YeeHaa Squid hackers Reports

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Post Options Post Options   Likes (0) Likes(0)   Quote Far Quirk Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15 Aug 2020 at 2:52pm
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Thursday 13/8/20  5:30 to 7:30 pm.

Thought we would go to level 4 on Saturday, so took one of the last chances to do some shore-based fishing.  Went to Orakei wharf 
and as light faded, used mainly 2.5 but also some #3 jigs.  It was cold.  Even put down a berley and hung a gas lantern down at water level to try to get their attention, but didn't see a single sprat, let alone a squid.  Moved along the wharf and set up near the lights, using the black ink marks of murdered squid for guidance on where to fish. 

Did I mention it was cold.  About 7pm moved to the Tamaki yacht club and tried around the shore there, staying close to the street lights, and keeping my gas lantern burning near the water.  Not even a tickle.  Tried all the go-to colours - natural (green/brown), pink, orange, green, purple, and a half and half pattern which is bright fluoro red/orange at one end and fluoro white at the other.

Any tips?  I'm inclined to give it another go since I can't use my boat, and it's still level 3.
Far Quirk - I'm goin' fishn!
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (0) Likes(0)   Quote Steps Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 16 Aug 2020 at 10:15am
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Titanium
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Think you may have wrong time of yr..
 My understanding is they live for about a yr..get big late feb / march and breed, then spend winter putting on a bit of size.
 Come spring, as the water warms, they grow very fast, thats when u use the smaller lures. Then increase size thru till feb march again..
 
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (2) Likes(2)   Quote Telecaster Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 16 Aug 2020 at 11:11am
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Titanium
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Not correct Steps. The best season in Auckland is from around May - October. They are getting to max size about now, and they get more aggressive as the water warms up. I have been catching plenty at night lately, and got one in the middle of the day last weekend. Best seems to be the start of the outgoing or dead low depending on location. I don’t bother with burley or lights.
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (1) Likes(1)   Quote Telecaster Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 16 Aug 2020 at 11:18am
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Titanium
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (1) Likes(1)   Quote Telecaster Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 16 Aug 2020 at 11:19am
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Titanium
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This one weighed over 800g
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (0) Likes(0)   Quote Reel Deal Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 16 Aug 2020 at 2:31pm
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Titanium
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telecaster you must be boardering being classed a commercial Fisher!!

Do mix up your lures or just take one or two favourites. 

Do you also swap sizes as well as colours to get a strike. Here in Aussie Ive had success by keeping same colour but changing size, seems to work sometimes more than colour swap. 
The gods do not subtract from the allotted span of men's lives the hours spent on fishing - Assyrian Proverb
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (0) Likes(0)   Quote Telecaster Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 16 Aug 2020 at 2:51pm
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Titanium
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I take about 8 different jigs but lately have been getting all of them on either a natural (jack Mack colour) yo zuri 2.5, or a clear/pink yo zuri 3.0. If they don’t hit either of those then I start cycling thru other colours.
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (1) Likes(1)   Quote Far Quirk Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 16 Aug 2020 at 3:19pm
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I'm going down to Okahu Bay wharf soon.  I watched a very good video of Auckland based squid jiggers giving away their secrets:
As a result I'm taking 2 rods today.  One to be fished either as a 2-jig dropper rig with the weights removed, or with a float and the jig about a metre below it.  The other will be the one I used on Thursday.  The rod is a Daiwa laguna 4-8Kg 8'6" rod.  It was advertised as being OK for eging, but it's a bit too stiff to get that nice rhythmic eging style going smoothly.  But I picked up some good tips from the video, and I feel more optimistic right now.  Might even put some secret sauce on some of the lures to see if that helps.  It was mentioned during the video, but the opinion seemed to be mainly negative.
Far Quirk - I'm goin' fishn!
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (0) Likes(0)   Quote Telecaster Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 16 Aug 2020 at 7:14pm
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Titanium
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Got a nice one at tindalls this evening, just on dark. The yo zuri clear/pink 3.0 again.
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (0) Likes(0)   Quote Reel Deal Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 16 Aug 2020 at 8:55pm
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Titanium
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good work...where’s the photos ? 👍
The gods do not subtract from the allotted span of men's lives the hours spent on fishing - Assyrian Proverb
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (0) Likes(0)   Quote Telecaster Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 16 Aug 2020 at 8:58pm
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Titanium
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It’s in an inky bag in the fridge but I’ll try to remember to get a photo before I eat it.
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (0) Likes(0)   Quote Steps Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 17 Aug 2020 at 10:29am
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Titanium
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Stand corrected on  "my think..."  seasons.
 We used to catch from the boat  casting into foul along the island shores bottom end Waiheke  mid to low tides during the day and evening.
And off the wharves around Maraetai and off the end of the club ramp carpark at night.

The ink, a doco some yrs back, reckoned it not only worked as a smoke screen, but had an attractant in it which left the predator searching in the cloud rather than chasing thru it.
I dumped some in a batch burly .. as with most fishing 'what is best..' 'trials'  did have what I thought was a better run on that batch..
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (2) Likes(2)   Quote Far Quirk Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 17 Aug 2020 at 2:58pm
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Sunday 16/8/20 4 to 6:45pm

Fished off Orakei wharf and stayed fairly close to the road because there is good weed cover for the squid, and quite a few ink marks on the wharf.  Started with a normal egi setup for casting, and another rod with 2 jigs on a dropper.  The dropper jigs had their weights removed to stop them hanging limply down, but the increase in buoyancy caused them to do the reverse, floating up so they were in an upside down position with the hooks at the top.  For future sessions, I'll experiment with adding weight back to the jigs so they are neutral buoyancy.

4pm was when the last of the incoming was slowly drifting in, and high tide was 17:07pm.  My past experience with all kinds of fishing including squid is that not much happens when the tide isn't moving.  Didn't see any sprats or squid and had no interest in either the egi jig or the 2 dropper jigs until after the tide started to flow out.  While the tide was close to full, I changed the dropper jigs over to a single jig on a float with a 1 metre trace, and put it over a weedy area.  No interest in this either.  When the outgoing started to flow, the force of the water made the float ride down the trace so that the float and jig were together, d'oh!  So ripped off the float and clipped the ledger rig back on.

Continued eging throughout, but apart from a few weed hookups, no bites, and no squid seen.  At 20 to 6 the light was fading and the tide was moving well.  Casting the single lure and glanced across and noticed the ledger rod slowly loading up, with a bit of pulsing movement too - definite squid bite.  Hastily dropped the egi rod but by the time I got to the ledger, the squid was gone.  Hung around holding the ledger rod for 5 minutes, but no further action, so put it down and back to eging.  Within seconds of picking up the eging rod, same thing happened.  This time the butt of the ledger rod left the ground despite the low drag, so it was a scramble to get back.  The little barstools were messin' with my mind.  And to my shame, not patient enough to wait for the next bite and it happened twice more.  AAAAARRRRRRHHHHGGGGGG! Angry

By 6pm, the "bite" was over, and while I hung around for another 45 minutes, no further interest.

There were a lot of other squid hackers around, but didn't see any caught.  Saw a few people fishing off the rocks between Kelly Tarltons and the Tamaki yacht club, but they were too far away to see whether they were catching.

Conclusions:
- I'm ****ing hopeless at catching squid
- next time I'll hang onto the ledger rod longer, and with the neutral buoyancy jigs, maybe more interest and an easier hookup.

Feel free to laugh and poke fun!
Far Quirk - I'm goin' fishn!
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (0) Likes(0)   Quote Telecaster Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 17 Aug 2020 at 4:19pm
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Titanium
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I have done the ledger-rig method with a pair of 3.0 squid jigs without removing any weight, worked fine. Don't over-think it Smile

Squidding can be really frustrating but once you get a couple you will gain confidence and stop doubting your gear etc, and this results in more time with a lure in the water rather than mucking around changing locations, methods, jigs.

It is a patience game - yesterday I casted over the same area with the same jig for 2 hours before I finally got one. Other times you get onto them straight away.

I am going again tonight, right-hand side of Tindalls should be sheltered from the wind.

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Post Options Post Options   Likes (0) Likes(0)   Quote The Tamure Kid Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 17 Aug 2020 at 6:49pm
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Titanium
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Good advice right there, Telecaster.
Squidding seems to be inconsistent (except for the absolute experts).

Geoff, it's no secret the the ramps either side of the yacht club are the hot spots in that area - either side of high tide, as the water shallows out a lot.
But the wall you've described seems to work, with the places with steps most favoured for obvious reasons.
The wharf obviously does too, but the current runs very fast there once it kicks in, whereas the bays beside the yacht club don't.

Stripstrike, who used to be on the forum a bit, was kind enough to take me along and show me squid fishing 101 - I just used by softbait rod and some Yama****a jigs (2.5 size 490 model with the zig zags on the side).

To avoid the crowds when I went solo, I found my own spot to try on Tamaki Drive (using Google Maps and daytime observation) and got a horse (28cm mantle) first cast, and a 27cm mantle one soon after. Couldn't believe it. But after that good start, I've always found it frustrating. Sometimes get one or two (and really, one good sized one is enough for a stunning meal of salt and pepper squid), but never the lineup on the concrete/rocks others do at times. See Telecaster!!

Mind you, one time I had the prime spot on the ramp at Tamaki YC when there were 13 people spread out either side and I got the only two. I am more confident when it's full moon. But others may differ.

I don't think you need to be an expert at the proper egi technique - which looks incredible, i admit. Just softbait twitching seems to work, as they mostly take on the drop from my experience. And you don't need to be able to cast very far, I've had several take very close in.
If you do hook one, make sure you have the drag very loose. I paid the price losing a huge one on the take - just a tentacle came back!

I've seen blokes do okay with just a float and jig at the yacht club - a lot of the regulars do that, using cheap jigs. And as Telecaster said, the standard ledger at the wharf, again with cheap jigs from one of the Asian fishing shops or probably direct from China. one guy goes to the trouble of setting up a light under the wharf fairly close to the road, so being close to one of the lights would be my choice. Sounds like you were in the right spot on Sunday. 

From what i've seen, the coast north of North Head has much clearer water than Tamaki Dr, which the squid apparently like, and I think it'd be worth you taking a jaunt up the motorway one still moonlit night. 
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (0) Likes(0)   Quote Far Quirk Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 23 Aug 2020 at 9:02am
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Saturday 22/8/20  5 to 7pm
Went to the Tamaki yacht club and fished both sides.  The onshore northerly was stronger than expected, and combined with the fairly big tide, made the water very murky. There were half a dozen other squid hackers about and I didn't see any caught.  I lost 4 jigs and went home despondent.

Has anyone tried the Chinese jigs from Aliexpress?  They look about the right range of colours and patterns.  10 jigs landed in NZ for about $35, and the box they come in seems well made.
No doubt this will horrify the people who sell/buy Yama****a jigs for over $20 each.
Far Quirk - I'm goin' fishn!
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (0) Likes(0)   Quote Telecaster Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 24 Aug 2020 at 8:56am
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Titanium
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I haven't tried those, but I have used the squid attack ones which you can pick up on special for $5 each sometimes. I have caught squid on them, but I definitely catch more on better jigs.

I have upped my trace to 20lb flouro which results in less lost jigs, and no difference in numbers of squid caught.
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (0) Likes(0)   Quote Steps Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 24 Aug 2020 at 9:18am
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Titanium
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We use 20lb fluro trace also.
I messed around with incandescent paints ( absorb UV sun /torch and keep glowing for next hr or so, a while back.. coating sinkers , jigs injecting into SBs. on flasher rigs, and paint on the squid jigs.
Defiantly upped the squid takes, regardless of colour.
Upped the non "glow" Sbs in water 15/20m + deep.

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Post Options Post Options   Likes (0) Likes(0)   Quote Reel Deal Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 24 Aug 2020 at 10:07am
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Im going to go up to 20lb and see how it goes.

I don’t know what it is but I get more squid during daytime than night time? I’ll do another day mission this week along the Mooloolaba channels and see how I go. 

The gods do not subtract from the allotted span of men's lives the hours spent on fishing - Assyrian Proverb
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Post Options Post Options   Likes (0) Likes(0)   Quote Telecaster Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26 Aug 2020 at 2:38pm
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I have pretty bad cabin fever so despite the weather, I am going to find a sheltered spot and catch the sunset and the last of the outgoing this evening.
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