Rigged squid deep-drop bait
A rigged squid deep-drop bait is a big bait fished on the bottom in water deeper than most boats ever fish. At 64-160 oz on a circle hook it wants a rod that is as stiff as rods get and bends through its middle, printed as extra-heavy. The standard bait for daytime swordfish, where the fish are near the bottom in deep water and nothing shallower reaches them.
A whole squid sewn onto a circle hook and lowered on a leader beneath several pounds of lead, usually with a light attached above it. The lead is not incidental. It is most of what the rod is holding, and it is the reason no casting rod appears anywhere near this bait. The bait has to stay intact under drag for the length of a drift in deep water, which is why it is stitched on and not simply hooked.
How to Fish It
Lower it under thumb control until it reaches bottom. Take up a set amount of line to hold it just above. Let the drift carry it, and watch the tip for a slack-line change.
Rated for clear and stained water, because 8-14" of bait is found by sight and the water has to be clean enough for a fish to pick it out at distance.
1000-2000 ft is the band it fishes, and it does nothing worth doing shallower than that; below 2000 ft a different bait is the answer, because this one is absent and not merely slow.
It is sold 8-14", and length and weight move independently: that range is wide enough that its smallest and largest are different baits to fish.
When to Throw It
The standard bait for daytime swordfish, where the fish are near the bottom in deep water and nothing shallower reaches them.
Pointless on a short drift or in a hard current. The bait sweeps up off the bottom before it is ever near enough to a fish to be eaten.
Letting a Circle Hook Set
A circle hook — a point curved back to catch the jaw's corner as line tightens — is turned by the fish, not by the angler. Under 64-160 oz of bait it slides to the corner of the jaw and rotates there against a steady pull, so the rod is chosen for how evenly it holds a bend. Swinging at the bite pulls the hook out before it can turn.
64-160 oz rules a rod in or out before anything else does, and one profile here covers it: 5'6" extra-heavy, moderate action stand-up, whose card says what it is bad at.
5'6" extra-heavy, moderate action stand-up
- Length
- 5'6"
- Power
- extra-heavy
- Action
- moderate
- Casts
- 32-200 oz
- Line
- 80-200 lb
Nothing about this rod is about casting, so the usual questions do not apply. Its 32-200 oz window takes that weight without being at either end of it.
Cannot cast, and nothing under two pounds will bend it at all.
The One Fish It Catches
Swordfish
- Water
- saltwater
- Mouth
- hard
- Line floor
- 60 lb
Swordfish have to be lifted by the rod, not wound in, so the line under this bait starts at about 60 lb. A swordfish is caught in 1,500 to 2,000 feet of water, and that depth decides the tackle before anything else does.
Everything else this fish is caught on is on its lures page. This bait is one entry there, and not always the first one to try.
The Method It Belongs To
Deep Drop
- Where it sits
- vertical
- Power
- extra-heavy
- Action
- moderate or moderate-fast
- Difficulty
- advanced
A short, extra-heavy rod keeps the weight close to the angler and lifts against several pounds of lead and drag without the tip folding.
Swinging to set a circle hook, which pulls the hook out of the corner of the jaw instead of into it.
Where This Decision Goes Next
Deep-drop jig
Fished the same way in clear water at 16-48 oz. The swap to make when the water changes, not when the plan does.
Find a rod that throws a rigged squid deep-drop bait
Five questions, four of them skippable. Answer them and you get the rods that cast this weight for the fish you are after — or, if you name a rod you own, whether it is one of them.