I have decided, among other things I’m planning on doing this summer, that I’m going to be gathering a library of underwater footage of certain baits, as they swim. To me, a ‘swim signature’ is the footprint or fingerprint or unique identifier that all baits have. This just needs to be done. The culmination of all things a bait gives off as it is swam (thinking mostly swimbait/bigbait) but all baits have some sort of fingerprint in or ontop of the water. I have access to a river, various springs, and clear water lakes that shall provide excellent natural environments to show the swimming of various baits and just showcase baits in the water. I’ve seen a lot of footage of baits swimming in swimming pools and even in lakes/ponds, but I’m finding there is something unique about swimming a bait in place in the current of a river, that allows the camera to really capture the subtle details of the swim and give you a better feel for all that is going on with the bait.
First thing of course is the dead-on accuracy and realism of the bait’s profile. Notice the Weedless Shad’s fully booted, miniaturized version of the 8″ trout’s vortex tail. The Weedless Shad’s tail has more thump and vortex than the Grass Minnow, and because it is a slightly bulkier and heavier bait, I find it fishes better in some situations. But both the Grass Minnow and Weedless Shad should have real estate in your tackle box. Fish catching sum’o’guns.
The idea of this ‘swim signature’ series is to provide an objective look at how baits swim in the water, with very little or zero narration or voice over. So, to kick things off, I went out and spent some time swimming the Huddleston Deluxe Weedless Shad in very clear little crick. I am using normal and slowed camera speeds. The Weedless Shad is an incredibly real and lifelike shad swimbait. I have caught fish from Lake Champlain to Okeechobee on this bait. I love to fish it in grass, but I know it will work around wood, or even open water. I filmed the bait on 50# Power Pro Braid, why? Because that is how I fish the bait, is on braid. I am teaching myself some new knots and methods for attaching floro and mono leaders to braid, but for the most part, I find 50# braided line that is coated black with permanent pen, very low profile and very fishable. I had some really bad experiences with floro and mono leaders, but am trying to come back around with the help of some trusted friends. Bigbait and swimbait fishing takes the physics involved to levels the square bill and shakey head guys don’t typically get. These are baits and fish of consequence, and even just repeated casting does things that are hard to quantify, but ultimately weakens knots and line. Basically, I plan on filming the baits on the same line as I fish them natively. Of course 8# florocarbon would make the bait look and swim better, and perhaps I’ll get myself there, but when I pull out the Weedless Shad on 50# braid, I’m using going in and getting after it. Guys who throw 100% floro tend to be fishing more open water, whereas I find myself in the jungles of the South East, on places like Santee Cooper, Okeechobee, Eufaula, and Seminole where grass, wood, and big bug-eyed bruisers are the game.
Swimming baits in place is surfing like on a ‘standing wave’… I’m finding out how telling the quality of a bait is by it’s ability to be swam in place. The baits that tend to catch fish swim nicely in current, in place. Hardbaits are much more difficult to swim in place, but even among the softbaits, their are stars and their are duds. The Weedless Shad is a shining star, excellent swim and example of realism in motion.
Size 6 Owner Hyper Wire mangled in a melee that involved a big eyed bruiser that lived around a large laydown tree. Split rings on big hardbaits are particularly vulnerable to bending out. A fish can use the the hook points on the other side of the treble than he/she is stuck onto and create "lever action" and put incredible strain on your split ring and hook. You hook gets bound up on the side of the hardbait and if the fish has the direction and leverage, bad things could happen. Not often, but for the investment, it's a no brainer, especially if you are really putting time into hunting a big one.
With everything getting a little bit bigger, and more swimbait like, even more the reason to pay attention to your terminal tackle. All these long cranking rods like the Wright McGill, Okuma, Duckett Rods, that are approaching 8 feet long, microguides, 7:1 reels and guys are generally now throwing much longer rods on average than even a few years ago. Swimbaits aside, longer rods mean more leverage and power and torque that can be applied to fish and hence the need for superior terminal tackle. Faster reels mean more physics involved, speed kills and magnifies weakest links. The Owner Hyper Wire Split Ring was a God send to the swimbait fishing community years ago. It never ceases to amaze me how good simple terminal tackle can be so hard to find. Split rings are often an afterthought and not much of a conversation, but Owner changed that with the introduction of the Owner Hyper Wire Split Ring. Split rings can be a weak point, so be warned.
Practice what you preach. I have spent a lot of money over the years on Owner Hyper Wires. You can re-use them, they hold their shape well and they don't rust. I use the Size 4 thru Size 7 anytime I have a hanging treble, period.
Mini/Stubby Triple Trout: anytime I’m using small hard bodied swimmers, I tend to go for #4 Hyper Wires and Owner ST-56 trebles.
replacement split rings for RC 2.5s and other full bodied square bill and conventional crank and hard baits where big fish happen in shallow water, close range or on braided line. Even certain topwater baits, like the Pencil Popper.
Little hard baits need to be balanced too. Size 4 Owner Hyper Wires balance very nicely with the ST-56 Treble Hooks and are a good compromise for small baits where you need small sharp, thinner diameter hanging trebles. The Size 4 ring is just small and fits the size of the bait and hook nicely, and gives you a guarantee you aren't going to have split ring failure, even if you fish these style of baits on 50# braid, 17-20 mono or floro, and med-light 8 footers, which most of us tend to do. Little swimmers are best served on long rods, just like big swimmers, and you've got to balance the hooks and rings with to the rod and reel and just be sure you don't have a 'weakest link', because it will be found by the fish, sometime, and you better hope it's not the 'one'. Even 5-7 pounders can wreck cheap split rings. Tournament and trophy implications with split rings and hooks.
The #5 Owner Hyper Wire Split Ring on the 8" Huddleston Deluxe Trout. You want the smallest and strongest possible ring. It holds onto that #2 Owner ST-66 treble up front in our Southern Trout Eater Huddleston Rig, and it has never failed me.
The 7" Triple Trout, with #6 Owner Hyper Wires. Add to that, 65# Braided line, Calcutta 300 or 400 TE reels, moderate fast/slow action 8 footers and you'll understand that hooks and rings can easily be bent out, shore up vulnerability where you can and get the right rings especially for snatching bigbaits around grass on braid. The size 6 Owner Hyper Wire is probably the most universal for most hanging treble type baits.
7/9/12″ MS Slammer (the Slammer has HUGE eye screws that screw into the wood, so you need a big ring to get around the thick eye bolt/screws that make up the hook hangers on the MS Slammers) (SEE BELOW)
Number 7 Hyper Wires for the MS Slammer and any of the bigbaits with the big eye screws where you attach the ring to. You simply cannot get a #5 or #6 over the eye screw (without major effort). It's just not worth it. Get the #7s and be done with it and know you're ready for battle with the biggest.Bits and Bites/Speeds and Feeds
Bottom line is, if you are serious about your swimbait and bigbait fishing, you need to be thinking about Owner Hyper Wire Split rings. If you are a guy who is fishing 1 ounce rattle traps and big topwater baits and pushing the envelope on hanging trebles on your standard hardbaits out there, you should be looking at Owner Hyper Wire Split Rings as added insurance, size 4 in particular. Especially if braid and/or big fish are in your life. Once you start paying >$15 for your swimbaits and bigbaits, adding a $.50 split ring and premium hooks to your baits is just common practice. You can and will bend out hooks and rings. It’s either going to happen on a straight pull or it’s going to happen where the fish uses the hard body to pry open the split ring in an instant of tug-o-war. Anytime you get locked up on a fish, or the fish hangs the bait into a tree or in some grass, now split ring are tested. I’ve never had one fail me, even though I’ve had a couple bend out like the one above—but not fail, imagine what would have happened without using an Owner Hyper Wire? The fish and the hook would have been gone.
I love to be able to recommend something I’ve used for years and years and years and have no reservations at all about recommending. The G-Loomis 966 BBR is an excellent rod for the 8″ Huddleston Deluxe, which in itself, you need an 8″ Huddleston Deluxe rod, therefore, do not pass go until you have an 8″ Huddleston Deluxe rod! No kidding, that is what makes this rod something to consider in the BIGbait picture. So, dig this, you can throw all 4 ROFs from Ken Huddleston with the rod, but its also what else the rod can do which is serve as your ‘bigbait’ rod, the one rod you have multiples of so you can also fish 10″ Triple Trouts, 9-12″ MS Slammers, XL Nezumaa Rats, and various hard and softbaits in the 3-7 ounce range. This rod is not the beefiest of rods in the bigbait world. I totally understand and get where the G-Loomis 966 BBR is NOT a good rod for the ‘megabaits’ lets call them, these giant hardbaits and giant softbaits pushing 10-16 ounces and upwards of 18″ long or longer. You need super specialized rods for those baits for sure. What about the Alabama Rig and other castable umbrella rigs? You plan on throwing any 4-5-6″ swimbaits on it?
The G-Loomis 966 BBR on deck or in my hand. You need an excellent Huddleston Deluxe rod, and the G-Loomis 966 is that indeed, and since it also handles A-Rigs, 10″ Triple Trouts, 9-12″ Slammers, XL Nezumaa rats, etc its an interchangeable tool in my bigbait approach
I need a rod to get after it with the 8″ Huddleston, the XL Nezumaa Rat, or the 10″ Triple Trout, or whatever combinations thereof, so having one rod that can handle multiple bigbaits is key. I have at least four G-Loomis 966 BBR rod and four Shimano Calcutta 400 TE reel setups in my boat when I’m seriously getting after the trout eaters. And at least one of the above said combos onboard at all times, because it can fish whatever bigbait I might want to explore in a more tournament centric lake that has big fish in it, like an Okeechobee or Seminole or Santee Cooper. I know that with that rod, if things are good, and feeling right or just feel like chunking some big stuff, I have a rod that will handle any of my best big search tools. Rod management. If you’ve seen Southern Trout Eaters, about 90% of the fish I catch in the film are on that rod. The other 10% are fish I catch on ‘medium’ rods. But the film itself should serve as validation that the rod is a workhorse and staple tool in my bigbait fishing approach.
The G-Loomis 966 BBBR + Shimano Calcutta 400TE + 80# Power Pro = torque and power like few have experienced in bass fishing. To properly fish exposed or weedless bigbaits around grass , or to just ‘snatch’ your baits clean, this setup has grass fishing and bigbaits covered as well as the standard clear water and 30# copolymer applications.
Braided line? You bet. Try 80# braided line on your G-Loomis 966 BBR, and add whatever bait of your choice. 8″ Huddlestons in the grass on 80# braid? No, don’t do that. You will realize that a Shimano Calcutta 400 TE and G-Loomis 966 BBR not only match well in the mountains, but they match well in the grass. You might migrate south down the peninsula called Florida or wherever grass grows thick and heavy. It is scary the amount of force and stopping power that rod and reel combo deliver with 80# Power Pro. I’m seriously contemplating moving to Fort Lauderdale, selling software, regrouping, and fishing in S. Florida and Central Florida for a few years until I get more bites on 8″ Huddleston Deluxes with 80# braid involved and G-Loomis 966s and Calcutta 400 TEs!!! Talk about addicting. Big fish, big bites and vicious battles in shallow grass where your gear better be balanced and able to get the job done. Braid and a slow action parabolic rod is the reason God made hydrilla.
The A-Rig Affect
I found the G-Loomis 966 BBR to be an excellent rod choice for lobbing the ‘bigger’ castable umbrella rigs with the larger 1/2 to 3/4 ounce heads and 4-5″ swimbait tails. Another usage for an already proven combo. The rod can load up and handle the lob casting and swimming of a lure that weighs in the 4-5 ounce zone really well. And it doesn’t suck that the rod can whip 4-7 pounders like other rods handle 2-3 pounders. So with the effects of the Alabama Rig coming down on our heads, guys who’ve never considered a big rod for anything but flipping might like to know this rod will handle the rigors of the castable umbrella rig as well as swimming big swimbaits.
The Rod:
Moderate Fast: Parabolic action. The 966 BBR is slow compared to most, and that slower action means it has that parabolic bend, which means it doesn’t wear you out when you decide you’re going to lob bigbaits for 8-10 hours. The rod does the work of the casting and retrieving, and hooking. Since the rod loads up nicely, it has an inherent slight load it maintains while you’re retrieving your bigbait, so when a bite does come, you are in an excellent spot to hook and setup on a bite. The slow action gives the rod incredible power on the pull, which is key to whipping big fish early in the fight. This rod builds and maintains a lot of force and momentum and it really comes in to play once you get a big fish hooked up because you control and fight the fish while applying maximum pressure.
8 foot long: I like this rod is a full 8 feet long. I like a rod that maximizes length for added casting distance, feel and touch, and ability to direct my cast as the bait flies thru the air. I can also lay my line where I want it at the end of a long cast, giving me the ability to influence the swim of my bait by the bow of the line at the beginning of my retrieve.
Balanced: The 966 BBR is not the lightest most advanced rod on the market today. That is okay. You don’t hunt elephants with a BB gun. You need to match power with power and this rod has the mass and make up that matches bigbaits, big fish and has proven itself as a workhorse. We mentioned the physics of bigbait fishing in Southern Trout Eaters. The G-Loomis 966 BBR is a standard to measure the strength of your line, terminal tackle selections, whereby you have a standardized rod that you can shape your rigs and rigging around. The handle is ‘right length’ and the full cork uniform feel makes it comfortable. It just works.
Shimano Calcutta 400 TE: The 400 TE is the reel. So, think about this. I have a big round gold reel with incredible gears and gearing. It fits and compliments the G-Loomis 966 perfectly. It’s like they were made to fit each other, which they weren’t, but the rod and reel together balance. There are a lot of rods out there where the Calcutta 400 TE would be silly because it so far outweighs and out guns the rod, even though some guy put ‘swimbait’ on the rod. The reel matches the rod, and the rod matches the reel.
Interchangeability&Consistency: With a few 966 BBR + Calcutta 400 TE reels, I know I approach any bigbait situation, and be able to throw the various tools of my trade and not worry about having specialized rods onboard everytime. I can use the same combo for any of the bigbaits (or A-Rig) I throw and that is huge because rod management and being able to be efficient with your equipment makes a difference in your fishing.
I’ve had 3-4 G-Loomis 966 BBRs on deck for 6+ years. Interchangeable because they handle the tools of my trade equally well. Sometimes with fishing rods, you just find one that covers multiple baits and applications, and that helps you simplify your approaches and be prepared out on the water. It’s not uncommon to have 2-3 Hudds tied on the same day or need a 10″ Triple Trout and 8″ Huddleston for the same 100 yard stretch. Picking up the same rod with a different bait is easier to get used to than different baits on different rods.
Conclusions:
There are plenty of rods out there marketed toward swimbaits and bigbaits. Shimano/G-Loomis doesn’t even highlight or feature the G-Loomis 966 BBR as a swimbait rod. They have other lines of newer rods and actions positioned to serve these purposes. I understand progress and business and ‘how things’ go, but fishing rods are like classic shaped surfboards, or a fine shotgun, or perhaps a Tommy Armor 7 iron…somethings just work and are classic pieces of sporting goods. Gary Loomis is a legend in the rod building world, and this rod is one of his best known in some circles, and is a model you can talk about and appreciate because it was made in the Pacific NorthWest as a mooching and salmon rod, where they’d lob big hooks and lead for big ole salmon, and can connect the dots that the rod is just ‘simple’ but takes advantage of the physics and balances and compromises. Catching big fish by lobbing bigbaits, and we are talking about the same approximate size spectrum, so that is why I think the 966 crosses over from that original saltwater world to the freshwater bigbait space so well. You a V8 engine to tow a boat, so don’t try and do it with a 4 cylinder. You don’t catch trains on a bicycle, you need to match power with power, and the reel has to match the rod, and the big ole round goldie locks 400 TE to the G-Loomis 966 BBR makes me feel like I’ve got the perfect high powered rifle to shoot whatever big game I encounter. The G-Loomis 966 BBR is a ‘classic’ and a rod that set a benchmark out there in the bigbait fishing community and is one you can talk around other rods.
Many of my friends use Okuma Rods, Dobyns, and the G-Loomis Swimbait series of rod. Rods are a personal choice, and sometimes they are a business decision and sometimes they just are because that is what you have and you already invested in them, and they aren’t broken so you use what you use. I have zero reservations about recommending the G-Loomis 966 BBR because it has worked so well for me, for so many years, and continues to impress me with the things I can do with it (ie, 80 # Braid). You need a Huddleston Rod, you need a BigBait Rod, you need an A-Rig Rod, and this rod does it all.
Swimbait Tails by Category: May-June 2012 FLW Bass Magazine Reprint
Click the above imaged for the enlarged version, that you can read. This is a digital image of an article I was fortunate enough to get done in collaboration with Curt Niedermier. The intent was to take a simple look at various tails on swimbaits and understand some subtleties and just keep it simple.
Wacky Rigging. One of my favorite things to do in a small bait, finesse, tough bite, you just need to catch 5 fish and haven’t had a bite in a while style of fishing is wacky rigging. Wacky rigging is the canary in the coal mine to me at times. If you can’t get a bite, wacky rigging, you are very likely not around ’em. My 2012 FLW Everstart tournament on Santee Cooper, started by picking up my boat in Augusta, GA on the way to lake, with a fresh fiberglass patch from the damage it sustained from Seminole. So, I only had 5 days to prepare for Santee Cooper, and in case you don’t know, Santee Cooper is 2 lakes, connected by a canal, and it HUGE. I mean, a man could spend a lifetime learning Santee Cooper, and because it has grass in it, which even the types of grasses are constantly changing (and growing and being sprayed or eaten by introduced grass carp), Santee Cooper is a lake that changes often. Add to that, South Carolina’s real estate on the Eastern seaboard. South Carolina, goes from extreme mountain trout eaters in the West, to the lowland black water swamp, palmetto tree + Spanish moss frog, swim jig, skippin’ jigs, buzzbait, 30 pound sack capable water, to Atlantic Coast beaches that people surf regularly ( I scored fun 1-2 foot peelers at Hilton Head one 4th of July circa 2006, 10 foot single fin, 80+ degree water, and a lot of hootin’ an’a hollerin’!) in the East. Santee Cooper is big fish fishery and it didn’t disappoint. Look at the weights from the event, lots of 11-15 pound, 3 fish sacks getting weighed in. Guys on 4-6 pounders pretty good, just numbers hard to come by. Santee Cooper is on a healthy cycle and it could be a sleeper for an incredible event if scheduling and weather permit. I wished I’d had more time to practice and explore things, because a bigbait bait there is inevitable. I threw Slammers, 3:16 Sunfish, 22nd Century Bluegills, and skipped the 6″ weedless Huddie too. I didn’t have tons of practice, but my gameplan was mostly around catching 4-6 pounders off cypress trees, but of course trying to just go fish and find big ones coming or going or on beds. I thought I could win with the wacky rig—if I got the bites and got them in the boat, there are just some awesome moments in tree fishing where you can get on ’em good. I had good bites going, just not lots of them, and it was the same stuff I had done here 3 years ago when I finished 7th place. I had the bites to win last time. This time, I didn’t have the bites to win, but I had a shot at it, and I knew I could compete and perhaps win, just like last time, but this time, things didn’t work out quite so well, but I did jump off a big one that cost me a Top 20 or so. 5-6 pounder eats my Senko on the base of tree with sparse grass around it in about 3 feet of water, and rips line off immediately for 10 feet right under the surface just hot and full dig style and when I went to turn and stop her, she reared up and jumped mouth open wide reverse flip backside roll tail grab fakey and spits the hook. Fudge. Whatever, I’m sitting in 7th place overall in the the SouthEast Division, and had a great tournament and finished 35th place, just solid, nothing great, but I’ll take it because Santee Cooper is tough as she is awesome at times. I had 3 fish on Day 1 for almost 12 pounds, so fun day getting 2 bigguns onboard, and one 14.5″ keeper. Big fish on the spinning gear around trees is just exciting and fun. I kept working and working, and also had a grass pattern going that never panned out, so I felt like I fished pretty damn hard and smart, just didn’t have the next levels of fish I needed. Look at how few guys caught limits both days. See Results Here. Ken Ellis won the tournament wacky rigging a Trick Worm on deep trees. So, I was on the right track and had the right gameplan, I just didn’t have the trees and the knowledge of what trees. Finding deeper trees is a key, sparse grass is key, and areas adjacent or near spawning grounds, where the fish are pulling out of their spawning areas and resting up, feeding up and hanging loose on the natural cover/structures in the lake.
The Old South. Santee Cooper is near Charleston, a city rich in old America history, and is two lakes, connected by a canal: Lakes Marion&Moultrie, named after American Revolutionary War 1770s era Generals famous for using the swamps and natural terrain to drive the Brits out. And of course, the first shots fired in the Civil War, happened in Charleston at Fort Sumter. My journey from Atlanta to Santee Cooper literally mirrored General Sherman’s notorious “March to the Sea” campaign, that ended with the Confederate surrender of Fort Sumter and terms being served, where the first shots were fired 4 years prior. I enjoy that kind of stuff, because I really try to understand the various regions and people of this country that are so different than my own home, and their history. I like South Carolina for the fishing for sure. I used to do great business in nearby Columbus and I know Charleston is really cool and happening and fun, and yet you can get yourself extremely rural and off the grid in a hurry too. Perhaps I have a soft spot for South Carolina because my personal best 14.60 largemouth came from South Carolina in 2006. But I think it’s just a killer state of mind and of fishing. The extreme Appalachian to Atlantic old timey Southern feel is highlighted with the weather. You want to talk about hot and muggy? We had low 90s and 100% humidity a couple days. Sweltering heat at times for what feels like ‘early in the year’. I believe in the summer time, Santee Cooper might be the hottest place on earth. You just feel lowland and can sense the warm ocean offsore influencing things. But then again, as the tournament came around, cool, windy, foggy, really windy, really really windy, rain and volatile weather came, making finesse fishing around trees, a bit more challenging! I wore my bibs all day on Day 1, that cold you get when you’ve been baked by the sun and then things cool down and you’re just cold because you aren’t baking hot. Finesse fishing, wacky in particular, is best served up under the above weather conditions, because the smooth water allows you to make precise and long distance skips of your bait to the tree. Wind creates surface waves which put your bait up in the tree and ruins the distance and accuracy thing horribly, but it isn’t game over, you just have to work that much harder to fish the trees properly. The calmer, the more finesse you can get, for example, throw a Trick Worm vs. a Senko, because it falls and stalls mas bueno, which is the thing about wacky, it is about fall and stall, which becomes neutral or floating mid water column at some point, which means you can keep your bait suspended or ‘floating’ one foot down, one foot off the tree, in the shade spot on base of cypress tree better than just about anything else. Stall + Fall = 0
I stayed in Eutawville (“Utah-Ville”) at Bells Marina and fished with my good friend Ron and his son, that I’d met here a few years ago when I was here last. Ron helped me quickly get a feel for the lake and more specifically, the tree bite. The best trees tend to be deeper 2.5 to 4 feet of water, and have sparse grass around them, or just be on the ‘point’ or generally favorable position to feed from in a stack of trees. However, it’s sort of like flipping at some level, where you just have to put your head down and make hundreds of perfect presentations time and time again, and eventually you get a bite. And where you get one bite, you usually get more bites. Little flurries, I love you so! I tried to find good areas of trees in practice. Which I did. I also tried to find a grass bite, which I did with some help from my man Bobby Wood and Ron Buck. I practiced with them a day and really did some damage on Skinny Dippers and Swim Senkos around lilly pads, gator grass, and mixed stuff. With the cool weather we had for the tournament, my grass bite died on the vine. You just knew they were in the grass and biting for someone, but I had trees and grass to balance, and after starting each morning in the grass and coming up empty both days, I decided my grass bite was dead and didn’t try it afternoon of Day 2, just stuck out the trees, which helped because I got my 5th fish with 10 minutes left and helped me get a paycheck. I caught all 8 of my keepers on the wacky rig and only missed one bite, but it was a big one. Wacky rigging is a work in progress for me, and I love doing it. I love super finesse and super big stuff, opposing poles, positives and negatives, north vs south/ east vs west, natural attractions and relationships between the two ends of any spectrum. I love how it points out things to my bigbait fishing, because I think my success with bigbaits in a national tournament will be somehow directly or indirectly related to a super small bait bite or understanding of fish and fishing. For example, keeping it simple, just throw a Senko or a Trick Worm, or just throw a Triple Trout or a Huddleston or Slammer, having the right tools narrowed down for your window and using the small baits to either quickly fill a limit or be there as backup to back fill a couple big ones.
Reel: Shimano Stradic 1000 or CI4 Stradic 1000 (small spooled reels handle 10-15 pound braid really well, that line has super small diameter and although I like big spooled spinning reels, smaller spooled small spinning reels are good too. You can throw small and light baits really well, and manage you line nicely. It all matches up, where you don’t have super thin line on a big spool.
Hook:Owner Mosquito Hook, #1 or 1/0, get the 50 packs, because you use these things a lot and you do break off at times because of the exposed nose hook, trust me, this is a good investment. Use bigger hook size in the wind
Rigging:Wacky O Tool and O-Rings: I put an O-Ring around my senko and slide the hook under the ring and just fish away. Sometimes I criss cross two rings and put the hook under the X, but I a really like the way this one fishes and rigs, it’s not perfect, but I haven’t found one that is!
Braided line + floro leader, Owner Mosquito Hook, O-Ring. I will use 2 O-Rings and criss cross them and put the hook under the X at times, but then again, I will just slip the hook under a single ring and just go fishing. I catch a lot of fish on this rig, and slight variations of it anytime I’m around shallow grass, wood, and rock. Trick worms and Senkos are blue chip baits, make sure you own plenty in various colors black to green. Get a feel for skipping, floating, dragging and stalling side rigged baits. Bait control.
Some really good fish were caught in the grass. You just had to have grass with bait or just fish in it. The grass was like the trees, lots to choose from, but most does/do not hold fish and even if they do, you have to be good to catch them, especially for 2 days in a row. Things change quickly on Santee Cooper.
I was getting 1 or 2 fish in the 4-6 pound class a day fishing the trees slowly and thoroughly with wacky rigs. Scattered grass, access to deep water, shade all helped the cause. I figured I might be able to squeak out 15 or 20 pounds a day on the right days. I almost pulled it off, but not quite. No regrets, looking forward to getting back there sometime and getting back to work. “Fine thanks……………………you?”
"Simplification is the Ultimate Sophistication" (Da Vinci) After reading the Steve Jobs Biography, I realized something basic about simplification in bigbait fishing. Softbaits get the most bites (and tend to catch the biggest fish, ala 8" Huddleston). So when in Rome, throw a softbait! Okeechobee validated what I already knew: The Vortex Tails catch the biggest fish, and the Boot Tails (3:16 Rising Son Jr) get the most bites. Making the 3:16 Rising Son Jr. the better tournament swimbait, among other reasons. Now, when I did get a bite on the 8" Huddleston, it was a magnum, they were just hard to come by.
You can expect full details, video/film and more photos to back this subject up, however, those things will take me much more time. Fishing bigbaits in shallow grass is like everything else an ongoing discussion. I’ve just arrived at Lake Seminole, and the shallow grass and bigbait assault continues. I’m a bit in a holding pattern on some video production stuff, trying to find my path on some directions and paths to take with various projects and pursuits that will remain private for now.
Okeechobee, outside grass line. 2012 is the first year I've been to Okeechobee in the winter where the fish were holding on the outside grass lines. The inside grass lines were choked out from the low water overgrowth, and the water clarity was good in the mainlake, which I've never seen either. The fish were more in their summer pattern that I've ever experienced, which made them a bit more accessible with baits with hanging or partially hanging trebles, especially those that weight > 2 ounces!
Preparations:
My mental preparations began for Okeechobee this past summer, when sitting and talking with Mickey Ellis for 3:16 Lure Company. I was reminded of some simple lessons and things I used to know. Line thru swimbaits, in particular, can be fished in shallow grass really well because they tend to swim high in the water column, and I knew that coupled with braided line, I could keep those baits even higher in the water column, literally on or just below the surface. Braided line adds weedlessness, trust me on this, its a combination of buoyancy and ability to snatch your bait clean.
The other preparations I had for Okeechobee came from reading the Steve Jobs Biography this fall. Laugh if you will. You ready? “Simplification is the ultimate sophistication” was the quote. Leonardo Da Vinci is the source of the quote, but Steve made me aware of it (along with a few other tidbits of Da Vinci wisdom). Let me attempt to walk you thru this. When you simplify your bigbait approach on a foreign lake or foreign conditions, you need to start with SOFTBAITS. When I assessed what baits I’ve caught the vast majority of fish on, it was clear to me that softbaits are what get bit more often, under most conditions. Of course I had my Triple Trouts and 22nd Century Bluegill on, but unless they are killing your softbaits in shallow grass, they probably aren’t going to kill your faster swimming and moving hardbaits in shallow grass, either. Forget the trout eaters here, we are talking shallow grass fishing, in less than peak heat season. With all the challenges of getting on a bigbait bite on tournament day, the one thing you can do, when conditions present themselves is keep is soft, stupid.
K.I.S.S: Keep it Soft, Stupid! You know I love certain hardbaits, but rarely do you go out and just pounce on hardbait fish on lakes without a lot of history of swimbait action, especially those without trout. Also, when you have a tournament minded approach, boot tails get bit quite a bit more than the the 8" Huddleston Vortex tail at times. It's a tradeoff. The 8" Hudd catches magnums, the boot tails catch 3-7 pounders and those are the fish I'm hunting on tournament day, not lake or world records. Add to that, Rate of Stall, a subject we have only just begun to propose, boot tails have more drag, and the 3:16 softbaits tend to have excellent Rate of Stall due to buoyancy and lift.
I had a phone conversation with Steve Pagliughi (“Urban”, is his online handle) in November. Steve is a Huddleston guy and a 3:16 guy. Steve and I have never met, never fished together, and just had a conversation about bigbaits and fishing. Steve implored me to take a look at the 3:16 Rising Son Jr. He told me the bait just flat out gets bit. Excellent, that is what I needed to hear, along with his other tidbits of insights about Huddlestons, grass, and line thru swimbait approaches. I don’t pretend to be a ‘know it all’ and find myself laughing at people and fisherman who take that approach. The most talented professionals I’ve ever been around have some common traits, and at the top of the list is humility. Being human and consciously recognizing your human flaws means you are aware that you cannot know everything. You cannot be master of all. You have to leave yourself open to continually learn, make adjustments and keep an open mind and mix the new things you learn into the pool of wisdom and experiences you have, and adopt/apply new things accordingly. California, the Bay Area in particular, excels in an open minded approach to everything. People seek out diversity and different because they know it ultimately enriches them. When you take the approach that you ‘know it all’ or otherwise close your mind to things because they are ‘different’ or don’t come from the same mold you came from or come from outside your world, you stop LISTENING. Folks may hear all and think they know all or are aware of all, but unless you really listen and process the information and take the time to do so, you aren’t really knowing everything. You are just hearing it, and it goes into the bucket of clutter along with everything else we are exposed to in today’s connected world. You don’t know everything, and even if you did, you cannot apply it in real time or in appropriate time. I really appreciated my conversation with Steve because it was so on time, and so honest and something I really enjoy, learning something new, especially in the world of bigbaits. Just hearing Steve’s confidence and experience with the Rising Son Jr. and some of his Huddleston applications got my head right well in advance of leaving for Okeechobee.
The Rising Son Jr.
When you take a look at the Rising Son Jr. it looks like you’d expect a line thru swimbait with a boot tail. Here is what you may not immediately grasp. Notice, there is no ‘hardware’ in the line-thru. There is no metal involved. The bait is 100% soft plastic with the 3:16 Line Thru block glued under the chin/throat. This makes the bait extremely buoyant (it damn near floats). Buoyancy equates to ability to fish the bait over and thru super shallow grass, which is perfect for Okeechobee. Also, buoyancy equates to greater ability to stall (Rate of Stall) the bait and keeps the bait overhead longer. This is a key point to understand, especially at Okeechobee, where you’re targeting fish that are “about” their beds. Big females are rarely locked on the bed. When they are, you sight fish them. Most times, they are ‘about’ their beds, meaning, you want to swim your bait over the bed, putting your bait in their nursery, and keep it there, swimming along, for the longest amount of time possible. The idea being, they aren’t biting out of hunger, they are biting because Mother Nature and natural processes dictate that anything a bass can fit in its mouth will get eaten if it spends time where it shouldn’t during spawn time. Your bait is seen as a threat or an intruder or something that needs to be taught a lesson. Some baits move out of the nursery too quickly, and aren’t the best choice (ie, fast moving hard baits). Buy yourself some 3:16 Rising Son Jrs, and get to work. These things get bit, they catch big ones, and they catch the medium sized ones really well too. Stay tuned, more to come on this bait.
Trap Hook: One 1/0 Owner ST-36 harnessed to a #4 Owner ST-66 (when in doubt, fish the stock hook provided, it works great, I just like the insurance of a second stinger back further in the bait. Stay tuned, more to come on the trap hook setup).
The 3:16 Lure Company Rising Son Jr. Let me try and net out why this bait was so effective: Rate of Stall (buoyancy, drag, and swim), size and profile, ability to fish with braided line, trap hook setup (not shown above), and where and how the fish were positioned on the Big O, winter 2012. You get a feel for what I was fishing over, near topped out hydrilla, in this case a few hundred yards from where Randall Tharp would win the FLW Tour Event, punching the thicker hydrilla mats.Day 2, FLW Everstart Lake Okeechobee. Two of my four fish that weighed 18 pounds. I only had 6 fish for the entire tournament, and 5 of them came on the 3:16 Rising Son Jr. The other one came on the Huddie. All six fish I weighed at the Everstart came on the bigbaits. Finished 21st place, a major leap forward in my tournament fishing, committing to the bigbaits and getting it done. Day 1 was rough with only 2 fish for 6 pounds, but that played into the game. When you're down and need to make up a lot of ground, throw the bigbaits, if you dare.
The 3:16 Sunfish/Bluegill
So, you might be wondering, when did you throw the 3:16 Bluegill or Sunfish (same bait, two color options, both of them excellent) vs. when did you throw the Rising Son Jr? When I first arrived at Okeechobee around Christmas time, the water was approx 13.75. When I left Okeechobee in Mid February 2012, the water had dropped below 13.25. Half a foot on Okeechobee is significant. Falling water on Okeechobee is a chronic problem we face each winter. As the water falls, it creates less and less swim lanes to throw baits in. The grass starts topping out and you better be on your game to keep you bait up and out of the grass while fishing. The 3:16 Sunfish/Bluegill is not as buoyant as the Rising Son Jr. and it tends to fish a little deeper, so as the water level dropped, I had fewer and fewer places to fish this bait effectively. I found that Okeechobee bass really hated bluegill and sunfish baits swam over their beds/nursery areas too. Bluegill/Sunfish tend to be an enemy of bedding bass because they eat the bass eggs and/or the bass fry. Bass love to eat bluegill/sunfish, and it’s honestly something I’ve never committed that much time to. I get asked all the time, what bluegill bait do your recommend? Now I have an answer, because I committed a ton of time to learning the bait and getting familiar with it. I really hate recommending baits or tackle without having any experience. Expect more to come on this bait too. Need a bluegill bait? Fishing around bedding fish? Throw a 3:16 Bluegill or Sunfish and see what happens.
Hook: Owner ST-41 Treble Hook 1/0 (no trap, just single hook, no rings, just direct tied to hook)
Okeechobee Trout Eater. Of course there are no trout on Okeechobee. Golden shiner are the obvious choice, but I found other colors like the Hitch color to get bites too. Here is a nice one on the ROF 5. I fished both the ROF 5 and ROF 12 on Okeechobee the Winter of 2012 and had some fantastic bites. Try fishing an 8" Huddleston with 80 Pound Braid and a 400 TE from Shimano. You won't believe the torque and power you have with that reel and braid.
I’ve written and filmed plenty about the 6″ Weedless Trout, the Grass Minnow and Weedless Shad, its about time to shed some light on the 8″ Huddleston Deluxe Trout on Okeechobee. I wasn’t fishing the Rainbow Trout color, but I’m sure it would work. Of all the generally available colors of the 8″ Huddleston Deluxe, I’d pick the Golden Shiner or Hitch Color to start. Understand, you need to be prepared to fish both a ROF 5 and ROF 12, so have 2 rods ready. I fished the ROF 12 with just the single top jig hook, because with braided line, it fished extremely well in the grass and could be snatched clean. The ROF 5 was fished with the “Southern Trout Eaters” Huddleston Rig, and I loved that the ST-66 Owner Stinger Trebles matched and handled the braided line very well. I fished the 8″ Huddlestons on the outside grass edges, edges of lilly pads, edges of Kissimmee Grass, edges of reeds, and over top hydrilla. The bait fished pretty darn well. Depending on wind and depth and amount of water I had to work with, would depend which ROF of Huddleston I’d fish. When you lob cast a bait that weighs almost 5 ounces, its going to sink down at least 6″ or so when it hits the water at the end of your cast. So as the water was falling on Okeechobee, again, it became harder and harder to fish certain areas without constantly being mucked up in grass. Even with braid, 400 TE reels and a stout 8 footer, you cannot snatch clean from super thick hydrilla and pads from the outset of your cast. So, fishability at times was a challenge, but not impossible. It can be exhaustive fishing, like when you’re fishing a buzzbait and really working to keep the bait on the surface 100% of time, getting it running right just after it hits the water from the end of your cast. I didn’t catch lots of fish on the 8″ Huddleston, but the ones I caught were STUDS. The bites were awesome too. Just crushed the bait. Looking forward to getting back there and working on this bite more. Again, stay tuned, more to come on 8″ Hudds in the grass.
Okeechobee is such an awesome place, I miss it already. I just love the warm winter weather, the fishing, the tournaments, the Tiki Bar and the entire Roland & Mary Ann Martin Marina & Fishing Campus, and shallow grass. Okeechobee was the first place I fished after resigning from corporate life on Dec. 31 2008, and my first week on Okeechobee in early January 2009 almost killed me. I wrecked my boat once, got lost a couple times, got eaten by mosquitoes , and couldn’t buy a bite, but my how things have changed. I settled down and got right. Three seasons later, I’m finally putting together a bigbait bite, and gave ’em a run at the FLW Tour and Everstart with the bigbaits. Didn’t quite pull it off perfectly and have a lot of room for improvement, but I sure enjoyed progressing and taking bigbaits to the shallow grass of Florida.
