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View from the Helm
Miscellaneous notes and interesting observations...
Seafood Guide | Issue 2 Survey Results | E-Tec Update | Deep Jigging Update | View from Below
Back in Issue 2, we ran an article about
"New Age" deep jigging. Popular in Asia, the
South Pacific, Australia and New Zealand, it's taken a while for the technique
to gain much traction with American fishermen.
The technique has finally gotten a boost in the US with Shimano's introduction
of their
"Butterfly Jigging" system. Shimano has been
sellng the technique as a total system: rods, reels, line, lures, and a
retrieve technique that they equate to the equivalent of "walking the
dog".
"Walking the dog" is a method of retrieving topwater lures so that the
nose of the lure swings back and forth. The Shimano deep jigging technique does
a similar thing but on a vertical plane as the jig is retrieved. Check out the
intro video from Shimano's website. NOTE:
this video uses Quicktime technology, and is NOT a streaming video link, so it
may take a while for the thing to start up. This is an issue with
Shimano's site, not OSJ...
Shimano has updated the specs on the reels they recommend for deep jigging to
include inches of line retrieved per turn of the handle, and the maximum drag
force the reel is capable of generating. Some of the specs on their spinning
reels are surprising, to say the least - their
10000FA and 20000FA Stella reels boast twin drag
systems capable of generating over 55 lbs of drag, and they both
pick up over 3.5 feet of line per crank of the handle.
Compare this to the Trinidad 30, which picks up a little
less than 4 feet of line per handle turn, but only generates about 16.5 lbs of
drag !
When we first saw the specs of the Stellas, we were a little
concerned about how our test Thunnus 16000 spinning reel would stack up,
but it turns out the Thunnus 16000 specs compare very well to the Trinidad
30 (about 3.5 feet of line / crank, 17 lbs of drag).
Where are we with the technique? Unfortunately, we're still waiting to give it a
serious try. It's been a dismal summer offshore season here in San Diego,
and we've only had one or two situations where we could give it a shot.
However, with water temperatures dropping, we're looking forward to trying
it on our deep water home-guard yellowtail this winter.
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