What this rig is all about:
Bottom fishing for grouper from a boat requires a relatively strong rig, uses heavy leader line, and strong hooks. Grouper are usually found in wrecks, structure, and rocks so a rig that minimizes your loss of gear and tackle is best to use since you will probably experience a few snags. Read on to learn how to make and use a simple fish finder rig that will minimize your loss of gear and maximize your chances of landing a keeper grouper as well as re-rigging convenience. Final product:
Here is a list of materials/items that you will need to make this rig:
Links include pricing info on Amazon and are the suggested products for this rig.
- 7/0-9/0 inline circle hook
- 60-70 pound braided main line
- 3 foot 50-60 pound mono leader line
- ~2 foot 80 pound mono shock leader line
- Barrel swivel
- Snap swivel
- Egg sinker (weight depends on depth and current of water)
Note: The line strengths are rated for general grouper fishing. Obviously, change the line strengths and tackle to accommodate for the size of the grouper that you are targeting.
Recommended rod and reel (conventional):
How to use this rig:
This rig allows for quick reset if it ever gets snagged in a wreck and you have to break off. Usually it will break at the leader line and what you can do for a quick turnaround, is have a bunch of the leader rigs tied up beforehand and then just switch them out when your break has been broken off.
For bait, you can use live bait like pinfish, grunt, pig fish, etc. when bottom fishing. Grouper are fairly aggressive fish so really whatever live bait that is around the size of your palm that you use for bait, the grouper will try and eat it. Live pinfish work really well. To efficiently catch pinfish, you can use one of these traps or a cast net.
Cut bait also works as well as squid. One tip is to cut the tail off of the cut bait so that when you’re dropping your rig down, the tail doesn’t cause any spin and subsequent tangling of your line especially with this rig since the hook is far from the sinker.
Setup guide:
- The first step is to connect the main braided line with your 80 pound shock leader line using an FG knot. This is a very strong connection and also has a very low profile. Please take a look at this video to make this knot:
- Cut the shock line to about 4-5 feet and feed the egg sinker through the line. After you tie the snap swivel on in the next step, the final length of the shock leader line should be roughly 2 feet.
- Tie the snap swivel onto the shock line. You can use your favorite secure knot here but I recommend a palomar knot:
- Now, let’s rig up the leader. Cut enough line so that after tying the hook and the barrel swivel on to each end, the resulting length is roughly 3 feet.
- Finally, snap the barrel swivel onto the snap swivel and this grouper rig setup is finished.
There’s a little bit of setup involved, especially with the FG knot, but this rig works very well! Go out there and test it out! Let me know if this rig is working for you and rate it at the top of this article.