FIGHTING DIRTY: BIG KING TACTICS

It’s well established that big kings fight dirty. In fact they’re probably one of the most intelligent and cunning species that anglers can come up against in our wonderful country. On top of this they’re extremely powerful to tame so the odds are well and truly stacked against the angler before a fish has even been hooked. I vividly recall a story of a mate who hooked a solid king on a surface popper alongside a lengthy breakwall. Instead of the fish slugging it out in the adjacent channel it decided to charge the breakwall and began smashing its face into the large rocks in only a foot or two of water in an attempt to remove the lure from its mouth. Thankfully for the angler everything stayed connected but this sort of behaviour evidently highlighted the lengths that these fish will go to for a shot at freedom.

Another trip of ours further underlined the intelligence that these fish are capable of displaying. We hooked a solid fish in clear open water