Plastic Wrap: Angel Bait – Dan Kaggelis November 2015

As a North Queensland angler, I’ve had limited opportunity to target many of our iconic southern native species such as the Australian Bass and Murray Cod.  

Whilst I wouldn’t swap a bass or cod for a jack or barramundi any day, the one thing I am a little envious of in regards to this southern fishery is the range of tackle on offer.

The southern freshwater fishing scene has some of the coolest and weirdest soft plastic and hard body lures out there and it seems the more bling you can fit on a lure the better the results.

Having had the opportunity to fish with many southern anglers, I am always keen to get into their tackle boxes and play around with the latest spinner baits, hard bodies and plastics, as some of the designs and lure shapes and colours are quite incredible and really leave our regular go-to hard bodies and plastics to shame.

I’m just as keen to tie them on as our northern species such as barramundi and mangrove jack have never laid their eyes on them.

Sometimes this can lead to incredible success with certain lures proving to be simply sensational whilst others flop and sometimes even scare fish off due to their weird designs and actions.

Just recently I came across one particular soft plastic lure from New South Wales based lure company Insanity Tackle that really caught my eye.

Before I get into the ins and outs of this awesome softy, a little bit about its origins.   Insanity Tackle is owned and operated by Wayne Dubois who is widely known in the southern fishing scene as ‘Mr Freshwater’.

He is the holder of several Australian and NSW fishing records including overall length records for red fin, golden perch, rainbow trout, brown trout and brook trout.

He has won multiple tournaments and is regarded throughout the country as one of the best freshwater anglers in Australia.

It is clear that his passion for fishing is second to none and this is what drives his lure business- Insanity Tackle.

Insanity Tackle is all about lure innovation and creating new unseen designs to help anglers fool pressured fish and his Angel Bait soft plastic fit that category perfectly.

Aptly named the Angel Bait, this soft plastic is one of the most strikingly beautiful soft plastics I have ever seen and it truly is a piece of fishing artwork.
Unlike many of our more common soft plastics, the Angel Bait is not just a soft plastic tail but comes as a complete package including jig head.

This is no ordinary jig head however and it contains some serious bling.

Starting with an elongated toe point, the jig head firstly consists of a plastic spinner with attached metal blades that spin in a circular motion when retrieved through the water.

When worked at a slow pace, the spinners flicker through the water similar to a spinner bait, but when you crank up the speed, you can get serious surface action as the circular motion tears up the top water.

Moving beyond the spinner is the jig head itself that has been masterfully painted and shaped with large realistic eyes which puts your average jig head to shame.

Next comes the inclusion of a two-tone plastic skirt that is fixed to the rear of the jig head creating a wog head style spinner bait effect.

This jig head looks so good you can fish it even without a plastic and it really is the Ferrari of jig heads in my books.

Now don’t think the terminal gear is lacking because the hooks used are designed to handle some very big Murray cod and if you see how big these things can get, then there is no need to worry about bending or breaking on a metre plus barramundi.

Whilst the jig head is amazing, the plastic tail that makes up the back half of the Angel Bait is just as spectacular.

This soft plastic tail is built on a paddle tail design, however this is far from your ordinary paddle tail style plastic.

The plastic itself is super soft and gives the tail incredible flexibility that leads to an enormous amount of action through the water.

The key to a superior paddle tail is maximum tail action but just as important is the side to side roll and the Angel Bait has both of these in spades.

It doesn’t stop there as the ribbed body profile of the plastic creates some very realistic detail that mirrors our northern mullet bait species profile perfectly.

Now I’m well aware of the fact that lures often catch more fishermen than fish so I was a little sceptical of all the added colour, sparkles and bling but being a paddle tail fan, I was dead keen to see if they could perform in our northern waters.

I have to say I copped a bit of ribbing from my very unsupportive fishing crew when tying them on firstly because of how ‘pretty’ they looked and secondly because they came from south of the border.

However, the barrage of insults were short lived after a well-placed cast and a slow roll saw the skirted plastic slammed by a solid jack which had the Daiwa screaming in pain.

The Southern Sensation was off to a good start but would it fall apart like Paul Gallen in an Origin match or was it a one off victory like the 2014 Origin Series? The plastic still had to earn its stripes.

I’ve always been a sucker for red soft plastics especially when chasing jacks so I upped the ante and went with the red and black Angel Bait and this proved to be a very good move.

The skirted paddle tail had the jacks crawling all over it. What was truly incredible was the way they were striking the lure with head on attacks, smashing the spinning blades and skirt opposed to the tail swipes often associated with paddle tail plastics.

It got to the point where we couldn’t figure out whether the jacks wanted the tail or the blinged up jig head so I decided to just fish the jig head itself and see whether the skirted blade running jig head had enough to seal the deal.

Two jacks later, it was clear the added bling was certainly not all show and it had plenty of jack go! Not to say that the Angel Bait soft plastic tail was not as effective as I would certainly rate it as one of the best tails I have fished and if I could get one in a 6-inch pattern, this would be the first lure I would tie on in both Peter Faust and Tinaroo Dam.

The Angel Bait is truly a special soft plastic lure that is unique, innovative and certainly deserves one of those special spots in the tackle box.

As lure fishermen, we often reserve this category for hard body lures as plastics are far more disposal, however it is refreshing to see the soft plastic moving into this domain. If you are interested in checking out the Angel Bait check out the Insanity Tackle Facebook page or give Wayne a call on 0428 582 812.