Megabass Downunder

By John Cahill

I have always had a fascination for Japanese quality lures and especially the tackle brand Megabass.  Having been associated with Viva fishing Australia since 2011 as an associate rod tester for Lox and Mursame blanks, I was delighted to recently with the news a year or so ago that Viva were now the Megabass distributor in Australia.  Great news for me as a fan boy who now got to extensively play with the gear and expand my small role with Viva to be a Megabass field tester here in Australia especially in the growing Murray cod tackle market.  Using rods, reels and lures I have found that there are numerous products designed mostly around large swimbait fishing for North American large mouth and smallmouth bass that have a direct relevance to the Australian Murray cod.  We have been fishing the lures hard and enjoying success on some great existing products such as the Vatalion, Magdraft, Garuda and V9, I am sure one day soon I will invest more time in the I-Slide as well!  

 

There is a small team of guys all inputting, fishing the lures often, trying them in different situations and conditions and we regularly give feedback to Nick Bailey at Viva and Megabass Japan with ideas on what we think could be good concepts for improvements or even new models.  It's been a worthwhile process with Japan taking notice.  The Murray cod scene is a tiny market globally, but it is recognized as important.  Recently at the AFTA trade show in Queensland, two Megabass executives came for a look, bringing with them some new toys including a lure in the latter stage of development, the BIG M. 

 Following the show, there was a small window of opportunity which allowed Nick and I to show Naoki Haruta and Kiyoshi Sugiura (lure designer who works with Megabass founder and design genius Yuki ITO) a little bit about cod fishing, a 24 hour hit and run mission to Victoria's Lake Eildon was on the cards.  Whilst the goal was to show the guys what cod fishing was basically about, it was of course in the front of our minds that we wanted to show them a fish, so our 'A' grade spots were rolled out.  Anyone who knows cod fishing in Eildon will know that producing fish on demand is just not a thing, so we definitely felt the pressure! As fortune would have it, we got lucky, or Nick was just good - nailing a stunning example of Eildon's potential; a fat 85 cm cod on Megabass Vatalion no less.  We look forward to what may flow from idea's at Megabass for our now famous fish.