Mackerel

[Mike Murphey]

I live in Papau anew Guinea and use poppers for GT's and have lots of strikes from Mackerel with almost no hook ups,just bust the lure and send it flying and wondering why I don't get anything hooked up as the GT's are almost always a sure catch when striking the poppers-any help

[Andrew Susani]

When you add up the anatomy of a mackerel:

Fairly hard mouths
Relatively small mouth (for their size)
Super fast attacks
Lots of sharp teeth
Extremely low attention span   

then your problem makes a bit more sense 

I used to like catching them but after the frustrations of biteoffs from small fish and their crazy behaviour boatside, I don't much like them anymore!   

[Jon Li]

Small stickbaits with big single hooks will be more successfull in hooking the mackerels than poppers meant for GT .

I fish the other side of New Guinea island during certain times , the mackerels outnumber anything swimming in the sea adjacent to reefs .

Back off the drag too , a couple times the lures came shooting back toward us after unsuccessfull hook up due to blinding speed strikes .

Jon .

[Jon Viney]

We catch a few Kings on Stickbaits i must say they do hook up alot easier on small stick baits. Here are a few we caught over the last months.

[Trevor Skinner]

Ah, Alex's 'coutasaurus' in that last picture. Knew you had to include that beast 

[Titahi brown]

That last mackeral is impressive, Ive lost a few lures to em, yet to land one on a stickbait  

I have experienced them hit the lure from underneath, sky rocketing out of the water, often with the lure tantilising in front of snapping jaws.

[Jon Viney]

That last fish took the stickbait and the fish didnt even know it was hooked until on the boat. it didnt even fight. swam up to the boat and we gaffed it. Think it was just old.

[Trevor Skinner]

There's lots of fight left in us old fellas whippersnapper!

I reckon it took one look at Alex's tats and gave up

[chris leishman]

Hi Jon

Do you know how big that last mackerel was.  It certainly is a cracker.  I was fortunate enough to set the mens 10kg world record in 1994 at 43.15kgs so can appreciate a fish of that size.  Your description of the fight was fairly similar to the fish I caught, given its size.  We did not appreciate how big it was at the time until it suddenly appeared close to the boat ready to be gaffed.  We soon took it a little more serious.  While I have caught a bunch of mackerel on traditional lures/baits - no real big ones one stick baits/poppers - 15kg max.

Cheers Chris

[Trevor Skinner]

Chris,

I wasn't on the boat when Alex caught it but subsequently saw the fish. Probably 30-35kg erring on the upper side.

Regards,


Trevor

[Cameron Mundy]

Smaller slim profile stick baits with small (max 3/0 trebles) hooks deliver the best result for me, when they attack they generally hit side on and are aiming to chomp the bait off behind the head a fairly light drag setting is the way to go or you'll pull the lure out his mouth. That said I caught a 11 kilo "dart" on an I-cup with 10/0 decoys the other day.