After several months of field testing the Prism Murrin range on Murray cod and golden perch in my local waterways I had become totally convinced of there unbelievable fish catching abilities and was keen to test them out not only on new waters but in a tournament situation as well. The time had come after deciding to take the plunge and make the 8 1/2 hours drive from Batlow to Timberlake for the first running of the Timberlake Legends tournament. When I finally arrival at the lake I was greeted with what I’d hoped to see, a very shallow and snaggy dam, perfect Prism Murrin water.
The reason I say that is that over the months of field testing the Prism Murrins on my own local waterways, I found that these lures worked better then any other lipless crank bait on the market in shallow water applications. So as I was being told at the briefing that Timberlake is no more then seven metres deep in its deepest point and on average is only around three metres deep, I was getting very toey to see if Timberlakes resident green fish loved the Prism Murrins as much as the ones from my local waterways do.
MY OBSERVATIONS
The Prism Murrins have a much slower sink rate then the more well known, more expensive lipless crank baits on the market which seem to just nose dive straight to the bottom with no action at all much like a sinking rock. The super slow sink rate of the Prism Murrins really helps to entice more strikes from fish especially those that are holding tight to cover. As we all know the longer a lure is in a fish’s territory or presence the more likely it is to be belted either out of hunger or territorial aggression. I also found that the Prism Murrins had an erratic almost side to side sink action on the drop much like a dying, wounded or struggling fish. This amazing sinking action also plays a big part in the exceptional amount of hits you seem to get with these lures in free fall.
Obviously being lighter then most other lipless crank baits on the market they allow for a much slower presentation rate which means that they don’t require such a fast retrieve to get the lure to work affectively and this is why I say that these lures work there best in shallow water. Other scenarios that I have found them to be unbelievably deadly is when they are slowly rolled along the edges of willow trees and thick weed beds for shadow hugging Murray cod and golden perch.
When I say that these lures work there best in shallow water scenarios I certainly don’t mean that they don’t work in deeper situations as I have still caught a lot of fish in what most people would call really deep water. When your targeting fish in deep water all that is required is a little more patience to allow the lure to slowly flutter to the bottom but this is not necessarily a bad thing as this will give the fish much more time to see your lure which will in tern give you more of a chance of enticing the fish to strike. When you’re chasing Murray cod and golden perch you very rarely need to fish deeper then around twelve metres anyway which makes the Prism Murrins close to perfect lure for targeting these fish species anywhere, any time.
CAN’T BEAT ‘EM, JOIN ‘EM
There was quite a few spinner bait manufacturers fishing in the Legends tournament and as the field of competitors where rigging there rods in anticipation, there was a lot of friendly sledging going on between the fellow competitors as to who’s spinner baits where going to work best. I knew that spinner baits would work in this dam but after already having a plan of attack I decided to stick with it and proceeded to tie on the #3 sized Prism Murrins.
Hoot the siren sounded for the beginning of the first session and off we all went to our preferred fishing destinations. A fellow competitor who had decided to troll for most of the tournament was rewarded almost instantly with a nice little Murray cod, not far from where I was fishing. I put a cast out and as I was waiting for the lure to reach the bottom I started to congratulate him on his nice fish but only got half way through congratulating him when my Prism Murrin was belted by a nice Murray cod. After a couple of minutes battle a lovely 65 centimetre Murray cod was quickly measured then released. These fish must be really going off I thought as I put my next cast in. Boof the lure was hit on the drop in mid water by what felt like a big cod but surprisingly after a quick but dirty fight a small 57cm Murray cod was in the environet. What a start two fish inside the first 15 minutes, might have been a bit of a fluke I thought or maybe there just going off and everyone’s catching them. It didn’t take long to get the next fish in the net or the next or the next and we had five fish measured within the first hour and a half of the competition and all where caught casting with the Prism Murrins.
The thoughts I had earlier where soon answered when the majority of the anglers most of them fishless had not only moved to my location but had changed from there spinner baits to lipless crank baits. Due to the popularity and exposure the Jackall range gets most of the other competitors only had Doozers or TN70’s to use. Once the lure changes where made I noticed these anglers starting to catch a few fish but they just didn’t seem to be catching any where near the numbers we where catching on the Prism Murrins. I don’t know if it was the Prism Murrins slower action both in free fall and on the retrieve, there slightly different rattle, there awesome appearance with there red and black eyes or a combination of all of these things that was making all the difference.
TROLLING PRISMS
The area I was catching most of my fish from was now swamped with anglers casting lipless crank baits and I felt a change in location was needed. We decided to troll the Prism Murrins to our chosen destination as it is an electric only dam anyway. We didn’t get more then fifty metres closer to where we where going when one of our lures got smacked by yet another cod in the mid 50’s which was once again quickly measured and released by the marshals. I won’t go onto boar you with all the details of every fish we caught during the competition but it did not seem to matter whether we cast, jigged or trolled the Prism Murrins the Murray cod and golden perch that weekend just couldn’t get enough of them.
The one thing I would like to point out about my experiences trolling these lures for Murray cod is the fact that we catch far more fish by using the drag and drop technique. This simple technique consists of an almost constant dragging of the lure forward with your rod tip around a metre or so then you drop it back around the same distance. When you troll this way you must make sure to keep your line taught at all times as most of the hits I’ve found have been as you’re dropping your lure back, so make sure you don’t drop the lure back with loose line or you will miss a lot of hits.
The dragging forward action entices the fish up to inspect the noisy intruder but the dropping back into there faces part seems to be too much for them and this is normally when your lure gets smashed. We found using this technique that the majority of the fish had taken the lure well and truly into the back of there mouths making for very solid hook ups. This technique is my preferred way of trolling these lures for Murray cod but we have had plenty of experiences on my local waterways where we often run a second rod in a rod holder and just let the Prism Murrins do there thing and quite often the rod in the rod holder gets its fair share of the fish.
RESULTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES
