Starting out with soft plastics for smaller fish doesn't need to be complicated or require fancy gear and jargon. It's a straightforward and efficient way to fish. However, there are a few basics that can help you get started and catch fish more quickly.
One of the most important pieces of equipment for success with soft plastics isn't just the Squidgies you have tied on, but also the delivery system you're using to fish your Squidgies. Using the right outfit is crucial when flicking around smaller soft plastics and lighter jigheads, requiring more finesse for species like bream, whiting, flathead, and others.
Putting together a light soft plastic outfit, roughly in the 2-4kg weight range, should focus on creating a balanced combo that's lightweight for long casting sessions. The outfit should enable lengthy and accurate casts, provide responsive hook setting, and allow you to impart subtle movements on your lure as needed. There's no room for cumbersome, unresponsive outfits in this type of fishing!
ROD SELECTION
Starting with rod selection for your light soft plastics outfit, there's a general thought process that you ideally want a responsive, crisp tipped rod for this fishing. By 'crisp' we mean a rod with a relatively fast action /stiff tip section. Give a rod a shake and look at the tip, if it's still wobbling around like a bowl full of jelly after a second or two then it's probably not ideal for twitching tiny plastics around.
Graphite rods, more so than 'glass, or 'glass composite rods, tend to have a desirable action for this fishing. Having a responsive tip section to your rod will let you effortlessly twitch your soft plastics and set hooks when your lure is sucked down.
A rod length of 6'6" to 7ft plus in a one or two piece configuration will be ample to give you the ability to make long casts, and work your lure with subtle bite triggering movements. A line rating of 2kg or more is a fine place to start, and if you need more stopping power bump this up a notch or two.
Shimano have plenty of entry level rod models that have all these attributes and more, through to top end alternatives. Something like a Shimano Raider would be a great place to start, while the extra investment in a finesse Shimano Zodias for example will see you with a fish catching weapon in your hands!
REEL AND LINE SELECTION
When it comes to reels for a light soft plastic outfit, generally a 1000 to 2500 threadline / eggbeater style option is preferred for this job, where large line loads aren't required and you're mostly fishing a line class from 2kg up to say 3 or 4kg. A 150 metre shot of braid like Kairiki 8+ will land most light tackle species, fished on a shallow spool reel. This said you could step up to a deeper spooled 2500 threadline for instance if you want extra capacity if larger fish are possible targets or bycatch - no one likes to get spooled!
Take your time filling up your reel to ensure you have a full spool of braid on it. Using a short length of mono backing will pad out the spool nicely and get the braid right to the rim of the spool. A well filled reel will cast a whole lot better than one that's under filled and provide improved casting accuracy also for presenting lures to snags or visible fish.
LEADER & JOINING KNOTS
With your shiny new soft plastic combo full of braid it's time to attach a leader to your mainline. There's a range of line to leader knots to consider, from the Albright to FG, and a bunch in between that can be adapted to the lighter leaders and mainlines in use here. The key being slim knots that will run effortlessly through the small rod runners used, and not take too much wear with repetitive casting.
A decent rod length of EX Fluoro Ocea Leader attached to your mainline in a suitable strength, with 2-3kg for bream and whiting, and 6-10kg for flathead, school jew and smaller snapper, and your favourite jighead and Squidgies plastic on the end, and you're all set to get flicking. Some seriously addictive and productive fishing awaits - good luck!