Kingfish Brutes on a Downrigger – June 03

Kingfish are one of the most respected and admired fish of the sea. Their shear brute fighting ability and never say die attitude earns them the title of the “Hoodlum” of the sea – and that’s just the small ones! The Bigger Kingfish (10kg plus) are like freight trains of the deep, patrolling the reef edges, waiting for the next unknowing baitfish to swim by before being engulfed by their powerful jaws. The “Brutes” are the Bigguns we all desire to catch, and we’re going to show you just how achievable it is for you to target these monsters of the deep.

Targeting the bigger fish can be a daunting task, especially when it seems almost impossible to stop them given their dog fighting tactics, dragging you directly to a nearby reef or structure-usually only a few metres away. In comes “the Downrigger”, the most effective way to catch big Kingfish since the inception of the Jig.

What is a downrigger?
A Downrigger is a “boom device”, which holds several metres of stainless wire or braid on a rotating reel. At the end of the wire, a weighted lead bomb is attached via a snap swivel. The bomb is normally streamline in appearance, as to create as minimal water drag as possible. A “release clip” is attached to the bomb – this is where you will be attaching your line. A good quality downrigger will have a line counter on it too, so you can see how many metres or feet of line you have out. It will also have a sturdy and strong base plate, which is either fixed to your boat, or placed in a rod holder.

How do I use it?
The downrigger’s sole purpose is to temporarily suspend your bait or lure beneath the water at the desired depth whilst under speed. The way we do this, is via the release clip. I like to connect my line to the release clip with an elastic band, which ensures that my braid is never damaged when a Kingfish crashes the bait like a steam train- but we’ll get into that later.

The first thing you should be doing when downrigging is scoping out the desired fishing area with your Sounder/Fish Finder. There are several reasons for this. The first and most obvious is to find the fish on the sounder. There is no point downrigging your hard earned live bait through lifeless devoid reefs, or even worse, through a school of picking leatherjackets or Mado’s, which will make a meal out of your delicious presentation. Spend the time searching the reef and its surrounds to establish if the Kingfish are there and if so at what depth. They may also be feeding on a particular bait school in the area. If they are – catch some! There is nothing better for a Kingfish to eat then whatever they are eating at the time! Exploring the reef will also allow you to ascertain the various depths, structures, reef formations and sudden undulations that could cause your downrigger to get stuck (and mind you if that happens, there are not many second chances, it usually ends in lost bombs or even worse… downriggers).

Once you have found the fish and are comfortable with the depth that you will be deploying the downrigger, it is time to set your bait. Keep the boat just in gear – particularly if you are using live bait. You must be travelling at a speed at which your live bait can swim naturally. Live squid in particular can not swim faster than a knot or two, so steady does it. Quickly attach your live bait hook at the tip of the bait fish, or hood of the squid. Attach the line to the release clip via a “Size 16 with 16 turn” elastic band when the bait is about 20ft behind the boat. This is enough to clear your doubles, leaders, swivels etc and should leave you on clean single strand braid. It also leaves the bait far enough away from the humming sound of the downrigger wire and bomb. With your reel in free spool, send the downrigger down to the desired depth. You may then click your reel into gear and pull it tight on the elastic band (now “x” feet under water”). What I like to do is have my sounder on the same units as my downrigger, that way I am not converting metres to feet all the time.
Now it is simply a waiting game. You troll your downrigger around and through those fish you found earlier, waiting for a strike.

 

Preparing you gear for “Brutes”
Before we get too much into what to do when you get a strike, I think it is essential that we investigate our gear to ensure it is up to the task before you start down rigging at all. This will truly avoid grave disappointments.
Kingfish will sort out any imperfections in your gear within the first 5 seconds of the strike. They fight hard and fast. There is a reason why the fish you are chasing have grown that big, and they ain’t going to let your failure to prepare, lead to their demise.
A good quality 80lb braided outfit, paired with a short and powerful 80lb plus “jig style” rod should be used as an absolute minimum for Kingfish 10kg and upward. These fish have the power and ability to pull drags of up to and over 25kg like the reel is in free spool. Any give and they will bust you off on any nearby reef within seconds. Mono just has way too much stretch- and often enough stretch to allow them to make it back to the reef.

Make sure the reel is maintained, tried and tested before bringing it near the water. Gear like the Okuma Salina II is a great starting point, and has accounted for many of the Brutes you see in the pictures here. Be sure you are comfortable with the smoothness on the reels drag, the gears are solid and strong, and your rods curve is flawless. Test it all BEFORE you go out. It will save you the heartache of losing that fish of a lifetime. We will get into the details of gear testing shortly.

Terminal Tackle
The business end of your outfit – the Terminals, should be carefully and delicately rigged with surgical precision. This will ensure there are absolutely no weak points at all. We will be basing our discussions for today solely on bait fishing – we will leave lures on downriggers for another day.
We start off with a 130lb fluro carbon for our leader. It should be about a metre long and attached to a twin hook rig, using 2 of size 4 or 5 live bait hooks. There are 2 ways of attaching them; conventional knots, utilising a uni and a snell knot or by simply using crimps. For 130lb I much prefer crimps. This returns a far greater strength factor than most knots. Both examples can be seen n the figure below.

The leader is then attached to a heavy duty ball bearing swivel, which should be rated to 60kg as a minimum. Again, we prefer the crimp connection, but knots can work fine if done correctly.
As you would imagine, a metre or so of trace would never be enough defence against an intelligent Brute kingfish, so now we must extend or leader with a wind on style monofilament leader. This should not be fluro carbon.

It will be wound through the rod and reel quite regularly- something which is not great for fluorocarbon given its high memory characteristics. It will not be exposed as much to the reef edges as that first metre of trace, so 80lb-100lb is more than ample. It should be about 5m long and attached to a bimini twisted double in your braid via a reverse or normal Albright. When done correctly, this is a brilliant and almost failsafe method of ensuring every bit of your lines breaking strain is retained through the sections. Of course, we will always re-do our knots after each trip, so we don’t have salt crystals forming in them, weakening them in the process.

Once we have rigged our outfit, it is time to test it. Place your hook around something solid like a tree or fence. Release all the leaders and doubles from the rod so they are free from any guides or bumps. Now it is time to tighten up the drag and apply the sorts of pressures you intend on applying to the fish. Of course, be safety aware at this point. You should have full length clothing and safety glasses on just in case the line does fail, you don’t want to end up with any bits hitting you. If the line or outfit DOES NOT fail, excellent, your gear is ready to take it to the Brutes. If failure occurs, it will be time to reassess your knots, line etc. It is much better to have gear fail at home, than on a fish of a lifetime. I recall a time when we had faulty braid which was breaking at half the labelled breaking strain. This was quickly replaced with a known brand such as Sufix – which is proven to be of excellent quality. Most of the time now when we are testing our outfits, we just end up bending the fence! Lucky we have understanding neighbours!
Your reel’s drag should be measured and never assumed. You hear lots of people say they are putting massive pressures on fish but still losing them. It would be interesting to know if these drags were actually tested. A quality drag checker will give you the piece of mind to know that the reel is putting out the claimed amount of drag – just as the Salina II 16000 did for us in the pictures below. If the reel is not up to the said drags, there is something wrong and you should consider repairing or replacing it.

The Take
Ok, so now we have our gear ready, we have found the fish, our line is baited with a lovely fresh squid or frigate mackerel, and we eagerly anticipate the take. We recommend that your drag at this point be wound up as tight as possible. The reel should be capable of putting out 20kg of pressure without fault. There are instances when the “puppy dog” tactic may work, applying minimal drags and walking the fish away from the reef…..but we have found that in extreme reef environments, you can never puppy them far enough away to make it worthwhile. Go hard or Go Home.
You spot the fish on the sounder. You and the crew begin to stare down the rod tip, waiting for the initial explosion. The rod tip stutters as the bait becomes hesitant momentarily. Then the rod buckles over in the rod holder. The reel is screaming with pain as line peels off like butter and the lucky Angler is struggling to get the rod our of the rod holder. THAT’s what it’s all about! This is the time for the Skipper to drive the fish away from the reef-at speed (5-8knots) to assist in getting the angle of the line up and the fish away from those jagged reef edges. Once the initial run of the fish is exhausted and the sounder indicates you are in a safer depth, it is time to get the downrigger wound up and out of the way. The Angler should be working extremely hard to get the fish up. Short, sharp strokes- particularly when the fish is facing the boat, as once it turns it’s head, it is more than likely to take you for another blistering run to the depths.
Once the fish is at the boat, if you are considering releasing it, try not to remove it from the water. The fish is usually quite docile by this point and will be easily manoeuvred. If you want to take photos, carefully lip gaff it and assist it with a hand under the belly into the boat. If you have a deck wash, get the fish recovering immediately by placing it in it’s mouth. Once back in the water it is CRITICAL that you swim it along until it is ready to go- just with the boat in gear.

Fishing for large Kingfish is one of the most rewarding and exhilarating angling achievements that you could hope for. The excitement when you see such a spectacular beast besides the boat is mind boggling. Downrigging by far is one of the most effective methods in targeting the larger fish. The Bigger Kingfish often swim beneath the smaller schools which are higher in the water column. They are also in smaller schools, which can be spread out over a large area on a reef. The downrigger allows you to move about, exploring different depths and locations without tying you down to one spot. It also gives you the ability to utilise the boat in the fight- as it is already in gear. Standing still often ends with the Larger Fish dragging you down almost instantaneously. Most fights don’t last more than 5-10 minutes, with only 2 or 3 steam train runs. If you can stop them at the beginning, the rest is relatively simple and achievable to even the most modest of angler. If you’re game, often the fish’s friends will be in close proximity when near the boat-which we discovered when using the underwater camera (You will be able to see this and all the tips and techniques in our Kingfish DVD due out in November. Check www.bandofbrothers.net.au for details). A jig sent behind them can often result in double hook ups on Monster Kings, something not really attempted by many.
Most Reef systems from Norfolk Island in QLD down Coffin Bay in South Australia will hold big Kings. All you need to do is spend the time exploring them. You’ll be amazed at what you can find.

Regards,

Anthony Raco

Band of Brothers Productions

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