Are you on this hot method?
Every so often an evolved style of fishing generates excitement. The modern phenomenon of slow-pitch jigging is one such style…
Russ Symons reveals the slow-jigging secrets.
I n the beginning there was pirking, using 30lb or 40lb breaking strain mono fished off a poker of a rod, with a highspeed Penn Senator 4/0 or 6/0 reel. Hanging off the end of the line was usually a Norwegian-made, ‘ silver banana’ weighing in at between 1-2lb, depending on the tide and depth of water, which was usually more than 200ft and sometimes more on a long trip.
Believe me, the first six fish were fun, and after that you needed to go into training. Back in the 1960s and ’70s there was no such thing as super braid lines; even ‘light’ 30lb mono was between 0.45-0.55mm diameter, whereas today even a relatively low-quality 30lb super braid line will be almost half of that diameter. Which means, in practical fishing terms, that an 8oz jig will get down quicker and easier than that monster 2lb silver banana.
DARK SECRET
EFFECTIVE METHOD
deep-water wrecks; we have to travel a long way these days to see such shoals of fish.
However, there was a deep, dark secret, which those in the know kept to themselves for years; that if you wanted cod (and who doesn’t?) then the speed jig had to be fished in the bottom 10-20ft of water, and if you gently bent the speed jig just a fraction, to make it wobble in the water, you caught a lot more cod than those who didn’t bend their jigs.
So, in effect, what we were doing all those years ago was slow jigging with speed jigs. Sounds a bit airy fairy, but in the light of what is happening with the highly mobile, sophisticated bottombalanced and middle-weighted jigs coming out of Asia today; crude though it was by today’s standard, we were slow jigging, after a fashion. It worked then and it still works today. coloured finishes, which allowed anglers to reel these lures through a shoal of high-riding fish at speed, with the occasional pause and twitch of the rod tip to induce a fish to hit the lure.
Pollack, coalfish and bass loved them. They still do, and speed jigging is as effective today as it has ever been. Alas, the gill-netters have culled many of those huge shoals of pollack and coalfish riding high in the fast water over the It was that wondrous introduction of super braid that enabled the cult method of deep-water speed jigging.
The original speed jigs were pretty things, with stick-on eyes and holographic silver and Proper slow-pitch jigging is a method and style of fishing that has swept Japan, Australia and New Zealand. It has proven itself in the Mediterranean, and it is rapidly gaining a foothold around our coast because it works. It is particularly effective on the predatory
species like cod, pollack and bass, for example.
It is a method that perfectly complements speed jigging. On days when the predatory fish are not aggressively chasing, then a slow-pitch jig twitched and fluttered just off the bottom will catch the slower fish that we have so many of around our coast.
I have caught bass, whiting, gurnards, haddock, pout, ling and even congers, as well as the inevitable cod and pollack, using the slow-pitch jigging style. I would have to think very hard to remember the last time I used bait in deep water.
The beauty of the slow-pitch jigging style is that it is not nearly so physically challenging as the hump and pump of speed jigging. Added to which, it is a new style of fishing, exerting a fascination and interest all of its own to those of us who care more about how we catch our fish, rather than a heavy, smelly plastic bag at the end of the day.
HOW IT’S DONE
So let’s get real. Do you need specialised gear to fish these jigs? If you want to do it properly and get with the trend then, yes, you do. But do you need specialised gear to catch fish on a jig – no, you don’t. It is very much one of those chicken and egg situations.
First catch your fish and then, inevitably, you will think ‘that was fun’, and then the angler’s well-renowned lust for shiny bits will do the rest. Get on the Internet, YouTube or Facebook and type in ‘slow-pitch jigging’ and you will be amazed at the techniques and wealth of information that you’ll find.
Speed jigging triggers aggression in a predatory fish to chase and harass a fast-moving baitfish. For the angler, getting the jig moving fast and working properly in the water involves constant upper body movement, which, let’s face it, is hard work, especially if you need to use a heavy lure to get down to the fish.
Slow-pitch jigging is slower and much less physically demanding. There is more involvement and skill in trying to mimic a wounded baitfish falling through the water, rather than a fleeing baitfish, as with a speed jig.
A crippled or wounded baitfish will make erratic and unpredictable movements, twitching and darting this way and that, as it sinks through the water. This is precisely the sort of movement that slow-pitch jigs are designed to make, as they lift and fall through the water. This erratic lift and fluttering fall is all about the movement imparted to the jig by the rod, the reel and the imagination of the angler.
A Japanese angler called Norihiro Sato has become the recognised guru for this style of fishing and has detailed in a meticulous fashion the intricacies of slow-pitch jigging. His website, Japanese Anglers Secrets (www.anglers-secrets.com), contains a wealth of information and is well worth reading. It is clearly evident that there are differences between where he fishes and where we fish. His methods are sound, so our task is to modify and tweak to suit our different species and location.
Drawing on past experience of pirking, speed jigging and, in recent years, what is now called slow-pitch jigging is a journey that I have relished. It has everything for me... a technical aspect in tackle and methodology, combined with the unpredictability of fishing for the last truly wild creatures on this planet.
Don’t you just love it?
Next issue: Rods and reels.
“Slow-pitch jigging is a method that perfectly complements speed jigging”