Chatto's Grub tail prawn - open/top pour soft plastic

FIRST PUBLISHED:(3 October 2022)
 

This is a hybrid of two very different types of lures … a prawn imitation and a grub tail soft plastic.

Both those types of lures have their place but I have to say that this combination, my grub tail prawn, has earned a place in my tackle box as a favourite when targeting scroungers such as, fingermark, grunter and flathead as well as pelagics such as trevally and queenfish.
 

The key features of my grub tail prawn are:

• Realistic durable plastic eyes that are molded permanently into the body.
• The six legs are located under the grub tail prawn in much the same location as the main legs of a natural prawn and each leg is split at 90 degrees to the body. The front half of each leg is a little shorter than the other half of the same leg so with any movement the current created by that movement separates each leg into two parts in a very enticing way.
• The grub tail is quite long and thin and consequently imparts a great trigger point to attracts target species.
• Two rostrum on the head of the lure are important also as they partly camouflage the connection of the leader to the lure.

Colors I make the Grub Tail prawn in:

• Black with gold external fleck
• Gold with black fleck
• Pink with white external fleck
• Lime/chartreuse with gold fleck
• White

 

Rigging the Grub Tail Prawn.

I watched grub tail prawns swim with all sorts of set ups and the two below are the ones I have chosen as the best way to set them up.
 

• Loaded on a #6/0 weighted TT jig hook works really well and is my most common rigging technique. The best technique when fishing these weighted jig heads is to cast to where you think fish are holding and then hop the bait back to you with pauses of up to 5 seconds between each hop and then do a slow lift before re-casting.

  3/8 and 1/2 ounce jig heads are my preferred weights foe this technique because they get the bait down to the bottom quickly and help me keep in contact with the bait throughout the retrieve.

 

• Rigging the grub prawn weedless is a great option when fishing into mangroves and other structure. My two favourite weedless hook set ups are on the 6/0 Owner twistlock unweighted hook and on the 6/0 Owner twistlock weighted hook. The unweighted set up is best for very shallow water or when fishing deep into shallow water around mangrove. In that situation cast the unweighted bait to where you think target fish are lurking, let the bait sink for just a second or two and the hop the bait forward. Then repeat the process back to you remembering to do a slow lift after the final hop. Fishing the weighted weedless hook is a similar process but with increased pauses / sink times. In either case the low center of gravity makes the grub tail prawn swim well.

 

• For dirty water or night presentations a further option is to set them up on a #6/0 Owner flashy swimmer system. The Owner Flashy Swimmer set up is relatively weedless and snag-less. The flashy swimmer can be either hopped back to you or brought back on a slow roll. In either case the inclusion of the willow blade makes the bait more visible and the flashy swimmer is quite noisy which helps fish to hone in on the bait.