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Barramundi on Blades

Barramundi on Blades

Declan Williams

After a few successful trips north, landing plenty of barra on the 6" ZMan SwimmerZ rigged on TT War Head jigheads, we couldn't resist making the most of a few days off to do the 6 hour run north from Brisbane to chase a few more metre plus fish.

We hit the water early, motored down to where we had fished previously, rigged the plastics and began casting, allowing the lure to sink and slowly retrieving as we had on previous successful missions... a couple of tiny taps. It seemed that the fish had shut down from the fishing pressure - they had probably seen every soft plastic in every colour over the last couple of months. The fish were there, we could see them on the sounder, but we couldn't get them to open their mouths!

Laying the lure trays out on the deck, we were confronted with hundreds of different style and size lures, in a kaleidoscope of colours... what to tie on? We changed to hard bodies to try and stir them up and trolled up a couple of barra but it was a long time between fish so we wanted a lure that would annoy them into biting.

We had been having great success on the TT Lures Switchblade in the smaller sizes on bream, 1/2oz on impoundment bass and 1 1/2oz HD on a stack of different offshore species and they really seem to switch the fish on. In one of the trays we had some new prototype 1oz Switchblades and this seemed like the perfect opportunity to give them a swim.

The 1oz Switchblade is a herring profile in a size that is perfect for barramundi and a wide range of medium to large freshwater, northern estuary and offshore species, especially when targeting shallow reefs from 20 - 40m.

We moved in above the schooled fish and worked the lure vertically, allowing it to fall to the bottom and working it with an aggressive rip upward and then allowing it to fall again. Fish on! A solid silver slab leapt from the water, grey hounded across the surface and put up a solid fight before sliding into the net.

The key was to work the Switchblade hard and then watch the line as it fell back through the water column. If you see movement in the line wind up on the lure and set the hooks.

Gear wise we were using 30lb Platypus Bionic Braid, 60lb Black Magic leader and we were tying the blade straight to the leader. We were targeting schooled fish in 15-30' of water using a vertical retrieve and later in the afternoon, when the fish fired up a bit more, we also used a long cast, rip and watch the line as the lure drops.

Strikes came as the lure fell back through the fish that had been switched on. Several times the fish just engulfed the blade on the drop and were in the air before we could even wind up tight. We decided to try one last spot before heading home and on the first drop in 3-4 knots of current I came up tight on a fish that had been holding behind a hump on the bottom. The fish didn't jump, which can often mean it's a big fish and after the best barra fight I have experienced my new PB 121cm fish slid into the net!

The TT Lures 1oz Switchblade managed to annoy these schooled fish into biting and we landed over 30 fish in 2 ? hours! I know what I am tying on next time I find shut down barra schooled in impoundments!