Soft Plastics

sloth
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Re: Gulp Soft Plastics

Post by sloth » Sat Feb 28, 2015 5:19 am

If you end up going to bcf - pick up a copy of Steve Starlings "Fishing with soft plastics" ... Will tell you everything you need to know.

The guys have touched on the key principles above: controlled slack, hop-pause, fish them slow.

To that I would add: rig them right, jighead selection and outfit.

They need to be rigged straight. Test swim it at your feet - if it spirals on the drop, or the tail doesn't beat or it does anything but swim down straight and nice on a taut line then re-rig it. Badly rigged plastics will catch fish but not as many as a well rigged one. So re-do it if it looks crap - spending an extra minute rigging is well worth it.

Pick a jighead weight that suits conditions - no champagne corks and no house bricks. The idea is the sp "swims" to the bottom - and a lot of time the hit will come on the drop. Get the right weight and it spends more time in the strike zone.

Outfit - a fast/x-fast graphite spin stick, eggbeater, light braid and leader and you're set for most estuary species.

Plastics - a bazillion plastics to pick. But really only four main types: single tails, double tails, paddle tails and creature plastics (worms, crabs, monsters etc).

Can't go far wrong picking one of each of the above and sticking to them for a while. With any lure fishing, not just sp, I've found concentrating on a limited number of lure or technique until you've got it wired works well. It's tempting to keep changing around but more often than not its location or technique which is the trigger.

Technique wise you can do the lifts with the rod tip and impart all sorts of subtle actions like a slight shake on the drop etc. However, when beginning it's often easier to use a more basic technique of using the reel to impart the action. Cast out and let the sp drop to the bottom - watch the line for movement/bites, count it down to the bottom ( remember the count - and always count the drop - it tells you depth and more importantly if your line just stopped before the bottom - only one reason for that :)). For the retrieve hold the rod at 10 o'clock and just crank the reel one or two turns. This has the effect of lifting the plastic off the bottom. Then let it drop on the tight line. This is much easier to detect bites on than lifting the rod and then trying to control the slack created by reeling. Long-term using the rod is the way to go but starting with the basic reel method will get you fish and help you learn bite detection. As Mazman said bites can be incredibly subtle. Strike at everything that doesn't look right... A slight pause in line, a slight tremor, sudden slack, a move sideways, a twitch, a speed up of line .... Anything. Don't feel an idiot hook setting on nothing ... Because some of the most minor tics in the line will come up tight. As time goes on those whooshing hook sets against nothing will disappear as you get tuned into bite detection.

The last bit of advice is don't try to force the bite. When it's quiet going it's tempting to fish faster because it feels like you're doing more "fishing". Try to do the opposite. The slower it is the slower you fish. SPs look realistic in the water - don't be afraid to let fish have a good long look at them. I've seen a bream pick my plastic up in the shallows having watched it for over a minute. I didn't move it at all in that time - gets the heart thumping :)

Have fun!

Edit: Oh and to answer the actual question. Gulp work fine. Only issues are around storage and sometimes the tails can get mangled. I bought myself a plano aqua-locker bottle and a bottle of gulp recharge. My gulps go in the leak-proof bottle straight after I buy then and it's much easier than trying to deal with them in the pack. You can get gulp cheap (as low as $5 a pack from a guy called fishaholic jigheads on Facebook) his jigheads are recommended too. Send him a pm about the gulp though as price varies on what he has in stock and how much you buy. Not affiliated to the guy but I do use both his jigheads and gulp.

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Raulfc7
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Re: Gulp Soft Plastics

Post by Raulfc7 » Sat Feb 28, 2015 7:25 am

Bloody good advice Sloth thanks for that mate :thumbsup:
"Do good when you remember, and what you forget will be revealed to you; and do not surrender your mind to blind forgetfulness."

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adbert
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Re: Gulp Soft Plastics

Post by adbert » Sat Feb 28, 2015 8:24 am

Sloth [emoji106] [emoji106] [emoji106] [emoji106] [emoji106]

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