Trolling skirted lures through the ocean in search of
pelagic fish ranging from small tuna to Godzilla sized
marlin is easier in essence than just about any other form
of fishing. The technology in electronics, rods, reels and
harnesses, plus their relatively inexpensive prices has even
made small boat, even as small as 12 foot (There is an 8’
game boat in Kona, appropriately named “Brain Damaged”,
though I certainly don’t recommend boats that small!!!)
viable platforms to hunt these fish on an even footing with
the large Game Fishing battle wagons, though indeed the
larger boats are certainly more comfortable and handle
rougher seas with more comfort and safety.
There are few things on this planet that give as good an
adrenaline rush as witnessing a rising dorsal accelerating
to intercept a surface run lure. Without exception the take,
and the moments following a strike are awe-inspiring and
totally addictive.
As with all forms of fishing the starting point is rather
technical, learning how the gear works on its own and
interacts with the other equipment is essentially a
technical exercise. Only when that has been understood and
using it becomes second nature can you effectively start
enjoying the art of lure trolling.
Somewhere on the planet a season is just ending and another
just starting, anglers may have cracked their first
successes, or they are just about to. The conditions and
currents might have something to do with this, though I suspect that
many of the marlin captures are a direct result of anglers
having a better understanding of the workings of the ocean
and skills of trolling artificial lures.
It is, at long last, accepted that artificial lures are not
only an effective weapon for catching large game fish and
the most spectacular of all. In many cases it is the most
effective, being responsible for many wins against those
using other methods. The best news is that trolling lures is
very easy to do. Indeed a novice can be very competitive
with just a basic knowledge of lure trolling.
Those who consistently miss out on success may do so for a
many number of reasons, not the least of which is sheer bad
luck. Though I suspect the main reason for failure is
because of a misunderstanding of basic lure trolling
principles that significantly decreases the chance of
reasonable success.
Anglers
generally experience some form of trolling before using
skirted trolling lures for game fish. It might be trolling
for trout along weed beds and drop-offs in a lake, or
trolling around the edge of the sandbanks, circling schools
of small pelagic fish or trolling for kingfish and small
tuna along rocky shores and reefs.
These forms of trolling have many things in common. They all
involve relatively low trolling speeds, under five knots,
and often at a slow walking pace. Lures are placed a long
way behind the boat so the lures will be in the ‘zone of
convergence’ that is, the distance behind a moving boat
where disturbed fish converge and resume normal behavior and
hopefully, resume feeding. In most of these types of
trolling it is assumed that the boat scares the fish. (In
most cases in all forms of trolling this assumption is
incorrect, however the assumption remains ingrained
Unfortunately these types of trolling have nothing whatever
to do with trolling for large oceanic game fish. In fact,
it’s generally just the opposite. When converting to blue
water trolling, you have to abandon the idea that the lures
should be as far away from the boat and its wash as
possible. When trolling for the big game fish, the boat and
it’s wash are actually part of the system and the trick is
learning how to use it to your advantage.
THE MOVING F.A.D.
When using skirted lures, the biggest difference is the
speed. In blue water skirted lures are pulled along at
effective speeds from a minimum of 6.5 knots, mostly 7.5 to
8.5 and as fast as 15 knots with the accompanying noise,
vibration and white water. These components actually combine
to form an effective ‘Fish Attracting Device’.
Many anglers, because of their previous experience with
other forms of trolling, run their lures way back out past
the end of the wash, fearing that the boat noise and wash
will scare the fish. In this form of fishing this is not the
case. The action is concentrated in the area between the
transom and the end of the prop wash and turbulence. This is
known as the Strike Zone. This area is where you should run
your lures.
Indeed fish do get hooked on lures a long way back, but they
were probably on their way to the boat. The chance of
getting a solid hookup on a fish are far better on a short
line, due to less line stretch and belly.
It is possible that the wash itself may appear to be a shoal
of tiny baitfish foaming the surface in a feeding frenzy, or
perhaps they have come to know that the motor noise and
vibration could mean a trawler dumping trash over the side
resulting in an easy meal, perhaps it does attract small
predators like striped tuna and frigate mackerel that search
the white water for a feed or camouflage, this may in turn
attract larger predators. Regardless of what we imagine the
wash represents to fish the boat does not in any way scare
these predators. The larger, bolder predators have even less
fear and will come in so close to the transom they almost
ram it as if they were attracted to it.
READING THE WASH
Before we put the lures out, let’s slow down to an average
trolling speed of about 7 knots and have a look at the
Strike Zone, the area between the transom and the end of the
prop wash or turbulence created by the boat hull. You can
read the wash behind a boat in a similar manner to reading
the water around a headland, island, reef or beach.
The features of the wash are shown in the adjacent
figure.
(Fig
1. Reading the Wash)
Down the
center is the prop wash, a very
concentrated boiling confusion of white water, or so it
seems. This white water is at its deepest at the transom,
with the maximum depth at the props. Perhaps it is not as
deep as you might have imagined, and comes very close to the
surface within a few feet of the props. Although it looks
like solid white water, it is quite translucent, allowing
enough light to enable even small tuna to find tiny lures in
the midst of it.
Along the side of the prop wash there are alleys of clearer
water with little or no white water turbulence; a nice place
to run a lure, as it would be very visible. Remember though
that predators are used to chasing tiny baitfish that are
very well camouflaged. No matter what size or colour your
lure is, it will show up very clearly no matter where you
run it, as will your leaders and rigging.
Notice the white water coming off the sides of the boat.
This Side Wash is very shallow and almost transparent
consisting mostly of surface bubbles. A lure that is run in
this area is probably more visible than in any other area,
as the frothy white surface will highlight the lure’s
silhouette.
Every boat has a
different wash format at every speed, in every sea condition
and in every direction traveled. For example the wash is
longer going into a current than it is going with it. To
maintain the lures position you may lengthen a lures
distance going into the current and shorten it going down
current.
THE WINDOW
The next items to take note of in the Strike
Zone are the waves following the
boat. These are pressure waves kicked up by the boat and
vary in size depending on the boat size and hull type. The
distance between them is the waterline length of the boat.
These waves are the most important part of the wash for
trolling skirted lures, as they are run and carefully
positioned or tuned on the leading face of the pressure
wave.
On close
examination you’ll note several things including:
They are largest at the transom and gradually get smaller
further back in the wash and generally fade out around the
end of the prop wash and turbulence. The top of the wave is
steeper than the bottom of the wave. The face of the wave
is far more visible from behind than the back of the wave.
We’ll call this the ‘window’ as shown in the adjacent
figure.
(Fig 2. The
Window) The
further down the face of the wave, the larger the ‘window’
and the more visible the lure is.
It is
important to note that some boats don’t have pressure waves,
in which case the positioning of lures is less critical. It
is also important to note that the rougher and choppier the
sea the harder it is to distinguish where the pressure waves
are, though with a little experience you will get to know
how properly set lures appear and behave and position them
accordingly.
WHAT A LURE IS
Until we can interview a game fish we
really don’t know why lures do catch fish. However over the
years we have come to understand why some lures consistently
catch more fish than others. It appears that they work
because they trigger feeding and, or aggression responses.
Basically in the world of the predator anything that moves
and easily caught is possibly edible, the more like
something it’s used to eating and the sicker or more wounded
it appears the more likely a predator will commit its
precious energy resource to an attack. This is a natural
hunting response. A cat will attack anything that comes
within range. A child will try and catch anything that is
thrown towards it. The factors that contribute to the
effectiveness of a lure are size, shape, colour, vibration,
action, rigging and of course, but often overlooked fact of,
using them in an area likely to produce results.
WHAT A LURE DOES
The types of lure we are specifically discussing are surface
running skirted trolling lures. (Though much of the theory
has relevance to other types of lures and forms of fishing).
When run behind the boat, trolled, they tend to ‘work’ in a
repetitive cycle. A lure that is working properly runs
through the following cycle: It comes to the surface, grabs
air ‘breathing’, dives down leaving a long bubble trail,
‘smoking’ and when it stops smoking, it comes up for another
breath. It should not run under the water without a smoke
trail for any length of time, if it does; it is called
‘lazy’. Also, it shouldn’t come out of the water, ‘blowing
out’ when breathing.
All the
different shapes and sizes go through these motions with
different aggressions and timing. For example, for many
sliced headed lures the cycle is repeated every 15 seconds,
some as long as 30 between breaths, Pakula lures are at
their best when they breathe every 5 seconds. Some lures
come to surface and softly breathe before diving, others
explode on the surface causing a sonic boom. Some dive as
straight as an arrow, others may ‘swim’ off the side or dive
in deep consistent arc, others shake their heads or tails as
they dive. Smoke trails vary from pencil thin to almost
creating their own prop wash. This mainly depends on the
shape of the lure head, lure length and trolling speed. How
often a lure goes through the working cycle depends on sea
conditions, boat speed, lure position, line class and
rigging.
LURE THEORY
Now that we understand the
basic idea of where our lures are to be run and what they
are supposed to do we can now move onto the lure selection.
This is generally based on the level of information you’ve
got, varying from getting a set of lures recommended by your
local tackle store or from anglers fishing in the same
areas, or perhaps chosen by recommendations from
manufacturers, web forums, and indeed from personal
preferences based on your own experiences.
Care
should be taken if you incorporate individual lure
recommendations to form a lure pattern. Think of it as
getting advice for car parts, you could end up with an
economical 1200cc motor, 4wd diffs, balloon tyres,
comfortable LTD body etc, all great as separate items but
when they’re put together it’s a bit of a disaster.
When choosing lures
we tend to specify them according to the species of fish we
most desire to catch, such as Blue Marlin Lures, Sailfish
Lures, Tuna Lures, Wahoo Lures etc. Unfortunately this
method of classification is not only incorrect, it is often
misleading.
A lure pattern
should imitate a selection of wounded or fleeing bait
species that are likely to be in the area at the time you’re
fishing. As most predators will feed on any available food
source over any given period, if you get this right and
you’ll target whatever predatory species are around from
small tuna to monster billfish.
“Matching the hatch” is
actually quite easy, as the species of blue water bait are
very similar throughout the world’s game fishing areas,
though it is very important to note that the food types
change as they migrate through an area at certain times of
the year. By following this system through you’ll also
notice that through any given period there are many
available food species. By working out which food is most
likely to be in the area you can more accurately select a
lure that “matches the hatch” in action, colour and size.
There is no doubt that if you get this system right you’ll
even catch the fish you’re after out side the period
considered to be a normal season.
NB: There may also be
an argument for trolling a pattern of identical lures if you
think that there is only one dominant bait species that you
can imitate it successfully.)
SELECTING
LURES FOR THE PATTERN
There are several considerations in choosing lures
to form a pattern:
Number of
Lures
The next step is to decide how many lures you wish to run
and the line classes involved. The number of lures run
varies greatly. In areas where the fish are in great
numbers, or there is a small crew to handle the gear the
number of lures is less than in areas where there are less
fish or more crew on board to handle the gear. For example
in Cairns many boats troll only two lures and no teasers. In
other areas up to ten lures and a brace of up to six teasers
are used. In the following we’ll assume that we’ll use five
rods which is not too many for an amateur crew of three or
four to handle if you hook up to a hot fish.
Size
Each line class has a maximum sized lure that can be
effectively trolled due to the drag setting used. There is
however no minimum sized lure for any line class. Nor is
there any minimum sized lure for any species or size of fish
you are chasing. Granders have and will eat lures as small
as five inches long, however as they are rarely rigged to
catch fish of this size they are normally lost on smaller
lures. As a guideline most predatory fish, particularly
billfish can swallow a meal of twenty percent of their own
weight. The largest lures that are readily available are
eighteen inches long that is equivalent to a bait of around
four to six pound, so even the largest lure you’ll use is
not out of the question for a small sixty pound marlin.
As discussed earlier the Strike Zone is from the
back of the boat to the end of the wash or turbulence. To
enhance this we select lures from highly aggressive and
large near the back of the boat to more sedate and smaller
as we get to the end of the prop wash which is also the end
of the strike zone. The greater the range of sizes used the
more species of fish you are likely to target. For example a
five lure spread would consist of one fourteen inch, one
twelve inch, two ten inch and an eight inch lure. There may
be times when you may wish to eliminate smaller species such
as Skipjack or Bonito, in which case you wouldn’t run lures
under eight inches.(Fig 1.
Reading the Wash)
Shape
The chosen set of lures should be compatible with each other
in action, vibration and effective trolling speed. The
simplest way to do this is run lures that are all similar in
type, i.e. all Scoop Faced Chuggers such as the Pakula
Range, or all Sliced Head Lures such as Black Barts and
Hollowpoints. Mixing lures types when your just starting out
is really making the sport far more difficult and
unsuccessful than it could be. Each lure developer designs
their lures to run in specific positions within a pattern.
Knowing where this position is just by looking at the lure
without a great deal of experience can be quite difficult.
To make things more difficult the
standard terminology used to describe the lures position ie
long corner etc is not appropriate, as it does not convey
the relevant information. Whether a lure works in a certain
position in a pattern relative to the others depends to
great extent on the angle at which the lure hits the water.
As shown in the figures below they vary considerably. (Fig 3 and 4.
Angle of Entry)
be put our first, in
order to avoid tangling with the closer ones. The Shot Gun is
generally the longest lure and is set just past the end of the
prop wash or turbulence whichever is the furthest. The Long
Rigger is put out next and set near the end of the prop wash
and turbulence. The actual ‘pattern’ is not very important,
but you must keep the lures far enough apart so that they
don’t tangle even when the boat makes a tight turn, though it
is also a good idea to have the lures close enough to each
other so that if a fish doesn’t like a lure as it is drawn
through the pattern it can easily be aware of others to chose
from. This tends to excite a fish into either taking the lure
it is following or race over and to attack the other. There
are other reasons for keeping the pattern relatively short and
tight such as the longer a lure is set the more line there is
to stretch and cushion the strike. A normal lure pattern is
shown hereabouts showing the relative positions and their
names. 
have to drop all the lures behind it back and
retune them.
