Topic: Tested many soft plastic designs and caught over 100 fish in two outings

[senkosam]

A lake I haven't been to in 55 years had a history I wasn't aware of. The dam needed repair and the water drained releasing most fish downstream. What was left were low quality fish, an overpopulation of sunfish and only three other fish species to my knowledge. The weeds, where I could see bottom were absent though in deeper water the sonar did pick up some. Sunfish and bass (a lb or less) were found in 3' or less water on flats and along shorelines with steep drops. What a weird lake!

At first I used a 1/16 oz ballhead jig with soft plastics and didn't do very well. I switched to 1/24 oz which didn't need to be retrieved as fast and the bites were one after another in quite a few areas. The 15 mph plus wind almost made me quit but I stayed in the north end for most of the day for more protection. The fish attacked many designs and unfortunately I left the camera home. I isolated those that worked great in a plastic bag so I can duplicate them.


Amazing cold front has dropped air temperature from 80 down to the 50 at present and the water temperature today read 60 degrees - cold for this time of year. I'll be fishing another lake with far better quality fish this Fri and report.

[Curt - NC]

1/24th oz.?? Wow! 

[senkosam]

All of these caught fish:

[Curt - NC]

All of these caught fish:

I wouldn't have any doubts at all that these baits will catch high numbers of fish!

[senkosam]

The nice thing about having even a few of those lures is that they catch fish most months of the year and most fish species. It's just so easy to cut 2.5" off the tail end of a thin plastic worm and rig it on a light jighead, I'm surprised no one has done it.  These are examples of plastic lures I use the tails after cutting off the main body:
tapered sticks (not the blunt tails of Senkos) - two are pictured in clear and pearl
Kut Tail Worm
Slider Worm
finesse worms


There is no point leaving on curly tail since the new designs are more versatile and have a better action on slow retrieves.

[senkosam]

Update using other lures in this water:
Update from yesterday's fishing on the same lake:

Unfortunately when I got there, pleasure kayakers were floating around key areas, but interestingly enough fish didn't seem bothered after an hour of quiet - even in shallow water where there were few weeds. I also caught fish just 15' away from a lady wading in shallow water with her splashing grandson.

As usual I wanted to confirm minor alterations to lures I've used so to have even a greater variety I can trust any time I fish a shallow (15' max) small lake.

This was a claw I cut from a bass crawday lure and attached it to a grub body. It always catches fish:


I never attached this hand poured tail to a grub body before but it caught fish!


The stubby tail grub always catches fish:

as well as this rockbass:


I hadn't cast a mini grub with fine tail connected to a float in a while but did catch 5 fish in 5 FOW.:


The Crappie Magnet like the others is a multi-species lure design similar to the stubby tail grub in its action and as usual caught fish - even a 3 lb. sucker!

...and crappie:


Here's the collection:


All were used with 1/32 and 1/24 oz jigs. that caught 66 fish according to the counter that included bass, sunfish(3 types), crappie, rock bass and that *#%!% sucker.

[Curt - NC]

That's a whole mess of fish! 

I'm assuming you're tossing these baits on an ultralight rod with very light line?

[senkosam]

That's a whole mess of fish! 

I'm assuming you're tossing these baits on an ultralight rod with very light line?

Close.
Light action rods 5.6' - 6', 8# test braid (2# diameter)(no fluorocarbon needed), spinning and spincast reels with ratios 3.5 - 4 (good line amount taken in when the hit happens). The set up allows good strike sensitivity - good thing since a can't see the line against the water chop and color. Even using 1/32 oz jigs, the weight of the plastic lure casts a good distance and sinks fine in 8' as well as can be worked slow in 3'.


If the lake averaged larger bass and panfish, I would cast larger lures on heavier tackle, though big fish do hit the light stuff.
Lures are 1"- 2" long.

[senkosam]

Update:
Yesterday was slow from 11:30 am to 2 pm, but only because fish were not in 75 % of the areas I fished. Once I started down an opposite shoreline, more bass and other species hit the usual small soft plastics. But by 3:30 pm on I my way back to the launch, I figured why not work an area off a huge flat that went from 4' down to 6'. Sure enough fish were schooled tight and I got hits on many consecutive casts. Different lure designs got hit hard by bass, crappie and sunfish in an open-water direction.

This mini-stick reinforced my confidence in it by how aggressive the strikes by all size fish and fish species:


The stick on the left was originally very thin and only 2" long right from the injection mold. I stuck the end on a thin wire and dipped it in hot plastic to thicken and lengthen it a bit. After that I brushed some soft plastic glue on the outside and rolled the lure in powdery craft store glitter.  Though I'm pretty sure the clear plastic would have gotten as many strikes,. the main reason for adding a bit of flash is my belief that strikes may be more forceful once the lure gets and holds their attention long enough for excitement to build. Casting a slow moving lure that sparkles in murky water may contribute to getting fish to be drawn closer.

example of glitter added to the outside of a lure:



What reminded me of the reason this lure design is a keeper is how it wiggles like crazy on a slow retrieve horizontal to the bottom. It wiggles also on the drop using the wacky positioned jig head but not as fast. Pauses are always used regardless the lure and what was cool was when the lure laid on bottom for a bit, it would be slammed when I went to retrieve it back to the boat. The stick on the right was made from joining the bodies of two grubs together using a candle and which also worked with wacky and regular jig head rigs.


Here's one more that was a major surprise:



I cut off the claw off a bass lure and fused it to a grub body. Every species hit it !

[Curt - NC]

Sounds like a lot of fun 

[toadhunter]

When Bass got super hard to catch I used to tie on the old reliable "beetle spin".

[Joe P]

When Bass got super hard to catch I used to tie on the old reliable "beetle spin".

I still use them occasionally 

[senkosam]

Will use the B.Spin today just for the h of it.

[Curt - NC]

The Beetle Spin is still a great option for catching lots of fish!

[senkosam]

Didn't get to use it. Concentrated on catching fish on different designs and proving different theories. 34 fish caught helped do that.