Location: Orange, NSW
Occupation: Product Specialist - Pharmaceuticals
Fishing History: I began fishing as soon as I was old enough to hold a rod in my hand. I started off chasing Trout on Lures in the Streams and rivers of the NSW Central Western region. On my school holidays I would spend nearly every minute of the daylight hours on lake Macquarie fishing for bream and flathead. At 15 I had my first job in a tackle store. At this time I was spending a lot of time flyfishing for trout and soon started helping out instructing flycasting. Not long after this I began to broaden my horizons and started to actively target Bream as well as Jewies and native freshwater species on hardbody lures, this led me to softplastic fishing, a craze that is very addictive.
I competed in my first Bream comp in 2004 and followed this up with the AUS Open and Bream Megabucks in 2005 / 2006 where I fished for my sponsors Baits R us, Chucks Pro tackle and also had affiliations with Strudwick rods and more recently Platypus Fishing Lines. I still regularly fish many social events and try to get to bram comp when able to. Of recent times I have been trialing new techniques with Damiki lures that are sure to change the way we target fish in different situations especially deepwater. I look forward to getting back into the comp scene as part of the Damiki Pro staff team.
After spending the last 18 months living on the Hawkesbury and having the joy of fishing for bream and Bass in my "backyard" whenever I wanted to I have relocated to Orange where I will be able to put Damiki Craft Lures to good use on Yellowbelly, Big Cod and Trout.
It is a pleasure to be associated with such a great company with such a broad range of lures and I reccommend that you get into Damiki Lures for a more consistant catch.
Fave Lures: Bream - DAMIKI MU-SP (black gold holo), Vault 35, WOW Grub
Natives: DC100, MU-SP, (bring on the technical crack)
Keep your eyes out for - Mini Miki Soft plastic, Poppy 75 and the new Vaults
Articles
Mitch's winter Bream tactics - Going Deep
With winter fastly approaching and the water cooling off the Bream can become a tricky fish to target at times. Although you still get them around there usual haunts there seems to be one area that produces the goods, Deepwater.
When targeting bream in the deeper water everyone has there own approach in regards to depth, flow and structure as well as tactics. I am going to briefly go over my ideal spot as well as tactics.
Firstly depth. I like to taget areas in the 8 - 10m depth. Keeping a close eye on the sounder I am not always particularly looking for fish as such but the structure on the bottom. I prefer an uneven reefy bottom with some definant prominant points to target. When it comes to current the old addage of "no flow no go" definatly plays a part in my decision to fish a deepwater spot. When fishing a large lake this can be an issue as the amount of flow is going to be minimmal so this doesn't play such a large role in that situation.
Now the important part - TACKLE. with the amount of tackle options out there on the bream scene these days, this can lead to many headaches so keep things simple. I like to use a rod of around 7' in length matched to a 2000 size reel spooled with 4 or 6 lb platypus braid leading to a 8lb Platypus stealth leader. When choosing my lures I like to have 3 main patterns in my arsenal and the DAMIKI range is just perfect for this. I will have a rod rigged with a DAMIKI VAULT 35 (the larger vaults will also be perfect for targeting these fish), another with a DAMIKI WOW GRUB and a third with a DAMIKI 4" BING.
With the Vault the intense vibration seems to attract nearby feeding fish as they hit with gusto. The great thing about these Vaults is that they can be fished many different ways. The slightest movement of the rod tip with have them swimming and vibrating just they way you want. The added weight of a blade lure allows constant contact in deepwater and the conversion rate of hits on the Vault with W hooks attached is second to none. the Vault also allows long searching casts to be slowly retrieved across the bottom.
The WOW grub is an awesome soft plastic and is effective in any and every scenario I have tried it in. With fishing the WOW grub for deepwater bream I find a slow hop pause hop technique to be the most effective. The cupped mouth of the lure pushes through the water whilst the sensitive tail works with the slightest movement. A lot of the time with a strong current flow the Bream will pick the WOW grub off the bottom as it is motionless except for the tail working in the Current. Definatly a must have for anyone wanting consistant results fishing the deepwater.
Last but definatly not least on my list of deepwater winter lures is the BING 4'. A hollow minnow profile soft plastic with large 3D eyes. These lures are just brilliant. the tiniest movement of the rod tip has these lures dancing across the reef. If fishing an active area these lures can be twitched and hopped along to look like a fleeing baitfish. My preferance with the BING 4' is to fish it slowly. By this I mean I will let it sit on the bottom for up to 15 seconds before i give the rod tip a flick which springs the BING of the bottom with the tail flicking behind it before resting back on the bootom. The Lure is a very soft and strong plastic that is very very strong. this allows the lure to move like nothing I have seen before.
I have found this to be a BIG bream lure and is definatly the lure I go to when targeting XOS fish. LIke the WOW grub a lot of bream will pick it up off the bottom but also once any movement is imparted in the lure and the tail starts dancing, the Bream don't give it much of a chance to get away.
There are many other Brilliant DAMIKI lures that can be used to target deepwater bream but these are my faves. I hope there is something here that helps you out and we look forward to hearing any success stories you may have using DAMIKI Lures.
Happy Fishing,
Mitch McGovern
