Huge Australian Yellowfin Caught on Casted Popper

Kirt Kiggins story and product review:

9 years ago I started casting at yellowfin tuna off Sydney, Australia.
There were around 4 guys I had ever heard of casting at yellowfin off Sydney and due to the difficulty most guys that would see us casting off game boats would laugh at us .
18 years old with a dream to cast stickbaits (instead of troll the traditional way) at big tuna out of Australia , being so new , it was very hard to find any guys with the same motivation to cast . I landed my first ever Topwater yellowfin in 2011 on “orca “ which really opened my eyes to the potential of topwater yellowfin off Sydney.

99.9% of fishermen off here told me it wasn’t possible to cast big yellowfin tuna out of Sydney..
Myself and Luke Wyrstatravelled to USA to fish with Sami Ghandourout of North Carolina where after 5 days of blind casting and not seeing anything, everyone had lost hope.. on the last day I hooked a monster bluefin on topwater, however the fishes tail hit the line and snapped it!

What I seen in the moment was heart break , what I see now is fishing with Sammy and those guys changed my whole perspective of what is possible on topwater!

I was also inspired by Brendan Wing Jason Taylorand Luke wyrsta who casted at big bluefin in cape cod USA!

I created my company making stickbaits from what I’d seen work best for tuna all over the world, designed exactly for topwater tuna!

This season I seen one of the best bites ever to happen so I literally dropped everything I had on and for 3 months straight I have been watching sea surface charts , reports, weather windows , moon phases and tides .. I had made this bite my life.

At the start of the season, my brother sold his boat so I fished with lots of different friends and customers, most of the time with no sounder , radio and some boats with no gps .. I’ve been stuck out to sea 3 times just in this one season. A lot of people see that type of stuff as crazy , I believe deeply in faith and genuinely believe every single thing happens for a reason. From this I found a new level of focus and dedication.. last week I drove 34 hours in 3 days chasing tuna in south Australia. The day after I got back I fished 5 days straight. 10 hours days and 3 hours of driving just to have a chance at casting topwater yellowfin.

Since my recent run of success I’ve had an incredible amount of support that I’m truly grateful for!
I’ve also had some people not happy about my hard work paying off for me , even some of my best mates .. it’s honestly an embarrassment to see grown men in this industry so negative and filled with envy .. I am not one bit phased by these people yet I worry for the younger generation of fishing kids growing up to this!

Fishing for me is for fun and if I see anyone putting in time and being rewarded I’ll be so happy for you whether I know you or not !

Last week my brother Ben Kiggins and I took Luke Latty out to catch his first ever tuna ..
it was a rough morning with not many guys out at all as of the strong southerly wind. As we got to 120 fathoms we were greeted with insane bust ups on very large yellowfin , it blew my mind. First cast we got Luke his first ever yellowfin 50kg +. We landed it after 7 minutes and went back up to the bust ups where Ben casted a yellow fin right next to the boat, his biggest ever topwater yellowfin 65-68kg. We landed Bens fish in 45 minutes, a brutal fight on a GT popping rod.

We started driving back towards home when we spotted about 40-50 mutton birds flying so close to the surface. I asked my brother to get me in range for a shot even though we hadn’t seen any tuna, I just liked the way the birds were flying .. First cast, I hardly moved the lure. One of the biggest explosions I’ve ever seen by a yellowfin on my dramatic stickbait. The fish fought very hard. 1 hour in and it got me close to having no line left. We played it out and got the fish after a very testing 1 hour an 30 minute fight with no gimbal. We boated a very round yellowfin which ended up being the biggest yellowfin I have ever casted and possibly the biggest yellowfin tuna casted off Australia ! We were back at port Kembla boat ramp by 11am due to the wind.

Fish weighed 71.8kg

All fish Dramatic Lures stickbait !

Interestingly I caught both big fish I got this season on this exact lure .. might retire it now !

Thanks Jules Hattonwardphoto for the shot !