McCubbin's Glow Jigs

Jigs, you either love or hate them. They have been around since Noah was a boy but seem to be showing no sign of abating with new patterns coming out all the time.

Modern jigs are a popular choice for many anglers and these days they are reinforced with tails of varying materials that give jigs extra action.

Jig can be fished on the surface by using either a cast or fast retrieve, or with floating material on the lead head. Other versions can be fished at varying depths, while the heavies go all the way to the bottom where the big fishes are waiting to be hauled up.

Jigs are dense and compact lures – heavy when compared to others of similar size. Thus there is little wind resistance making jigs the easiest and longest casting lure available. They have been about for a seriously long time, no one knows how long, nor do we know who the inventor was.

Earlier jigs were crudely fashioned from bone and shell and were the earliest forms of lures used by primitive man. At least we like to think so….

But jigs as we know them today evolved from the early 1940s when they were used by mostly saltwater fisherman. These anglers found jigs gave them the edge over fish when probing reef depths.

Jigs proved successful on a variety of fish reef species. Especially when casting into the wind with the old-style heavy lines the extra weight of the jig head certainly made life easier.

It wasn't until the end of World War 2 that the popularity of smaller fishing tackle enabled anglers to use scaled down versions of jigs.

It was spinning and baitcasting gear that started the widespread use of jigging. Soon there were jigs of all shapes and sizes in tackle shops suited to a wide variety of fishers. Compared to spinning and minnow style lures, jigs are cheap and their simplicity, coupled to fish-catching ability, makes them attractive. In some waters they are more effective than anything other than dead/live baits.

By its design the lead jig head is very efficient in hooking fish, or when pulled through thick snags as it largely avoids hooking is in the best possible position to hook a fish when it strikes. The same feature allows the jig to be bounced off the bottom – whether rocks, mud or sand – with impunity whilst other lures with down-riding single or treble hooks snag.

Less Snag Time:

Fishers that fish with jigs claim more time fishing and less time un0snagging. If you are of the school that believes that jig is the most cost-effective and productive lure available you won't get too many arguments. Cost is always a factor when shopping and the current range of jigs in all their various applications is proof as for the price of a single hard-bodies lure you can buy half-a-dozen assorted jigs.

If you make your jigs heads it's even cheaper. What it all boils down too is that you can own and carry more jig lures than other styles in an assortment of colours, sizes and forms to meet changing fishing conditions in the field – providing you don't get a hernia carrying all that lead in the tackle box.

With jigs you will be game enough to fish rough spots that eat expensive minnow lures for dinner. Thus you will be more likely to fish in places where fish hang out rather than in that clear sandy spot downstream from the snags. And while most jig anglers do make reasonable attempts to free a snagged lure; they have no hesitation in breaking the line if they have to. Yes, jigs are simple, cheap things that some anglers claim will do everything a hard-bodies lure will and while I won't go along with that, the crux of the matter is if you do not fish with jigs it is about time that you gave them a go.

Jig Heads.

The lump of lead that makes up the jig lure weight and head encases the hook. This is perhaps the only failure of a jig. When the hook is damaged the jig has completed its mission in life. Jig heads are not expensive and last for some time, the only thing that is generally damaged is the body material like those from soft lures for example. The tail gets bitten off by a toothy critter and you need to strip another body on it. In most case the head is coloured which is an added attractor to fish.

In the 1970s, I fished with Doug McCubbin a bit. He was the manager of Leyland Motors in Mount lsa and a very keen fisherman. We spend some quality time fishing the Gregory River and Lawn Hill Creek in the Gulf country.

I also bought a Series 3 Land Rover off Doug. I lost touch with him but recently got a phone call and he is happily retired on the Sunshine Coast north of Brisbane. Though like some retirees Doug has a cottage industry hobby. He makes jig heads in a variety of sizes and colours and also sinkers. The jigs heads resemble similar heads, until it gets dark and when the lights go out they glow with a luminosity intensity that has to be seen to be believed.

This luminosity makes Doug's jigs easy to find in the tackle box on a dark moonless night, but more importantly attracts fish – as I discovered when fishing a narrow causeway during an incoming tide at Dinah Island north of Karumba. I have some minnow-style lures that glow and they are wonderful fish catchers.

McCubbin's Glow jig heads do a similar job and I had more strikes and caught more barra and threadfin salmon on soft rubber and threadfin salmon on soft rubber bodies fitted on the glowing heads than all other lures I used that night.

If you haven't tried fishing with jigs, especially with glowing heads, give Doug a call and try them next time you are out fishing at night whether in Tinaroo Dam for giant barramundi or flathead on an isolated beach. Life is full of surprises and jigs make it even more interesting.