shock leader failure

[keith basso]

recent popping in Palau revealed the tricky combination of trying to catch GT near drop offs and the toothy critters that like to occasionally crash the party (no complaint) from those darker depths...resulting in, more times that not (nearly all the times) 130lb non FC shock slicing like butter (tail?).

Knots held no problem. FG onto shock onto swivel to ring to popper....but 130 never even came close.....

Critters were big Spanish, a couple of big YFT and a couple of unknowns. Tons of sharks made getting GTs next to the boat very difficult as well including an oceanic showing up after a black tip had chomped my smaller Spanish....sight to see from 10 feet away.

But back to the problem....solutions? FC?

any ideas?

Help!

[Mark Harris]

Which mono shock leader were you using Keith? If using one of the soft and supple brands, you might be better off moving to a slightly harder mono.

I would say that 130 lb is light and just moving up to 150-200 will certainly help.

Fluorocarbon is of course much more abrasion resistant but I am never brave (or foolhardy?) enough to try to tie an FG or other friction knot to fluoro.

Another option would be to move to using twisted leaders.  I am not a fan of those but plenty of excellent anglers here are.

[Jon Li]

With toothy critters like narrow barred mackerel , only wire will work but on YFT , thick FC bite leader > 250 lbs. will work but against GT around the reef sharp edges , use No Line Out technique , just my opinion .

Jon .