Tricks With Soft Sticks
by
Steve Quinn
If, a year or two ago, someone had said you’d pay $1 apiece for a
soft plastic lure, you would have chuckled in disbelief. Today,
however, you’ve got to face the music.
A
pack of 7-inch Senkos sets you back about $5.99 and you will have to battle
other anglers for them. But if you’re after that kicker bass this season, you
will not want to be without this remarkable type of bait. The story of Gary
Yamamoto’s Senko is not new. His design goes back at least seven years. Yamamoto
and his family field-tested the design on giant bass holding on brushy mid-depth
flats on
Lake
Baccarac in Mexico, rigging with a swivel in front to add a bit of weight. The
density of Yamamoto’s plastic, loaded with salt, also help to sink the bait when
fished weightless. While soft stickbaits like a Senko, YUM Dinger, Tiki Stik,
Prowler Slim Jim, or Berkley Sinking Minnow don’t look too exciting in the
package, you can turn loose the attraction by hooking them up and tossing them
into a swimming pool or shallow, clear area where you can watch the action. When
rigged with a standard Texas rig or wacky-rigged with the hook through the
middle, these lures shake as they fall horizontally, creating a unique action
that bass (both largemouth and smallmouth) are having a real hard time getting
used to. It’s the closest thing to a magic bait on the market today — just heave
it out by a weed clump or sandy flat and the fish will come take it away from
you.
To
get the most out of these lures, however, a few tricks are in order.
First, you can miss fish if you don’t use large enough hooks. Wide-gap hooks
like the Gamakatsu EWG Superline or Mustad MegaBite (sizes 2/0 to 5/0 depending
on lure size) make the bait fall a bit faster, as well as giving a sure hookset.
You will also want to stock some weighted hooks to rig these baits for casting
in windy conditions, when vegetation is growing deeper in early summer, and when
targeting suspended bass. I recommend the Bait Jerker Hooks made by Falcon
Lures. Built on Gamakatsu EWG Superline or G-Lock hooks, they offer weights of
1/32- , 1/16-, or 3/32-ounce on the shank to provide a vertical fall. Other
options include Mustads’s Power Lock Plus and the Daiichi Butt Dragger. For
pitching soft stickbaits into weed pockets or brush, a Gambler Florida rig
sinker is hard to beat. Just use enough weight to be able to effectively pitch
the rig, and so it will fall into the heart
of the cover. You will lose most of the nice wiggling action with this rig, but
they still bite it.
Just be sure to use heavy enough line because you will stick some real sporty
ones. I like heavy fluorocarbon for this technique, but lots of guys do will
with the newest generation of braids like SpiderWire Stealth and Stren
SuperBraid. Some top pro anglers still like heavy mono. If you like to Carolina
rig, be sure to rig a soft stickbait, because it offers the same wiggling action
as you drag it along. With the heavy sinker on the bottom, the stick will glide
and wiggle as it sinks. Dropshot rigging also works great with a little 3- or
4-inch stickbait nose hooked with a small baitholder hook. This manner of
hooking gives the best lure action. But if you’re fishing in weeds or brush, you
will have to sacrifice some action and Texas rig the dropshot, using a
light-wire, offset-shank hook.
The
final rigging to try is the wacky-rig. I first learned to wacky-rig Mann’s Jelly
worms more than 25 years ago when fishing bass tournaments on the Finger Lakes
of New York. Yet this rig is still not commonly used. To fish a wacky stickbait
around cover, select a hook with a guard, such as the K-Wacky from Falcon Lures,
built on a Gamakatu black nickel Shiner Hook. These also are available with a
bit of weight on the shank for windy conditions or when warmer water calls for a
faster fall. Wacky rigging really tears up your baits, and none are more fragile
than Yamamoto’s costly creations. It’s not hard to tear up $30 worth of lures in
a day when they’re biting.
To
save baits, I have several suggestions, which I credit to several avid anglers
who are plenty creative. Kevin VanDam slides a split rig around the middle of
the bait and puts the hook point between the lure and the ring, which avoids
piercing the lure. Alton Jones of Waco Texas prefers rubber O-rings that can be
purchased in a hardware store, or by going to the website of the O-ring
specialists at
http://www.allorings.com. The rubber helps cushion the bait a bit more than
the metal split ring. Finally, Roger Bullock of
Arkansas
adds to this technique. He recommends cutting a little section of plastic wrap
that you’d use for adding a bit of Fishing Glue to hold it tight. Then he
greases is with Lure Doctor or MegaStrike and slips on the O-ring. Roger, by the
way, is a retired mailman and does not get his lures free. But even the pro
anglers try to conserve these baits, as it’s easy to run out of a hot color.
One
final note of caution: bass will swallow and eat these lures, even if you don’t
add a flavor formula. Watch your line closely and set as soon as it starts to
walk away. We do not want to damage our great bass populations with hooking
mortality, if it can be avoided. If a fish does swallow the bait and hook, try
to remove the hook by going after it through the gills. This trick has been
demonstrated in recent In-Fisherman issues and on the TV show, and also in the
2004 In-Fisherman Bass Guide. It works very well. If you cannot remove the hook
without damaging the fish, cut the line and leave at least a 10-inch length of
line attached to the hook, which will help to pull the hook to one side of the
fish’s mouth and allow it to feed without too much obstruction until it is able
to dislodge or pass the hook. (See "Through-The-Gill
Hook Removal" on the In-Fisherman web site.)
Steve Quinn
classicbass.com Pro Staff
