Episode 269: Connors River Saratoga With Andrew Trigg

Triggy’s Top Saratoga Fishing Tips

• Google Earth is your friend. Shallow areas are fine for sooty grunter, but stick to the bigger, deeper water for saratoga fishing. Look for big reaches or large, isolated pools with laydowns, lilies and weedbeds.
• Saratoga can be caught at any time of day, but Triggy likes topwater fishing for them, which is best when the sun is on the water. Given high banks in those parts, the sun is often only on the water surface from 11am until 3 pm.
• Sunny, clear skies, no wind and warm, clear water are the recipe for a hot toga bite. Once the rains come and the rivers flood, forget it.
• The trick is not to cast the lure onto the fish’s head, which will certainly spook it. Instead, land it within 1 to 1.5 m of where you see the fish cruising – even if you can only land the lure behind the fish, it will often turn to come back.
• Having sticky hooks is critical, saratoga are notorious for missed strikes and for throwing hooks. Triggy recommends waiting for a second or two after the lure is taken before setting the hook.
• Cast from well back and try not to reveal yourself to the fish. If you can’t see fish cruising or the conditions are tough, it’s worth firing out some long casts and just working them across the pool, especially in the vicinity of big timber.
• A saratoga that hits a lure but doesn’t hook up will usually have another crack if it hasn’t felt the hooks, so be sure to fire another cast out after it.

Triggy’s Toga Fishing Tackle

• A light, graphite spin rod in the 1-3kg line class with a 1000 to 2500 size reel, 10lb braid and a 30lb leader will do the trick.

Triggy’s Best Saratoga Fishing Lures

• The Rapala Skitterpop has been an especially productive saratoga lure for Triggy. Cast the lure within 1.5m of a cruising fish and wait….. often the fish will take the stationary lure with no further action, the ripple created by the landing lure is enough. If not, work the lure in short pops of a few centimetres at a time, with long pauses in between. Sometimes the fish will follow a long for a long distance, just beneath the lure – keep working it when this happens, don’t be tempted to speed the lure up or create extra splash as it will only spook the fish. Triggy will usually start with this lure because it can be worked very slowly and kept in the zone for a long time.
• The Lucky Craft G Splash is a very productive walk the dog style lure that Triggy will use if the fish are not taking the Skitterpop. Once again, cast close to the fish and wait to see if it will nail the stationary lure. If not, work the lure back gently with a walk the dog action. Rinse and repeat.
• A 5” Berkley Gulp Shad soft plastic might seem a bit large for saratoga, but they’ll often take them with gusto. Triggy likes his topwater, so he only uses this lure if all else has failed and conditions are bad. He’ll use it to take one fish and then go home! This lure is best fished on a 3/0 hook with a 1/8 oz jig head and counted down in deep water near a laydown. It’s then simply slow rolled back. It’s usually not necessary to set hooks, the fish will usually smash the lure and be hooked.