Bluefish, poppers, and plugs

[Even Steven]

Howdy,
I enjoy fish that give a fight from the surf. Some folks dont see the excitement of catch and release slammer blues, but I find it refreshing to hit these bullies hard. However, they often hit back fairly hard, and I cant help but lose lures now and then as my line gets chomped to bits :(

I fish with a teaser setup and like to use popper and plugs for these toothy fiends. How can I minimize damage to my line and / or lures? I relaize there is no guarantee when it comes to fishing, but I never tried wire leader because I figured it would affect the swimming of my deceiver and plug. Should I be using it?

Generally I use a 30# mono leader of 60 inches. Havent had many chew offs, (havent had many fish either), but how can I minimize damage without really affecting the work of the lures?


Steve

[fishin'girl422]

from my very little experience in fishing the OC inlet with plugs, I would have to say there is nothing you can do to minimize damage to the actual lures themselves with blue fish, the only thing you can really do to prevent chew offs is to use a heavier pound test or wire leaders.

I have never fished there with wire leaders, but one night we hit a run of blues, every other cast we were getting a hit, I didn't have any chew offs that night, but I believe I was running the lures on a heavier leader like I do for surf fishing. Run like a 4 - 6 inch leader of 50 or 80 lb test to a swivel

please someone correct me if I am wrong, but that's what I have had luck with

[Even Steven]

Could I use wire as the 4-6" leader you suggested? Will this affect the swimability of the lure?

Thanks,
Steve

[Steve]

Try both and see wht you feel works best.
If you use wire, try 30#.
For mono, like FG said above, I'd go with 80#.

I prefer wire, more limber than the heavy mono.