SHORT BUS TIP #6 HYBRID BOW ROD OLD DRUM RIG

[BTH284]

8 years ago I started the addiction of old drum fishing in the carolina dirty waters. Ever since that first day two of my old drum mentors Extreme and Capt "O" have kept me driven to catch more old drum and always keep these fish delicately handled to assure that the old breeders come back year after year to do their duty in the dirty water and breed for the next generation.

I have been improving every year with catch and proper hooking then release of of these fish thanks to the magik style drum rig that Capt "O" developed and sells that works great to properly hook and release these fish.

When I switched to fishing out of an aluminum skiff (not a good idea if you have ever seen these waters on a stiff NE blow or SW blow) to fishing out a center console I took notes on the Extreme man's bow rod system in order to add more rods to the spread on my boat. What we came up with was this.

That was 5 years ago. It worked like a champ at keeping all 4-6 of my bow rods tight to the bottom and with the wind and/or current keeping the pyramid sinker tight up against the coast-loc swivel. This allowed for less tangles, better hookups and more fish per trip by allowing more rods to fish with. It also allowed very few deep hookups of the old breeders on the bow rod setups. IE DEEP HOOKING to me = the hook became set farther down in the mouth but not in the throat "ballon looking knot" that all fish have. We had great success with this style rig out of the bow up until last 2 years. We started to notice that more and more fish were getting deep hooked. Our ratio was something like 10-12 fish out of every 100 were hooked like this.
SO.......................this is the next generation of the pyramid style rig that we came up with. I believe that Capt "O" also has one right similar to this that he sells so buy you one and check it out.

It still allows bow rods to be fished tight to the bottom and the wind and current maintaining ZERO tangles with the stern and gunnel rods plus it still gave us great hookup ratios on the bow rods. The main thing it has done for us and goal we were looking to achieve is put the deep hookups back to ZERO where they belong for these old drum thus allowing quick release. Our ratio in the 2008 season for every hundred fish caught was ZERO deep hookups. As long as it stays near that level I think that is acceptable.

Just heard through the grapevine that the circle hook rule is in effect in these waters from 7pm to 7am. and that anything bigger than a 4/0 hook has to be circles. I believe that also states that leader length has to be 6" or less. I could be wrong so feel free to correct me here.

Be sure you handle these fish with care when taking your first one out of the water for picture. USE BOTH HANDS, ONE ON THEIR JAW AND ONE UNDER THEIR BELLY. Do a search on here for EXTREME MEASURES OLD DRUM PICS AND HE DOES IT PERFECTLY. If you have never caught any of these I strongly suggest that you charter the Extreme Capt and let him put you on the pain! Otherwise try to leave these fish in the water when releasing. But be sure to keep an eye out for Mr Bull shark who may try and take a bite out the released fish or even you

[HOLWACHAGOT]

Nice post Brian. Thanks for taking the time to share. Now delete it before anyone sees it.
Holwachagot

[reel1321]

Try this link for a picture of the new rig requirement.
http://www.ncdmf.net/download/circlehookreddrum.pdf

[N2theBlue]

good looking rig man

[Bird Dog]

I'll have to give this a try. The rig I currently use is the one in the first picture. Thanks for the tip

[shunt]

Yo Brain,

Post up a picture of the pyramid rig made with only one crimp so they can see that variation also. You might also want to show one with a mashed down barb as I know you got to do a bunch of that!

[SeaMarie]

Yo Brain,

Post up a picture of the pyramid rig made with only one crimp so they can see that variation also. You might also want to show one with a mashed down barb as I know you got to do a bunch of that!

Good call there. We always mash down the barb big drum fishing. Makes it MUCH easier and quicker to release those big ones. Also, the occasional deep hook can be retrieved with a little less effort.

[shunt]

Great points....I was really trying to harass him. He is my "little" brother and we were talking last night about how we were going to have to mash a lot of barbs down on hooks over the next few weeks with the new regs requiring such.

The deal with single crimp is that you can make the "pyramid rig", as we call it, using only 1 sleeve/crimp. Just like the Lupton Rig in his first photo, but with the coastlock in the place where the egg sinker is.

Like Bryan suggests, if folks prefer to buy them, the best ones to get are the ones made by Owen Lupton himself, not the knockoffs/pirated ones from others.