Paddle tails

[Jonas Staggs]

I have only caught 1 fish ever on a paddle tail. Everything I read/watch about them talks about slow rolling them. Do you guys use any different retrieve? How do you rig them? I heard of drop shotting them but haven't tried. Has anyone fished one under a slip bobber? The one fish I got was unpegged Texas rig.

[Ski]

Are you referring to something like this ?

 

[Jonas Staggs]

1 hour ago, Ski said:

Are you referring to something like this ?

 

 

Yes

[Ski]

Several ways to rig this bait. 

Texas with a wide gap hook and swim it.

Belly weighted hook with a screwlock. and swim it.

Use it as a trailer on buzz baits, swim jigs chatterbaits etc.

https://www.bassresource.com/bass-fishing-videos/paddle-tail-swimbaits.html

[softwateronly]

2 hours ago, Ski said:

Several ways to rig this bait. 

Texas with a wide gap hook and swim it.

Belly weighted hook with a screwlock. and swim it.

Use it as a trailer on buzz baits, swim jigs chatterbaits etc.

https://www.bassresource.com/bass-fishing-videos/paddle-tail-swimbaits.html

 

Any open hook jighead too, I’m a fan of the guppy head from dirty jigs and owner round ball jig heads. 
 

scott

[casts_by_fly]

Yep, exactly what the last two posters said.  An open hook jighead in rocky areas (weedless in grass or wood) and bounce it along.  Try lighter heads for a slower presentation or heavier stuff to burn it along.  An underspin if you want more flash.  Throw one on the back of a swim jig and that's my standard combo.  I don't like them on a chatterbait or buzzbait, but they add a little wiggle to a spinnerbait and some bulk for the fish to inhale.  Tons of options depending on the cover you're fishing.

[WIGuide]

They're straight up fish catchers. One of the baits I have tied up in some iteration 24/7 365. There are a ton of possibilities out there on how to fish them. Probably my favorite way to fish them is with a belly weighted swimbait hook. Retrieve will vary based on the fish activity it could be anything from a slow crawl to a pretty fast retrieve occasionally popping or killing it. I like throwing them on a Buckeye J-Will swimbait head around sparse cover or early in the year before there's much grass. In addition, they make great swim jig and spinnerbait trailers too. 

[Functional]

I'll put them on a wide gap hook weightless and throw them in really heavy laydowns and weeds. I'll crawl them out and fish em like I would a jerkbait, couple sharp snaps and let it rest 2-3 seconds. Trick is to not let it sit too long or it starts sinking unnaturally. 

 

Edit: a standard fluke I'll do the same with but it gives it a much better darting action. sometimes they prefer one over the other. 

[Captain Phil]

14 minutes ago, Functional said:

I'll put them on a wide gap hook weightless and throw them in really heavy laydowns and weeds. I'll crawl them out and fish em like I would a jerkbait, couple sharp snaps and let it rest 2-3 seconds. Trick is to not let it sit too long or it starts sinking unnaturally. 

 

Edit: a standard fluke I'll do the same with but it gives it a much better darting action. sometimes they prefer one over the other. 

 

Gambler Flapp'n Shad

[Functional]

3 minutes ago, Captain Phil said:

 

Gambler Flapp'n Shad

 

 

You are the 2nd guy in 3 days to tell me to try one, must be a sign lol. Ran into a guy as I was launching my boat saturday and he said thats all he could catch them on.

 

I won quite a bit of freebies from Zoom and I've been working through the hoard or stuff I got through that but I'll have to pick up a pack and see how they do. 

[Captain Phil]

19 minutes ago, Functional said:

 

You are the 2nd guy in 3 days to tell me to try one, must be a sign lol. Ran into a guy as I was launching my boat saturday and he said thats all he could catch them on.

 

Pull it on top like a buzz bait.  Throw it back into the pads and pull it out.  Hang on!

[MickD]

Rig it as instructed earlier and try varied retrieves.  Slow and steady, slow lift and fall, and also a fairly sharp snap from the bottom.  The last retrieve is made by counting down to find the bottom, then on subsequent retrieves, just before it hits, or as it hits, snap the rod tip up about 2 feet, drop the rod tip taking up the slack, and let it fall again on a slightly taut line.  Great smallie and walleye lure.

[scaleface]

Heres one way of fishing it that  lucked onto a few years back . I found fish relating to a point with my sonar that were correctly identified as bass . I tried cranks and worms but could not get a bite . I then tried hopping a paddle-tail grub on a jig-head with open hook and still no takers .    I experimented, lifting the bait high off the bottom then kept the line tight allowing   it to pendulum  back and got bit.   Caught a bunch more afterwards that way . 

[FrnkNsteen]

Don't know why anyone would use them on a dropshot or slip bobber. The paddletail is there to give it a swimming action when retrieved. Needs to be noving for the tail to swim

[PhishLI]

12 hours ago, Jonas Staggs said:

I have only caught 1 fish ever on a paddle tail.

Keitech Swing Impact and Fats and their various clones work in many places. However, in some places they don't. It doesn't matter if they're rigged on a swimbait hook, a jig head, how they're retrieved, or if prayers are chanted before they're thrown. In four of my favorite lakes the bass won't touch them whether they're thrown by me or anyone else I know. Perhaps each water body was hammered with Keitech types somewhere in the past and now the fish are simply resistant to them? Perhaps the tail wag is too extreme? I can speculate all day long as to why, but nothing will change the fact that they simply don't get bit here. Not for me, or for anyone else I fish with.

 

That said, it's quite possible that you'll have the opposite experience where you fish when using them, but if you do not, don't throw in the towel on paddletails. There are plenty of other options out there with more realistic profiles and actions, and several of those are amongst my top producers in the same four lakes I mentioned earlier.

[Bird]

My standard rig is a 1/8 belly weighted screw lock swimbait hook.

They are outstanding fish catchers in the clear water I fish.

Excellent on an underspin as well.

I'm kinda partial to Keitech.

[Jar11591]

Paddle-tails are one of the most versatile bass baits. There aren’t many ways they won’t catch fish. They work great Texas rigged, on a jig head, as a jig or spinnerbait trailer, on a drop shot, ned rig, or weightless. Rage Swimmers are my favorite paddle tails. 

[Jonas Staggs]

5 hours ago, Functional said:

I'll put them on a wide gap hook weightless and throw them in really heavy laydowns and weeds. I'll crawl them out and fish em like I would a jerkbait, couple sharp snaps and let it rest 2-3 seconds. Trick is to not let it sit too long or it starts sinking unnaturally. 

 

Edit: a standard fluke I'll do the same with but it gives it a much better darting action. sometimes they prefer one over the other. 

 

Flukes work good for me 

[KSanford33]

Just about everything has been covered, but let me add one more.

 

If you fish rivers or other fisheries with bridge pilings, drag one of these on an open jig head past the pilings. I've had numerous smallies on the Mohawk river just crush these when the pass the piling.

[Jonas Staggs]

5 hours ago, FrnkNsteen said:

Don't know why anyone would use them on a dropshot or slip bobber. The paddletail is there to give it a swimming action when retrieved. Needs to be noving for the tail to swim

 

I was under the impression drop shotting them was a well known technique, it's called drop swimming. Under a slip bobber would be real similar to drop shotting but it could float along, the current plus some pops would get the tail to kick, that was my thought process anyways.

 

What made me think of it is one day I saw a bait fish resting on the top, I had a very hard time figuring out whether it was a old paddle tail floating around or a actual fish untill it swam off. I was fishing over about a 10 ft bridge so I wasn't close up.

 

It's a finesse technique, I primarily UL fish and when I want to get a little heavier, I finesse fish. Anyways here's a good video about it.

 

https://youtu.be/Te5OS9r6zZo

[FrnkNsteen]

1 hour ago, Jonas Staggs said:

 

I was under the impression drop shotting them was a well known technique, it's called drop swimming. Under a slip bobber would be real similar to drop shotting but it could float along, the current plus some pops would get the tail to kick, that was my thought process anyways.

 

What made me think of it is one day I saw a bait fish resting on the top, I had a very hard time figuring out whether it was a old paddle tail floating around or a actual fish untill it swam off. I was fishing over about a 10 ft bridge so I wasn't close up.

 

It's a finesse technique, I primarily UL fish and when I want to get a little heavier, I finesse fish. Anyways here's a good video about it.

 

https://youtu.be/Te5OS9r6zZo

Hmmm,... Learn something new every day! I had never heard of that. I guess I could see that in a current maybe.

 

Just watched the video and seems like he is swimming the dropshot like a bottim bouncer in walleye fishing. That makes sense. I was originally thinking of stationary dropshot where you let it sit and just jiggle it when I said I didn't understand it.

 

Another way I have seen people use them is on a Tokyo Rig, which is basically the same as the video, only with a short rigid weight.

Edited January 25, 2023 by FrnkNsteen
Additional comments

[Jonas Staggs]

52 minutes ago, FrnkNsteen said:

Hmmm,... Learn something new every day! I had never heard of that. I guess I could see that in a current maybe.

 

Just watched the video and seems like he is swimming the dropshot like a bottim bouncer in walleye fishing. That makes sense. I was originally thinking of stationary dropshot where you let it sit and just jiggle it when I said I didn't understand it.

 

Another way I have seen people use them is on a Tokyo Rig, which is basically the same as the video, only with a short rigid weight.

 

 

Yeah not a fan of the Tokyo, I have never tried it but don't feel the need to. I tried slip float fishing today for the first time. Learned the hard way and something they don't seem to say in the videos is don't us it with braid. Bobber stop knicked the guides on the way out and caused multiple tangles. I was only trying about 10 ft depth. 

 

I only started using the drop shot for a few years now. The way they say in all the videos to remain stationary is great, but you can also cast out and hop it back, hop hop stationary hop hop. You can fish it anyway you want really. I like it quite a bit, it's very effective and you can do it weedless as well. If you don't use it you should definitely give it a shot 

[Koz]

Underspin, underspin, underspin!

[Jmontgomery87]

Every bass I've caught this January has been on a Keitech swing impact on a 1/4 oz Berkeley Fusion swim bait jig head. Definitely a cold water confidence bait for me. All we're caught slow rolling just over the bottom.

[Mike L]

8 hours ago, Koz said:

Underspin, underspin, underspin!

One of my biggest last year came on a Skinny Dipper with a nickel Duz-It underspin. 
 

They just couldn’t lay off it. 
 

 

 

 

Mike