Essential Soft Plastics

[Ryanralston07]

I carry a small backpack with a couple 3700 sized utility boxes, so my lure selection is limited whether I'm fishing from the shore or kayak. What are your essential (maybe 3-5 styles) soft plastics for t-rigs? What colors, too?

[Mobasser]

Always a plastic worm is #1 for me. Too many good ones to list here, and they can all work. Plastic worms still rule.

[roadwarrior]

1. Senko

2. Fat Ika

3. Rage Bug

4. Menace

5. Gitzit

[Spankey]

Not sure how much color means. Too many colors and what I like may not appeal to you.  
I don’t fish big worms but always have a curly tail, straight tail and a cut tail on or ready to be on. Something you have to build confidence in. You might be all about Junebug, I might be motor oil. Quite different, who’s right, who’s wrong?

[Pat Brown]

Rage Craw

Mag Speed Worm

10" Power Worm

D Bomb

Zoom Super Fluke

 

Color is whatever you already have confidence in!

 

I throw all of these regularly in a variety of applications.

[Dreveal]

4" Berkley Power Worm- Motor Oil

 

Zoom Super Fluke Jr- white

 

3" Senko- green pumpkin

[JackstrawIII]

Senko

Rage Bug

Bellows Stick

GOAT 

[Fishlegs]

1. Senko

2. Rage Tail Menace

3. Brush Hog or Lizard

4. Trick Worm

5. Ribbontail Worm

 

Like most of us I have too many colors of each, but my color categorization is pretty simple:

1. Light (White, grey)

2. Green (watermelon, green pumpkin)

3. Dark (black/blue, june bug)

4. Red (tequilas, red bug/plum)

[Bankc]

Lizard.

 

I find the lizard to be the most versatile soft plastic out there.  You can rip the legs off and have a worm.  Rip the tail off and creature bait.  Rip the front legs off and tail and have a craw.  Rip the front half off and have a jig trailer.  Rip the legs and tail off and have a Ned rig.  Or just fish it as it comes. 

 

Outside of that, I just usually pack of bunch of whatever was on sale.  I've not found a magic bait yet, so I'm not particularly loyal to any one brand or color.  They all seem to have their days, so it's just a matter of going through the box until you find what the bait of the day is. 

[scaleface]

Dinger 

Gitzit

Whatever floats my boat.

[BrianMDTX]

1. Senko

 

2. Zoom Trick

 

3. Rage Craw

 

4. Rage Menace

 

5. Neko Macho/Fat IKA

[padlin]

The only essential plastics for me are the Rage craw and baby craws, in white. Any other plastics are just options. I do like black trick works.

[Spankey]

You’ll be busy with the bait monkey. 🙈 

[Hook2Jaw]

1.  ZOOM Trick Worm: Watermelon and Junebug.

 

2.  Yamamoto Senko: Green Pumpkin and Junebug.

 

3.  Missile D-Bomb: Super Craw and Lovebug

 

4.  ZOOM Ol' Monster: Watermelon and Junebug.

 

5: YUM Craw Chunk: Crawdad and Black Blue Shadow.

 

I could probably cut down to those 5 baits and feel comfortable anywhere.

[AlabamaSpothunter]

Since we're in the summer fishing season, I'll only list my summertime plastics....

 

1.  Missile Baits D Bomb and Destroyer 

 

2.  Zoom Ol' Monster and Magnum Lizard 

 

If they won't eat those, they're either not biting, or they're small fish.   Those four baits are what I consider big fish plastics.      These are being used primarily during the night.  

 

Colors:  Green pumpkins, black and blues, and purple/black grapes.   

 

Throw in some Free Rig weights, and a few packs of 4/0-5/0 Gama Nano Coated EWGs and I'm good to go.     

 

[CastingClinic]

When it comes to plastics I think more about action (a lot, a little or something in between), and profile (compact and chunky vs long and slender, etc.).

 

When it comes specifically to texas rigs, lizards, craws, beavers, and ribbon tail worms seem to find themselves behind a weight while most straight worms are rigged weightless.

 

As for color, in my opinion, there are only four.  Dark (black, junebug, etc), Natural (green pumpkin, watermelon, etc), Bright (chartreuse, bubblegum, etc), and White.  

 

 

[casts_by_fly]

I just did this exercise over the winter.  Last year I carried two overstuffed speedbags worth of plastics plus another 15-20 in the sides of my tackle bag.  However, I never dipped into most of it on any given trip so I consolidated a bunch of choices into a single 3700 that goes in the kayak all of the time and then during 'plastics season' I throw in the rest.

 

I'll say that I have a separate ned rig box (3700 extra deep, 2 section) that has ned plastics and heads/terminals.  That's a separate thing and I only take it if I have a spinning rod on the boat.  Similarly, I have a 3600 box with jigheads and jighead minnows that stays in the box all of the time so long as I have FFS with me.

 

My 3700 was consolidated down to:

- rage bugs (a couple sizes)

- rage menaces

- Zakos

- keitech SIF of various sizes

- rage craws and chunks

- senkos/dingers

- spunk shad

- one 'misc' section which has randoms that I want to try.  right now it has a couple rodents, a flipping tube, and something else I can't remember but want to give a go.

 

These are the things that I will use as trailers, on their own, on a jig head, or on a texas rig.  Throughout the year they will all catch fish so they stay in the bag all of the time.  I took a couple of each color and threw them all in together with like colors.  I overindex on green pumpkin variants (gin clear water here) but also have some black/blue, some brown/red, and a couple others depending on the plastic (white/silver for the baitfish imitators).

 

This time of year I throw the 2 speedbags in that have big worms, straight worms, dropshot worms, and a couple other things.  

[king fisher]

Zoom Ole Monster- Junebug ,or green pumpkin

Zoom Magnum Ole Monster- Junebug

Zoom Magnum trick worm- Junebug or Watermelon Candy

Zoom Trick worm - Green Pumpkin chart. tail

Magnum Rage Craw- Okeechobee Craw

 

[PaulVE64]

Smallmouth only

For colour I'm going black/blue, white or natural depending on conditions

Yum dinger/senko

Pit Boss/ adrenaline bug/Rage bug

Tube

Trick worm

Paddletail swimbait

Hula grub

Helgrammite

[bottom_dollar]

3.3 Keitech- pro blue red parl 

Zoom trick worm- green pumpkin magic 

Zoom UV Speedworm- green pumpkin 

Ragetail Menace- Green Pumpkin 

Zoom Baby brush- green pumpkin blue. 
If I could just limit myself to those 5 I would probably be a lot more organized and have more room for water and snacks 

[Mastercaster]

1. 8-inch Zoom Lizard - green pumpkin/chartreuse

2. Brush hog - baby & mid size - green pumpkin magic

3.  Tube bait - Strike King Watermelon Candy Green Pumpkin

4.  Culprit 7.5 inch original worm - red shad

5. Senko - dark color black/blue 

[WRB]

Roboworns

Yanamoto Senko & Grups

US Plastics Reaper and Screamers

Jackall  4.8 Flick Sajey worm

I still use both Iovino’s and Uptoms hand poured worms.

Tom

 

 

[thediscochef]

Everything that these guys said, and also the Mann's jelly worm 

[rgasr63]

Zoom products are on my A list most of the time for the mag II and the trick worm. I use a lot of zoom finesse worms also.

Shaky head,Neko rig goes to Dizzy Diamond. Old monster and rage tail space monkey and Rage craw get used too. I have a stockpile of pit boss to use too.

[bowhunter63]

Rage Bug 

Rage Craw

Zoom Fluke 

Zoom Trick Worm 

Senko