Gift a lure into Killa mystery

A FEW months ago, I was gifted a beautiful timber lure – one that I believed to be a Killalure, yet something was not right.

A rare timber Killalure from the mid 1980s

A FEW months ago, I was gifted a beautiful timber lure – one that I believed to be a Killalure, yet something was not right.

I had never seen one looking like this. The eyes, the tow point and the hooks hangers were right, but something about the shape was unusual ...

Was it just a copy, or a very rare one?

I asked here and there if anyone had seen a similar lure but to no avail. The mystery grew deeper and deeper.

With a lot of people giving their opinions, some of the answers I received were closer to science fiction than reality.

Then one evening trolling an online lure forum, I struck gold!

I found someone who obviously had a very good knowledge of the Killalure brand.

I sent him a message, he replied and the enigma was no more.

The lure is indeed a Killalure, from the mid ’80s. It is in fact a 4” Killalure cut down.

While making them, the good people at Killalure had a problem with a run of blank that had been oversanded.

So the man making them cut the tail off and put on some aluminium bib that he had laying around.

About 100 of them were made. The run was so short that the lure didn’t even receive a name!

The lures were painted with Dulux Base Coat. The colour is originally a Nils Master one, but in the Killalure range this is colour number 70.

The hooks might be 777 #2 Eagle Claws. A few different bibs were used for this lure model – on this one it was the 3” Barra Bait bib.

Who is the man who generously gave me all this information? No other than the man behind the Killalure saga: Dave Killalea.