DIY - Slow Jigs

On a recent trip to the Outer Gulf to test the new Black Magic VX hooks, Pete came along to share the action, and after good session anchored up fishing baits down a berley trail, asked if he could give his home-made lures a shot.

Generally this style of lure is fished on the drift, so I didn’t hold out much hope. First drop Pete was hooked up, and the result was a nice three-kilo snapper heading for the slurry, a trick that was repeated next drop. 

Pete said, “Not bad for a home-made lure,” and this was cause for closer inspection. Yep, it was not your usual slickly designed, mass-produced fishing lure, but one made by combining a number of items found in most anglers’ garages.

Firstly, the head: this was made from a ball sinker dealt to with a sledge hammer, flattening both sides, while the hole through the centre remained open. And if it didn’t, a nail tapped through opened it up again.

Attached to the head, which had been painted with bright orange or red enamel paint, were two large plastic eyes purchased in lots of 100 for a couple of bucks at the Two Dollar Shop.
The skirt was made by cutting a party balloon into slivers and bound onto the double-hook trace system.

Pete thought the ‘secret’ was in the large google eyes, which move about, creating a rattle and a vibration. He is looking to use other material for the skirts, such as vinyl, because the balloon is not particularly tough and is soon dealt to by repeated fish attacks.

He says a simple solution is just to buy ready-tied tails, which are then attached to the trace via the hole in the sliding head.

“I guess it’s probably easier for most people just to head to their local tackle shop and purchase the product off the shelf, but there is a certain satisfaction in catching decent snapper on a lure you’ve made yourself.”

So will we see these ‘Brown’s Bombers’ in the tackle shops alongside the more conventional slow-jigs?

“Not likely,” says Pete, who prefers to be out testing them rather than making them.

Great to see Kiwi ingenuity is alive and well in our fishing community.