Nick, always enjoy your videos, Steve, your posts on SRB are must reads. Thanks for teaming up here, enjoyed it. Need more, good exchange of info/thoughts between the two of you.
Hi Robert, aren't you on SRB? That name looks familiar. I load most of my redfins and the heavier I load them, the more of a "tail" I use to help balance the swim out. I load redfins with anywhere between 5 CC's to 18 CC's of mineral oil. The lighter loaded ones, I just use a standard flag tail tied with bucktail. The heavier ones I use bucktail and 1 or 2 feathers. The feathers help create drag on the back of the plug. I also have some loaded with about a quarter ounce of BB's too. I also play with hook sizes on redfins. The lighter weighted plugs get either a 1/0 or 2/0 Mustad 5X with a wolverine split ring. These swim closer to the surface and are great in places that do not have much current or sweep. A lot of my early spring fishing from March to April are on these plugs because I can fish them very slowly, within a foot or less of the surface in the shallow areas where the water is warming up faster during the spring. For the heavier plugs I have gone all the way up to a 4/0 Mustad 5X. The larger hooks help add weight to these plugs, and I use them primarily in inlets, points; any place with stronger current or in rough conditions. As far as casting, a loaded redfin casts better than an unloaded one, but they are never really going to cast as far as an SP minnow, or even a bomber. I don't expect to throw a redfin much more than 60 feet, and I use them in places where I don't need a really long cast. The load for me is more about getting that lure to "hold" in sweep and current. I want to just add some weight to make the plug "bite" so it does not get "washed out" when fishing throughout all of the stages of the tide. There are a lot of mods you can do to a 7" redfin, but it will work just fine out of the package IF just change the hardware; the hooks and split rings are not great and you're better off replacing them right away. If you're on Surf Rats Ball you can reach out to me there for more info. Hope this helps and have a great season.
Hi, this is is Steven. The plugs swim as intended (as far as I can tell). You need to balance the weight of the hook and split ring in the back of the plug. I do with most plugs under 7 inches. My larger metal lips, high hook needles, 4 oz darters, larger bottle plugs all have two hooks. All of my poppers and pencil poppers still have 2 hooks no matter what. I stick with the one hook because it is easier on me to get a fish unhooked and released (especially at night). I wrote an article for surfcasters journal about a small bass that go a hook caught in my boot laces while wetsuiting on the south of Block. While I was trying to get the fish off the hook and out of my boot I got washed hard. After that I started playing around removing tail hooks, most of which did not work very well. When Audet and Anderson started writing and talking about the one hook solution, I tried it out. It worked for me and I have been doing it for about 4 seasons now. I fish with a few people, all of them are on two hooks, or standard rigged plugs and there has never really been a night where our catch rates varied very much one way or the other. Surprisingly as well drop rate and miss rate is about the same. I did a few posts on this on Surf Rats Ball, if you are on that site feel free to reach out if you have more questions. Hope this helps and have a great season.
Hello there. I tried replying to this post, but I think because I posted the link to SRB it got marked as spam or something. SRB = Surf Rats Ball. It is the site run by surf guide guru Bill Wetzel. Do a search and it should pop up. SRB also hosts a month long tournament that is coast to coast. It's a forum based site with a casters from all over. Great to place for shop talk and information. Hope this helps and I hope you're having a great season too.
Nick, always enjoy your videos, Steve, your posts on SRB are must reads. Thanks for teaming up here, enjoyed it. Need more, good exchange of info/thoughts between the two of you.
I appreciate the positive reinforcement. I feel that we compliment each other well in terms of sharing our thoughts as well as techniques.
Thanks dude, glad to help. Hope you are having a great season.
Awesome video
Thank you.
Nice job guys.
Appreciate it.
Great stuff guys. Thanks a lot.
Not a problem. Tight lines.
This video was great. Its giving me the itch
Tight lines. Its giving me the itch as well haha
So Steve seems to like flags on his Redfins. Can you tells us why and how it affects the swim and castability?
I would imagine it gives out a larger and more lively profile.
Hi Robert, aren't you on SRB? That name looks familiar.
I load most of my redfins and the heavier I load them, the more of a "tail" I use to help balance the swim out. I load redfins with anywhere between 5 CC's to 18 CC's of mineral oil. The lighter loaded ones, I just use a standard flag tail tied with bucktail. The heavier ones I use bucktail and 1 or 2 feathers. The feathers help create drag on the back of the plug. I also have some loaded with about a quarter ounce of BB's too.
I also play with hook sizes on redfins. The lighter weighted plugs get either a 1/0 or 2/0 Mustad 5X with a wolverine split ring. These swim closer to the surface and are great in places that do not have much current or sweep. A lot of my early spring fishing from March to April are on these plugs because I can fish them very slowly, within a foot or less of the surface in the shallow areas where the water is warming up faster during the spring.
For the heavier plugs I have gone all the way up to a 4/0 Mustad 5X. The larger hooks help add weight to these plugs, and I use them primarily in inlets, points; any place with stronger current or in rough conditions.
As far as casting, a loaded redfin casts better than an unloaded one, but they are never really going to cast as far as an SP minnow, or even a bomber. I don't expect to throw a redfin much more than 60 feet, and I use them in places where I don't need a really long cast. The load for me is more about getting that lure to "hold" in sweep and current. I want to just add some weight to make the plug "bite" so it does not get "washed out" when fishing throughout all of the stages of the tide.
There are a lot of mods you can do to a 7" redfin, but it will work just fine out of the package IF just change the hardware; the hooks and split rings are not great and you're better off replacing them right away.
If you're on Surf Rats Ball you can reach out to me there for more info. Hope this helps and have a great season.
Excellent. Wow 18 cc. Yes I’m on SRB. I’ll get in touch.
I noticed Steve has some plugs set up with the one hook solution, curious how he likes how those plugs swim ?
Hi, this is is Steven. The plugs swim as intended (as far as I can tell). You need to balance the weight of the hook and split ring in the back of the plug. I do with most plugs under 7 inches. My larger metal lips, high hook needles, 4 oz darters, larger bottle plugs all have two hooks. All of my poppers and pencil poppers still have 2 hooks no matter what.
I stick with the one hook because it is easier on me to get a fish unhooked and released (especially at night). I wrote an article for surfcasters journal about a small bass that go a hook caught in my boot laces while wetsuiting on the south of Block. While I was trying to get the fish off the hook and out of my boot I got washed hard. After that I started playing around removing tail hooks, most of which did not work very well.
When Audet and Anderson started writing and talking about the one hook solution, I tried it out. It worked for me and I have been doing it for about 4 seasons now.
I fish with a few people, all of them are on two hooks, or standard rigged plugs and there has never really been a night where our catch rates varied very much one way or the other. Surprisingly as well drop rate and miss rate is about the same.
I did a few posts on this on Surf Rats Ball, if you are on that site feel free to reach out if you have more questions. Hope this helps and have a great season.
What Website does Steve post on ? SRB ? I’m not familiar with it I’d like to read his posts Thanks
Hello there. I tried replying to this post, but I think because I posted the link to SRB it got marked as spam or something.
SRB = Surf Rats Ball. It is the site run by surf guide guru Bill Wetzel. Do a search and it should pop up.
SRB also hosts a month long tournament that is coast to coast. It's a forum based site with a casters from all over. Great to place for shop talk and information.
Hope this helps and I hope you're having a great season too.
I believe SRB and surfcasters journal