Just back from Australia where it was 8 days of casting lures at mangrove roots and barnacle encrusted drowned trees. When a barramundi hit, the goal (as always) is to drag that sucker into reasonably open water and then hang on. In trying to think about salmon and steelhead-relevant lessons learned, drag settings head the list.

I hooked two fish-of-a-lifetime in barramundi terms -- bonafide 30lbers -- and landed neither. The first hit in relatively open water, jumped and then headed for a snag pile 100' away. I was using 14lb Fireline and a locked up Chronarch drag (I mean LOCKED)on a musky rod. The line was blistering off the reel, so I thumbed it (losing my fingerprint in the process). The sow (the big barra are all females) pulled up 3' short of the barnacle covered brush and rolled. The guide gunned the engine and we dragged the fish 30' out into the river. It was looking good for the home team. I remembered the adage "If the fish isn't taking line out then you should be putting line on the reel" and gave it a down low pump-and-wind, drag still on maximum choke. The fish's response, not surprisingly, was to pull back and swim in an arc against the drag. She cut me off on a submerged oyster or barnacle.

The second one was a shorter battle with an even bigger fish. Hooked her in a tributary 50 yards from the main stem. This barra was so big she couldn't get more than half way out of the water, then roared off for the main river. As it turned out, this is where I wanted her to go as it's deeper and has fewer snags. Again, there was so much drag that I managed to stop the fish while the guide was pulling up the anchor. She turned and swam back at me, and with minimum leverage there was nothing much I could do when she buried me in the brush pile from whence she came.

The Board has dealt before with the lighter drag technique for keeping big steelhead in the same pool. I've successfully "walked" big fish back up stream under light to moderate pressure before putting the screws to them again. If I had to do over again with both fish, I would have backed off the drag setting when each was clear of the immediate snags. This comes with its own risks (starting with the flesh on your thumb: that Fireline really hurts), but my conversion ratio on the over 20lber's was dismal so anything would be an improvement.

The good news is that my partner and I hooked more big barramundi than the guides had ever seen done. We took the view that if you don't hook 'em, you can't land 'em, and threw our plugs into the middle of some of the worst snags in history. The fish were there but getting out anything bigger than about 12-13lbs proved impossible. One day I lost seven lures to fish. But what an adrenaline rush to pull up to patch of flooded forest, spot a casting alley and throw the Mann's Stretch 15+ or similar back down it to its mortal peril. Most of the time the battles were like fistfights in a phone booth. Most of the time we lost, but victories were doubly satisfying. It ain't steelhead fishing but it's the 100 F next-best-thing!