Andrew McGovern discusses some unique approaches to rigging and retrieving soft plastics that go a little bit against the rules.

The versatility, flexibility, and fish-catch-ability of soft plastics are undeniable on just about every species available to freshwater anglers. The continuous evolution of the techniques and applications associated with this type of fishing, as well as the various ways to rig soft plastics and the hardware used, all combine to create a variety of presentations which is one part of fishing I personally can’t get enough of. How you rig soft plastics and how anglers use them is only restricted by one’s imagination and our ability to think outside the square.
In this piece I have detailed several strategies that will hopefully assist you in taking your fishing to the next level, or at the very least, get you thinking about how you can design a system that might just provide you with a stack of memorable sessions and SD cards full of big fish.

This well conditioned brown trout fell for a slowly worked ‘off set’ rigged Strike Tiger plastic across a shallow weed covered bottom.

RIGGING VARIATIONS
One of the first lessons many fishers are taught when first employing the modular system, is to ensure that the soft plastic is rigged correctly on the jighead. Correctly rigged refers to a number of variables which basically relate to how and where the hook is threaded onto the soft body so that the final presentation is straight with the jighead’s hook laying neatly through the centre. To achieve this final presentation the body must be fed onto the hook through the dead centre of the plastic. The hook must exit the body so that the body lies straight; ensuring no part of the body is bent, twisted, or crooked.
This ‘correctly’ rigged presentation will allow you to swim, hop and lift your lure at all speeds without fear of spinning or twisting. This includes both during forward momentum and when a pause is imparted into the retrieve. Testing or ‘pre-swimming’ a newly rigged lure should be undertaken before casting commences. What is lost on many fishers is that they don’t test their presentations ability to drift or swim on the pause. Some presentations that work perfectly well when moving forward, fail to perform absolutely correctly without forward momentum. It is vital that the presentation doesn’t twist or ‘roll over’ during the pause portion of the retrieve as many bites are experienced duirng this part of the retrieve. This is particularly the case in many freshwater scenarios when targeting perch, trout, and occasionally cod.
What is meant by ‘rolling over’, is when your lure is paused and the presentation falls to one side (almost as if your lure is sinking upside down) and plummets to the bottom. This is a completely unnatural presentation and a sure way for any trailing fish to quickly lose interest.

The lesson of rigging soft plastics straight is an essential element when using fast rips or the popular ‘burn and kill’ technique commonly associated with flathead or bass fishing. However, because the majority of trout and perch applications require a slow, more methodical retrieve, rigging the soft plastis dead straight is not paramount.
With this in mind, several seasons ago saw the beginning of us experimenting with rigging our soft plastics slightly crooked. The catalyst for this experimentation was one humid afternoon in late March while chasing perch when I observed this sickly looking gambusia struggling its way along the perimeter of a mid-water weed bed. In a flurry of fins and scales, and a considerable amount of water displacement, a belter of a golden perch nailed the gambusia right at my feet. I delivered 30 to 40 casts in the area with no interest.
Having intently watched my soft plastic travel in every cast, the penny finally dropped that my presentation was ‘too perfect’. It swam like a healthy baitfish frolicking without a care in the world. Even with varying alternations in speed and intermittent pauses, my soft plastic looked like a fit, vibrant baitfish. I decided to re-rig the soft plastic on a slight angle so that the hook was positioned just off centre. The lure still swam satisfactorily so that it didn’t spin or twist, however, when retrieved it tracked marginally to the left. In addition; the soft plastic appeared bent in the middle.
As my plastic found its way to the boat on the third cast after my experimental rigging option, a perch of just over three kilograms powered in from the depths and nonchalantly engulfed my lure. A solid hook up resulted with the lure pinned deep inside the fish’s mouth cavity. The way the fish took the lure coupled with the relatively casual way in which the perch took the presentation, reiterated the fact that my new rigging style had paid dividends. Since then we have racked up a substantial tally of both natives and introduced species using this ‘off-set’ rigging method.

This Berkley ripple shad was rigged slightly off centre so that it swam marginally to the left and was the engulfed by this average lake trout.

The other variation in rigging that we have used with success is to rig the body with the hook exiting the body a few millimetres short of what would be deemed the correct location for a straight rigged body. Exiting the point early means the tail of the SP body rides lower than a straight rigged body with the tail and bottom third of the plastic hanging lower than normal. As with the ‘off-set’ position, rigging short should not cause the lure to twist or spin when retrieved. If it does then re-position the soft plastic on the hook shank until it swims without twisting. When rigged in this method, closely watch your lure on the retrieve. You will notice that the low riding tail gives the realistic impression of a baitfish struggling to keep itself off the bottom and quite obviously injured.
Working lures rigged in this method has proven a watershed moment in my soft plastic trout endeavours. Slowly retrieving plastics across mud beds riddled with yabby holes delivered a couple of memorable sessions over the past two seasons at both Eucumbene and Jindabyne. Last season we finished a late autumn trip with 16 fish landed, when most others were struggling to generate any interest. We found that the key to our success was retrieving our lures ultra slowly just off the bottom. The lure would intermittently drag or come in contact with the muddy substrate. Importantly we did not use any pauses or alterations in speed during every retrieve that resulted in a strike or hook up.

Mud substrate scattered with yabby holes are ideal areas to work soft plastics that are either rigged ‘off-set’ or slightly short, so that the tail hangs below the shank of the hook.

FOOTBALL HEADS
The use of football shaped jigheads is gathering momentum with Aussie anglers. These cleverly designed heads allow the body of the plastic to stand up when the head is resting on the bottom. American bass anglers have successfully been using these types of heads for a few decades on shut down fish. In Australia though, perch and brown trout have been the most commonly caught with these unique heads. Loading them with a paddle or fish tail has proven the best combination. As the lure is rested the tail will hang down tantalisingly and as a result; quickly picked up by predatory fish. We have caught a few fish across mud and clay beds as well as broken pebble and gravel bottoms, however, areas where the bottom is covered with short weed growth or recently flooded grass has proven the most consistent.
When fishing windblown banks where there is a degree of water movement in the shallower regions, as well as loading our football heads up with fish tails, creature style plastics such as lizards, shrimps, and yabbies have taken fish. The appendages that hang off the body of the creature plastics, such as legs, claws, nippers, and tentacles will sway and drift with the water movement which fish can’t seem to resist.
In these scenarios don’t be afraid to rest your football head on the bottom for extended pauses while the water movement does the work for you. It is worth keeping in mind that the lure does not need to be moved large distances to attract fish. A stationary lure with minimal movement of the lure’s appendages due to the subtle water movement can be enough to convince a fish to bite. In some ways this is like bait fishing with lures. Patience is a key factor when applying this technique if you wish to taste any success.
A common trait with this style of fishing is that often the fish will pick up the lure and begin to swim off with it. Perch are the main culprits so you need to be wary not to strike too early as you may pull the hook from the fish’s mouth. If you feel your line go tight then move your rod forward towards where it enters the water. This will allow the fish to swim off a short distance without feeling any tension on the line. As the line comes tight again by using a gentle but firm lift of the rod tip, a solid hook set will ensue.
Another interesting fact we have discovered is that if the water along the edge has some colour in it, due to the stirred up bottom, then chances are there are fish nosing around for an easy feed.

Releasing a healthy trout. Check out how thick the weed is where this fish was taken. An unweighted weedless soft plastic was worked across this weed where the trout materialised from within the weed to eat the soft plastic.

WEEDLESS OPTIONS
There has been plenty of text devoted in Freshwater Fishing Australia to fishing weedless presentations over the past couple of decades. Purpose designed jigheads such as the Decoy Nail Bomb, TT Snake Head, and the like, have made weedless presentations a much simpler process and much more readily available to all levels of fishers. In addition to using the weedless jigheads, which have a pre-determined lead weight moulded around the bent shank of the hook, we have been using just a weedless hook to deliver unweighted ultra-finesse presentations. The combination of small soft plastic bodies, ranging from 2 cm grubs or wriggles to 7 cm paddle tails, sitting on a light gauge hook, means that leaders and main leaders should be no more that 4 lb breaking strain to facilitate accurate, easy casting while attaining sufficient distance. Long fluorocarbon, or thin mono leaders can also assist casting distance and accuracy as well as improving bite to cast ratio in heavily fished impoundments. You will need a ‘punchy’ rod with plenty of backbone to power these light presentations into various pockets of water that look likely to hold fish.
As good as these unweighted presentations have been, there have been times when the wind has been too strong or water too deep to effectively fish an unweighted, weedless soft plastic. The solution is to carry a handful of small split shots in various sizes and a pair of long nose pliers. Simply pinch a split shot onto the bend in the hook and you can continue using the same soft plastic body. When you first add a split shot, always start off with the lightest you have and continue to add more shot as required. I have even experimented with painting a handful of shots in different colours, with red working quite well as it is the colour that represents the flared, exposed gills of a baitfish. The twofold benefit we have found with loading a small split shot to weedless hook in this fashion is that lures will drift down the water column naturally. Lures can also be paused and allowed to drop into difficult to get to areas that may be missed when employing a constant retrieve. There are some purpose designed jigheads on the market that have a moulded weight around the turn or belly of the hook. The TT ChinlockZ SWS being the best option for southern freshwater anglers as they come in 1/12 oz heads on 2/0 and 3/0 hooks.
For many, the weedless game can be confusing and can actually steer some fishers away from how effective soft plastics rigged this way are, in areas other than weed. We have found working weedless plastics around artificial rock walls, rocky points, and hard broken bottoms equally as effective as around weed beds. When fishing across broken, rocky substrate it is vital the weedless presentation is paused, to facilitate a slow, downward drift towards the bottom as numerous takes are experienced during this portion of a retrieve. This style will also allow your offering to be worked through every crack, gap and cavity in the submerged rock feature (See Tech Tip – Weedless Soft Plastics across Hard Substrate). The benefit of using a weedless (or snagless) set up is that with the hook embedded inside the plastic body, the chance of your lure locking up solid is reduced. Of course the jighead or split shot can still become wedged in the rocks, but we have found by fishing a weedless presentation that our snag up rate has roughly halved.
I should outline here that fishing weedless presentations is not without its drawbacks. The main negative is that because the hook of your jighead is positioned inside the soft plastic body, when a fish bites, there is a real possibility of the hook not pinning the fish. This is more common with trout than natives as trout tend to bite or gently slurp the presentation in, whereas perch and cod are implosion feeders so the lure is often deep in the fish’s mouth cavity when the angler strikes.
Having experimented with a number of different variations, by far the most successful method to set the hook on trout is to maintain a low rod position, using a firm sweeping, sideways action – this movement will help pull the hook through the soft plastic body. Then immediately lift the rod to between 1 and 2 o’clock where the hook point should embed nicely into the fish’s mouth. Using this method we have found 90% of hook set positions are sitting right in the scissors of the fish’s mouth, which allows for a quick, harmless release for the fish.

The author displays a solid perch taken while using a stationary retrieve and the highly successful football shaped jighead design.

The final point on using weedless soft plastics around weed is that this all-inclusive underwater flora is not the same. Strap weed or duck weed, which are those long strands of relative firm strands, make for the ideal areas to retrieve weedless presentations. However, that annoying slime, with its stringy, sticky nature can be cumbersome to fish effectively, even with a weedless presentation. In the majority of cases you will finish up using your weedless plastic the same as a stock standard rigged lure, which therefore defeats the purpose of the exercise, as you are unnecessarily incorporating the extra complexity of setting the weedless hook in the fish’s mouth.
FINAL SAY
There you have a handful of different strategies and rigging methods that should improve your catch rates under difficult conditions. In conjunction with the above mentioned techniques we have been utilising some other ‘left field’ methods that I will detail in a later instalment of Freshwater Fishing Australia.
Andrew has been fishing the Canberra, Monaro, Snowy Mountains and south coast of NSW region for almost 40 years and is considered one of the country’s most innovative and competent anglers. He has been a freelance journalist for almost 17 years, has written two extensive books on the region, and featured in numerous AFN tactics DVDs. He regularly undertakes all forms of fishing with casting soft plastics for trout, chasing kingfish from the rocks, pelting baits from beaches, and luring his local estuaries amongst his favourite pastimes. Andrew is currently a Pro Angler with Jarvis Walker Australia and endorses their range of products.