Do bass actually care about the action in stick baits?

[Shak Muscles]

I know all the fishermen go crazy about the action, the "wiggle" of stick baits and such. I was wondering have there been any studies done with bass in a controlled environment presented with lures with different action to see if the bass react differently. I did a quick Google search but couldn't find much. 

 

I ask this because to me it seems more that fisherman are more enamored by the action of a lure than a bass might be. The ever so slight different in the wiggle between say a senko and dinger drives fisherman crazy! But do they actually drive bass crazy?

 

For me personally, I seem to catch the same amount of fish on any stick bait, and the more important factor is probably sink rate because it sinks to the bottom faster, and since I'm relatively impatient this helps a lot. 

[papajoe222]

Hello Neighbor.  Yes, bass do care about the action of, not only stick worms, but most slow presentations and that includes jerkbaits and some other hard baits.  Bass are first and foremost sight feeders. They will use other senses when feeding and under certain conditions they may rely on them more than seeing, but even in murky water getting their attention is your number one priority and their sight is what they rely on most. Even action tail worms that are the same length and color vary from one brand to another and from ribbon tail to G-tail, to Rage tail. Often times one will get bit when others get ignored.

You need look no farther than the success of stick worms and presentations like the Ned rig. The only sense they appeal to is the bass' sight. Try fishing the river with a Ned rig. It'll make a believer out of you.

[BuzzHudson19c]

The action definitely matters. To the degree between each brand may be negligible. Personal preference, I like dingers and shim e sticks.

 

Tie a pencil on wacky rigged and see what happens.

[MIbassyaker]

33 minutes ago, Shak Muscles said:

I know all the fishermen go crazy about the action, the "wiggle" of stick baits and such. I was wondering have there been any studies done with bass in a controlled environment presented with lures with different action to see if the bass react differently. I did a quick Google search but couldn't find much. 

 

 

 

If you're talking about publically-available study results on stickbaits, I doubt there are any accessible, and even if there was a controlled study demonstrating one stickbait outperformed another, the results would be dismissed by most anglers as inconsistent with their own experiences, and not applicable to real-world fishing scenarios in natural environments.

[Paul Roberts]

I think I agree with you. Sink rate is the most important thing to me. However does action matter?

 

In many soft plastic baits, yes, absolutely. I spend the time to boil or modify many baits to get better action.

 

Stickworms are attractive via their shape alone however. And there has been such a study, done at Pure Fishing by Dr. Keith Jones. That cigar shape is uniquely attractive to bass. However, I still boil some of my stick worms. Senkos are so heavy they produce that quiver on the fall that appears to help -maybe. But some lighter (less salt) worms i do boil as a wriggling twitch seems to trigger bites especially well. 

 

A lot of bass will fall for any old stick worm, but I think certain action elements trigger even better.

[WRB]

The only evidence you need is; do they catch bass.

Bass are predators that rarely eat dead bait. I spent lot of hours fishing live bait in the mid 60's to early 70's because the excepted belief was Florida strain LMB transplanted in San Diego city lakes avoided most artifical lures. They would eat hand poured straight tail worms occasionally but live crawdads, waterdogs and shiners were the baits they could be caught on consistantly. Fresh dead crawdads, waterdogs or shiners only caught catfish, the critters had to be lively.

Time tends to change precieved concepts and artifical lures did work if the bass were active feeding, then the bass would strike a wide variety of lures. 

I came to the conclusion trying to catch inactive bass was futile, active bass are easy.

Present a stick bait soft plastic to a active feeding bass and it will strike it if it looks alive by making movements even slight ones.

Tom

[QUAKEnSHAKE]

Bass will take a deadsticked senko even after a good ten minutes of non-movement. Ill toss one out and cast with another set-up in the meantime.

[Bluebasser86]

They'll eat a weightless trick worm on the fall, which has very little movement. I think the main thing is, it looks like a potential easy food item and bass don't have hands to hold and examine a potential food item, so they must take it into their mouth to decide if it's food or not regardless of if they actually intend to eat the bait in the end or not. Personally, I don't get too caught up in what the bass think or care about, as long as the bait is putting them in my boat

 

[Catt]

Rate Of Fall

 

I've thrown Senkos, Dingers Tiki Sticks, Trick Sticks, & Ocho

 

They all have different rates of fall but pretty much the same action.

[scaleface]

12 hours ago, BuzzHudson19c said:

Tie a pencil on wacky rigged and see what happens.

I caught one on a cigarette butt.