imfishn

Very courageous man indeed, well done on getting your lures back.

Monday night I decided to head out for a fish, so I packed my squid outfit and a soft plastics outfit for some tommies. I packed it into my bicycle bags and headed off to Glenelg jetty. Got to Glenelg about 7pm and fished for squid till last light, then switched over to soft plastics for tommies. No joy with the squid but plenty of tommies about for a feed and to stock up on bait for crab nets.
The jetty was pretty empty with only two other people, which was surprising because the conditions were excellent. Then about 10.30pm the wind started to pick up with increasingly strong gusts. Just after 11pm a really big gust came through and I turned to see my bicycle being blown over. All my gear was secure in the bike bags, except my box of squid jigs, which went over the edge of the jetty. There was no moon, so quite dark but with a torch I could see the box of jigs partially floating and heading out to see. Well, 10 quality jigs and the lure box sinking to the bottom was not something I was happy about, and I quickly said to myself "F*** it!", stripped off to my boxer shorts, climbed the railing and took the plunge into the inky brine. One of the other fishos shone a torch on the lure box and I swam out to get it, then back along the jetty and underneath to the opposite side to climb the ladder.
By this stage my heart my heart was pounding pretty hard, not from jumping in (I was a regular jetty jumper as a kid), not from the swim, but from the thoughts racing through my head. With no moon, it was bloody dark down in the water and the fear of the unknown lurking below certainly put me on edge as I swam back to the ladder.
Would I do it again? F*** yeah! I'm not letting $150+ of jigs and lure box get away that easy.

I've posted a couple of reports of local land based squid fishing and thought I'd give a run down of the rig I use.
So lets get the obvious out of the way, you don't need anything fancy to catch squid, and a handline with a jig will catch you squid. However, if you are land based fishing from popular metro spots, there are some upgrades that will increase your chances.
Rod
Number one item I would suggest is a long rod capable of flinging a jig a long distance. Every man and his dog will be covering the same area with their casts, but if you can cast further and search an area others can't reach, you might just hook into that big squid no one else has been able to tempt. My rod of choice is an 8'9" medium heavy Emeraldas. These are nice quality rods, good blanks, Fuji K guides and a good action for squidding. I've tried a 9' medium NS Black Water and a 8'3" medium light Atomic Arrowz egi rod. The Emeraldas has been the best all round in terms of quality materials, build quality and performance, however I feel the NS Black Water was a better rod in terms of performance (particularly for price), but the build quality lacked a bit (the rod joint was a little too lose). I wouldn't buy an Emeraldas if I was paying the local price of $250 for the entry level model and would opt for the NS Black Water instead. But I bought a rod built for the European market from OS for $165 landed.
Line
After the rod i think the next important part is the line. Again, I'm mainly interested in casting distance, so a quality 8 strand braid is the way to go. I'm using Platypus P8 0.14mm, Australian made and owned, and there is an Ebay seller who usually has it for a good price. When I bought it, the guy chucked in for free a small bottle of Line Butter line conditioner. For leader material I use 15lb Duel HD fluorocarbon. Ideally you would use a lighter mainline and leader for both better distance and sensitivity, but it's a trade off with strength for pull jigs out of snags.
Reel
The reel isn't too critical for squid fishing, it's basically just a winch for dragging in the squid. However you do want a reel that allows line to come off easily for long casts and also lays the line evenly on the spool when retrieving the line. It's hard to go past either Shimano or Daiwa. My reel is an Emeraldas LT 2500 double handle, not necessary, but I paid only $153 including shipping. The drag on the Emeralds is well suited to squid fishing, as it's nice and progressive, so you can easily dial in the drag for different jigs. When whipping the rod up to make the jig hop, ideally you want the drag set so gives a little so when you strike you don't lose the squid from ripping out the jig out or ripping off a tentacle.
Jigs
In my opinion, jigs are the least critical part of the set-up. You can spend a fortune on jigs, but I think it's more important to have a selection of reasonable quality jigs rather than just a couple of expensive jigs. Firstly you will definitely lose jigs to snags. Secondly, if you are not catching anything you might change your luck by changing your jig to a different color. Having several different coloured jigs should increase your chance of success when its slow (but you will also use the same jig 80% of the time and you only need a selection for the remaining 20% of time). I have lots of jigs (again bought cheap from OS or locally from Rui), different colours, different weight/sink rates). I've made a laminated cheat sheet for my tackle bag so I know which jig is which.
Terminal Tackle
Not critical. I like to use a quick change snap with a swivel so I can easily swap jigs. I'm currently using a snap swivel by Rui, but there are many other brands.
Occasionally I add chin sinkers if the current is strong and it's difficult to get the jig down deep. Strong wind can also make it difficult to get the jig down deep because it catches your line. You can use a small 00 ball sinker just above the snap swivel, but I'm currently using Nakajima sinkers which have a simple quick connect.

Did anyone receive a fishing related Fathers Day Gift?
My son (9 years old) gave me a selection of squid jigs. Amazingly they are all jigs I would have selected 😉. My wife knows I'm a hard person to buy gifts for, so we have a simple arrangement; I buy what I want and store items away in a cupboard, then whether its my birthday, Christmas, etc,. and people ask her what to buy me, she can just go to the cupboard and grab an item. It's a win win, she doesn't have to shop for me and I get what I really want 😀.
The jigs are a mix of rattle, UV, and different weights for different sink rates. There are 3 size 3.0 rattle jigs that are slow sinking, 6 sec/m, for some shallow rocky areas I fish. The Yamashita Egi  OH K is a really nice jig, extremely well made; it is UV reflective and has a little fin at the back to help it stay balanced when sinking. This is a pretty heavy jig for a size 3.5 at 22g (the Daiwa size 3.5 are 18.5g), and has a sink rate of 3sec/m so sinks twice as fast as the 3.0 type S by Daiwa.