The ledger rig is a great way of targeting Giant Trevally
(GT) and a variety of other unusual species in deeper water.
Ledger rigs are also an excellent all purpose reef
fishing rig which can be fished directly from a rod, or set and left to fish
like a longline.
In shallower water this drop-shot or dropline fishing rig
will catch snapper, tarakihi, kingfish, porae, red snapper, trumpeter, trevally
and grandfather hapuku.
Generally no more than three hooks are used when fishing
a ledger rig from a rod while up to 20 hooks can be set in very deep water
beside high underwater cliffs for deepwater species.
When left to fish the deep water rig is called a hapuku
dropper or dhan line. Deepwater Fishing
An example of a typical ledger rig is shown on the right.
Keep the traces shorter than half the distance between
hooks to avoid tangles.
All the knots you need to tie including tying a snell can
be found at my pages.
Hapuku, bass and bluenose can be found in depths ranging
from a few metres to 240 metres but are more abundant in the deeper water.
If fishing for these deep water species use only snelled
circle hooks from size 5/0 to 10/0.
Long strip baits are good for deep sea fishing as
generally the fish suck the whole bait into their large mouth.
Hapuku will take whole fish baits, whole squid, long strip
baits, crayfish and crabs.
Fish Hook Knots
It is important to use the correct fish hook knot when
tying fishing rigs
Again use a hook snell on circle hooks for this rig.
NOTE
Always snell hook to trace first, as you cannot snell
fishing rigs unless both ends of the trace are free
Articles comparing the catch rates for different fish
hook knots can be found here fishing knots snell v/s tied
I have set many 10 hook ledgers in the kelp overnight
around the Labuan Islands when I was fishing and caught many big snapper up to
12 kilograms doing so.
Surprisingly we also caught many good sized Red Snapper
& Ayer Budak along with the odd kingfish in very shallow water.
Many of these good fish were taken on the top hook which
was seldom more than three metres deep.
