Fishing with soft plastics can be an extremely rewarding or frustrating experience and the two extremes aren’t as far away from each other as they might seem, simply rigging plastics correctly and presenting them as intended are an important part of the puzzle! Our Black Label Livies Jerkshads represent up-to-the-minute design features and materials (why? Read this) so let’s ensure you get the best out of them! Read on for how we rig them onto a jig head.
Before you get started make sure you use the correct size hook and weight of your jig head. What weight you choose speaks mostly to sink rate and what depth you want to be able to fish your plastic relative to the speed of the current, wind, speed of drift, and depth are the physical factors along with how important it is (or isn’t) that you reach the bottom. In our experience, you will catch more fish if your jig head is a tad lighter and takes longer to reach depth compared to fishing too heavy and having an unnatural presentation that doesn’t get eaten. The second issue is the right-sized hook, generally a hook length that is 1/4 to 1/3the length of the soft plastic is optimum with some wriggle room on either side of that. We favor a shorter shank over a long one.
We start by first sitting the hook alongside the plastic, lining up the front of the lure with the back edge of the jig head, and looking at where the hook would optimally pierce through if rigged that way. That is the spot where you need to make sure the hook passes when we get to it! Now use the point of the hook to make a tiny nick in the top of the plastic at that point for reference.
Now identify the dead center of the front of the plastic. Take your time here and if you feel you are even the slightest bit off start again and get absolute center. Commence to push the jig head through the middle while holding the plastic still with the other hand, ignoring the plastic bunching up at the bend in the hook, concentrating on being straight and center.
Line up the point with the nick you made earlier and push the hook tip right through it, ensuring it passes right through the middle of the channel that’s molded in the top of the plastic. Now push the plastic all the way home over the keeper barbs so that it’s snug with the back of the jig head. Stretchy plastics require a big of muscling and a few attempts to get right where you need them to be
We have used the Catch The Harrier jig head in this demo which we love using and features are strong just like the hooks! Hydrodynamically designed to give soft baits more life, a UV paint coating, a second attachment point for alternate rigging options, and a super strong and sharp short shank 3/0 stainless steel hook – perfect for snapper and reefies.
