Illustration 1: Electric reel setup through outrigger.
Illustration 2: 80 lb reel through outriggers.
Illustration 3: 80 lb reel through dredge boom.
54 • SKI-BOAT July/August 2018
assumptions we’ve been making can now be proved. Numerous videos show billfish rising up to an artificial dredge, slapping at it once and then going straight to a bait. So dredges raise billfish, but do they work in South Africa. Yes, definitely, as can be seen in the results from the past few tournaments where the top boats were all pulling dredges. In the last OET the top two boats were both pulling dredges — Hotline pulling a Pulsator dredge and Jean Mari pulling a Squidnation dredge — and they raised most of the billfish behind the dredges. I asked Jean Mari’s skipper Japie Kleinhans and crew member Nick Nel whether the dredges worked and Japie replied, “For sure! We raised billfish every day except the f*?#! day my crew left the dredge on the side!” With all that said and done, figuring out how you pull a dredge from a skiboat was the next challenge. “We don’t have that type of boat,” is usually the first answer you get when suggesting that skippers try dredges. Wrong. You can easily rig a complete electric dredge reel from a ski-boat (see picture4 and illustration 1). If you don’t want to invest in an electric reel use an old 80 lb setup that would work just as well (see illustration 2). In both the electric reel and 80 lb reel setups the dredge is run from the outrigger with a snatch pulley system. The reason for this is the speed at which you can retrieve the dredge and the reduced strain that is put on the reel when you retrieve the dredge. If you feel your riggers are not strong enough for this setup you can use a dredge boom (see picture 5 and illustration 3). This is an independent boom that can be placed in your standard 30 degree rod holder in the gunnel of the boat. This will take the dredge out to the desired position without straining your riggers. The setup uses the same snatch pulley system as shown before. Set up from the pulley to the dredge is the same for all the above mentioned systems. Spool the reel with 300- to 500 lb mono as the dredges create a large drag through the water. Place a screw swivel or snap-on swivel of at least 500 lb between the mono and the dredge weight. Then make up a cable around 500mm long, from 800 lb stainless cable, with at least a 500 lb swivel on either end to link between the dredge and the dredge weight (see picture 1). Always inspect the swivel and the cable before you put the dredge in the water as 90% of dredges are lost between the weight and the dredge due to swivel failure. You should now have a successful dredge fishing setup.