{{start}}

These soft plastics were inspired by a white soft plastics that I was given in late 2019.

It turned out that soft plastic was called a "Hammer" and unfortunately they became unavailable in the early days of Covid 19.

Not to be daunted by that, I went about making my own open/top mould of that hammer so I could make my own variants of that original Hammer. That process has had many iterations and progressively developed into a reasonable facsimile of that original hammer. There are two major difference to the original Hammer which I was given. The first is that the tail has a much tighter angle to the body ... that variation was on purpose and helps the Hammer Variant to swim better than the original at slow speeds and the second variant is that a glass rattle is incorporated across the tail as an attractant to barramundi.

As well as a very active tail with a rattle the Hammer Variant has a good shoulder roll and to capitalize on that I generally make them two or three tones with the darkest on the back and the lightest on the belly. With the dramatic shoulder roll the light and dark tones are highlighted as the shoulder roll sways the whole lure from side to side making them very visible to barramundi.

The four colour combinations I have settled on are:

 

GOLD PROSPECTOR: This is a great option for daytime fishing and has a pale gold body which is laced with 0.03mm gold hex fleck tinsel. The back is loaded with black 0.3mm shredded tinsel mixed throughout and black 0.03mm hex tinsel tinsel is sprinkled on top. Eye colour is red with black pupils.

 

NIGHT
 

QANTAS COLOURS: Are arguably the most successful colour combination for barramundi hard bodied lures in Queensland fresh and salt waters. I have also had a lot of success with red and white flies around Gladstone. Given those past successes it's no surprise that one of the first colours I made my Alpha Gar soft plastic in is Qantas colours and that is my goto colour for night time fishing and a strong option in murky and discoloured water in both fresh or salt water fisheries. The belly is a solid white and the back is solid red and the eyes are red with black pupils.

 

TWILIGHTThese are my goto soft plastics for dirty water, last light and first light and tidal colour changes.

 

GUNS AND ROSES: No surprise here this Alpha Gar is dressed in "Guns and Roses" colours of red for the head and belly, yellow for the rest of the body and green laced with green 0.3mm shred strip for the back then the whole soft plastic has a sprinkle of gold.

 

Green over chartreuse: Not quite as lairy as the Guns and Roses soft plastic above bur sill a great option the soft plastic has a chartreuse body and a green back laced with green 0.3mm shred flex.

 

 

At 8.5 inches (21cm long) my Hammer Variant is the biggest soft plastic that I carry.

I rig these on either #8/0 TT Warhead hooks or Mustard Big Game Jig Head hooks in #10/0 or 12/0 sizes. I also dress My Hammer with a willow blade under the head and comes in at around 50g when rigged.

With hook weights ranging from 1/4 to 1/2 an ounce they can be fished at various depths and speeds but mostly I rig my Hammer Variant on 3/8 ounce jig hooks.

These big soft plastics are generally fished on a leader that incorporates a stinger hook which is a 5/0 Mustard or Gamakatsu live bait hook that is snelled directly in front of the lure to increase the hook up rate.

ADDING A STINGER HOOK

NIGHT TIME LEADER SET - LEADER TO STINGER TO LURE CLIP

HOW I TIE AN FG KNOT

MAKE A SOFT PLASTIC CATCH A BARRA

The 5 barra above are all over a meter and have been caught in Lake Awoonga over the last 5 weeks on soft plastics that I rigged up in my own very personal way on soft plastics I poured myself in mould designs I finessed and made myself.

{{end}}