Setting The Hook On Plastics

[WRB]

One more question; what type of tackle do you fish the soft plastics with?

If you re using bait casting or spinning with a worm rod from shore I would use a finesse C-rig or what I call a slip shot rig. The only difference being the line and weight size.

For casting a 3/8 oz Top Brass Pro-Jo weight painted black, 8-10# FC line, Glass faceted 8mm bead, Peg-It II rubber peg and size 1/0 Owner or Gamakatsu light wire worm hook.

Spinning use a 1/8 oz Pro-Jo eight, 6-8# FC, size 1 hook.

Worms; casting use 6" curl tail, spinning use 5.1/2" curl tail, color Roboworm Oxblood w/lt red flake and MMII.

Both are high% colors this time of year.

Peg the weight about 24" above the hook. Rig the worms weedless and skin hook. Bites tend to feel like a rubber band pressure. The retrieve is simple; slowly drag the weight about 1 to 2' using the rod, reel in slack and repeat.

Fish major and secondary points and fan cast the entire point area. Points near spawning areas are best at this time.

Remember the worm is weightless to the bass, you feel the sinker weight, any thing the pulls back is a bass, set the hook.

Tom

PS; Iovino products carries the Top,Bras painted weight and Peg-It. Don't worms are also good, his Honey worm is hot now.

[crankbait2009]

WRB, do things change from what you stated if I fish from a boat?  Or does the same principals apply no matter where I fish?

[WRB]

WRB, do things change from what you stated if I fish from a boat? Or does the same principals apply no matter where I fish?

First I want to let you know that my sat map didn't allow me to look at your lake in any detail.

Yes a boat makes a lot of difference, you can go anywhere and set up your casting angles to optimize the presentation. From shore all the angles are casting out and retrieving back to shore.

When you are learning to fish soft plastics keep to 1 or 2 presentations until you are consistant at catching bass before adding other presentations. Depending on the depth you are fishing and the wind conditions, you want the weight as light as possible and still feel the bottom. With a boat you don't need the weight as heavy to cast, you can move the boat, making shorter casts.

Not knowing the depth to fish, which is critical, I would cover 1' to 20' until you start getting strikes, then focus on the depth the bass are more active in.

Tom

[TheBassfish3r]

What I have figured out is, 99% of the time a bluegill takes your bait, you will feel multiple little bumps. Sometimes they will pull and it may feel like a bigger fish but it is just the bluegill trying to not let the prey get away. If it was a bass, you will feel heavy weight that doesn't move. as soon as you feel the weight and start to pull up slightly to figure out if it's a fish or not, it will pull back much, much harder then a bluegill. One thing I have heard that has really helped me is "hook sets are free, don't be afraid to set the hook. Use them as much as possible". If you set the hook, I tend to pull straight up instead of going to the side. Setting straight up will guarantee a hook set instead of a side hook set which has the chance of pulling the bait out of the mouth of the fish.

[BillinDurham]

I just started fishing again.  After some cranking and spinner baiting I started playing with some T-rigged worms.  Kept hearing about this Senko stuff, studied up, bought a bag and started fishing one in an area where I've been unable to raise a single bass on anything else.

 

On a 2nd or 3rd cast I got the spinning reel equivalent of a bad backlash (flourocarbon on spinning reel can be a challenge).  I decided to handline in the worm so I could cut out the knot and re-rig.  Hmmm, something seems to be on the end of it.  Once I realize it was a fish, I went back to the reel, and ended up with a perfectly lipped hooked chunky 3 pounder.  Whoa!

 

I don't know how that happened, but I'll be working with these tasty sinking salty worms a lot more.

 

Great thread for us novice worm people.  Thanks.

[Loop_Dad]

forget about hawgzilla for a second.   many fish you'll come across are dinks to medium size.  smaller bass will hold on to a senko and don't even mind playing tug of war. bait fish fight like heck when trying to get away so many small fish like the pull/fight of a senko. 

strictly for understanding the tap feel... keep ur rod at 10 o'clock and watch ur line tighten.  then you'll feel the rod tip bend.  this would be a good time to drop, reel up slack and set hook.  

you can take it farther and even let the rod tip bend and play tug of war. obviously don't use this method alot b/c if you wait too long you'll gut hook the fish (I'll post hook removal). it will def help you understand the whole process. 

getting back to hawgzilla..there is very little chance of you gut hooking his old wise @$# while trying this and if you learn the bite feel/hook set there is a much better chance of you catching the beast

http://www.electric-bass.org/throughTheGill.htm

 

x2.

 

Having hi-vis line helps to watch the line move in low light condition. I think about the size of bait vs size of average fish when I time the hook set. I do not want to wait too long with 4" senko. Also I recommend pinching the barb with single hook with small bait as it is easy to gut hook as you are practicing the timing.

[Loop_Dad]

I just started fishing again.  After some cranking and spinner baiting I started playing with some T-rigged worms.  Kept hearing about this Senko stuff, studied up, bought a bag and started fishing one in an area where I've been unable to raise a single bass on anything else.

 

On a 2nd or 3rd cast I got the spinning reel equivalent of a bad backlash (flourocarbon on spinning reel can be a challenge).  I decided to handline in the worm so I could cut out the knot and re-rig.  Hmmm, something seems to be on the end of it.  Once I realize it was a fish, I went back to the reel, and ended up with a perfectly lipped hooked chunky 3 pounder.  Whoa!

 

I don't know how that happened, but I'll be working with these tasty sinking salty worms a lot more.

 

Great thread for us novice worm people.  Thanks.

 

I believe some folks use hand lining technique and call it "twitching".

 

Edit actually "stitching".