Old Adversaries

Here at Nautical we have recently received a heap of new gear from Lucky Craft, building on our ever-popular range. Lucky Craft is a world leading lure designer from Japan and produces some of the best gear on the market. These lures are built with purpose and each model has a unique and mesmerising action, making them some of our absolute favourites.

Without a doubt, the most popular design is the Pointer, which we currently carry in 2 different sizes (78 and 100mm) and 3 diving depths. The 78mm pointer is available is 3 depth models, the SP (suspending, dives 1.2-1.5m), DD (dives 1.8-2.1m) and the XD (up to 3m). This size, as you would expect, is a prime smaller presentation for essentially every estuary species. Dead slow cranking the DD and XD models down the face of sunken timber and other structure is a great way to draw bites.

The 78 SP model is a weapon for freshwater species, as well as barra and jacks holding shallow. The 100mm bigger brother has long been a go to among barra anglers, in both the shallow (SP) and deeper (DD) models. The 100SP is my personal favourite of the bunch, because it is probably the most versatile. Diving to around 1.5 metres this model is perfect for twitching snags, slow rolling open through water and just about everything in between. With these and a few other weapons arriving in the shop in June, I was pretty eager to take some out for a test drive.

A mate of mine, Darryl and I managed to get out for a JP session late in June and trialled some of this awesome new gear.  Jungle perch are often at the top of the list for me at this time of year since conditions are quite good for them after the wet. I started off the morning flicking a few of the Molix RT shads in 3.5 and 4.5”, which had been killing it for be in the last few sessions. Though smaller than my usual first choice, the 3.5” model has a great presence underwater and seems to punch well above its weight on the bigger perch. I ended up pulling some really nice fish (up to 44cm) on this weapon of a plastic by lunchtime. I had it rigged on a 1/4oz 2/0 jighead with a jigspin to add flash and vibration. Darryl saw similar success running the 4.5” RT shad on a 1/2oz 6/0 jighead, which produced some incredible eats at a leaders length.

Later in the day I switched to a Lucky Craft pointer 100sp to mix things up a bit. Normally this would be considered a big lure for jungle perch, but they are willing and more than capable to take lures this size and bigger. This was certainly the case on the day, as it drew aggressive strikes one after another, from big and small fish. A lot of the larger fish were also responding much more positively to the pointer than other techniques, which was a welcome surprise. There were many instances where multiple casts in an area with soft plastics wouldn’t draw any interest, but fish responded instantly and aggressively to the fast twitched hardbody. Before this trip a 100mm pointer was not something I would use regularly for JPs but from now on there will always be more than one in my tackle box! A great example why it pays to experiment, even if you are completely confident in your approach. Overall, we had a great session, with 11 jungle perch over the 40cm bracket landed, including a 44cm beast, and a couple others in the 43cm class. Another memorable trip with a few little things learned to keep us excited!