Favorite wacky worms

[FishTank]

Senko 5in. I throw every time I am out on the water. I always catch something on it. I have tried many others and have a few that I will return to from time to time but the Senko has always produced the best. 

[WRB]

I have a difficult time calling a Senko a worm, it’s more than that.

Senko is #1

Flick Shake 4.8 is #2.

Roboworns Straight tails #3

Tom

[VTFan]

Zoom trick worms and Senko's for me.  I really loved the Dudley Wackys except they are not durable at all. No matter if I used rings or bands, one or two fish is all I could get out of one worm. 

[ike8120]

Yum Dingers

[Shadow1]

10 hours ago, AlabamaSpothunter said:

For weightless whacky rigging, exclusively Yamasenkos.   It's the king of weightless stick worm action, nobody has ever replicated its subtle shimmy action....some good YT videos comparing them all underwater.   For weighted applications including weighted whacky rigs, it doesn't matter what brand you go with in my book.  The weight is going to kill the stick worm action for the most part.  Maybe on a Free Rig, I'd go with the Yamasenko, again because of its natural shimmy action. 

 

That said, the biggest piece of advice I wish somebody gave me when I first bought a pack of stick worms to whacky rig was to buy the cheapest brand you can find to start off with, Yum, Academy brand name, or the BPS ones are good to start out with.

 

The reason for this is because confidence in baits is everything, the single most important aspect imho.   If you start out with GYB Yamasenkos at $7-8 a pack like I did and have fantastic success, there's no going back to Yum Dingers at $3-4 a pack.   I've tried, and in the back of your mind you always feel you'd be getting more bites, catching bigger fish with the more expensive ones.

 

The last week alone I've gone through $35-40 in senkos/VMC crossover rings.  I'd be broke if I used them outside the months of March and April lol.  

Wow . . . never more better words of wisdom spoken . . . I started out with the Yamamoto and just can't give them up.  I have tried every brand of stick bait you can name, and I just don't catch the fish I do with the OG.  A friend of mine and I did an uncontrolled experiment a few years ago . . . we went out on his boat, and were both wacky rigging.  He was using a Yum Dinger in watermelon/red flake, and me the OG in color 301.  About 2 hours later he said, "can I have some of those senkos".  I let him use some and he started catching fish.  

[BrianMDTX]

12 hours ago, Swamp Girl said:

Senkos. All the colors seem to work.

I’ve used Yum Dingers and tried Trick worms, etc. I’ve yet to find a bait for a wacky worm that works as well, consistently, like a 5” Senko. Any given day one may work well, but it’s a cold day in Hell when a Senko doesn’t catch a bass. 
 

This past Saturday was a cold day in Hell. 😂

[JHoss]

13 hours ago, AlabamaSpothunter said:

That said, the biggest piece of advice I wish somebody gave me when I first bought a pack of stick worms to whacky rig was to buy the cheapest brand you can find to start off with, Yum, Academy brand name, or the BPS ones are good to start out with.

 

The reason for this is because confidence in baits is everything, the single most important aspect imho.   If you start out with GYB Yamasenkos at $7-8 a pack like I did and have fantastic success, there's no going back to Yum Dingers at $3-4 a pack.   I've tried, and in the back of your mind you always feel you'd be getting more bites, catching bigger fish with the more expensive ones.

 

The last week alone I've gone through $35-40 in senkos/VMC crossover rings.  I'd be broke if I used them outside the months of March and April lol.  

On the flip side, you'll waste a lot of time fishing less effective worms. I started out with the dingers and the ochos when I first got into bass fishing. Thankfully, one day an old guy at work brought me a pack of Yamamoto's to try since he knew they were better. Fished a tournament that weekend and threw a Dinger around for 6+ hours without a bite. Switched to a Senko on the paddle back to the ramp and instantly started catching fish. I've never looked back. That's not to say I haven't experimented. But I can't find anything else that has the right shimmy and sink rate as a true Senko.

[MN Fisher]

51 minutes ago, JHoss said:

But I can't find anything else that has the right shimmy and sink rate as a true Senko.

That's true for weightless, and I use Yama-Senkos for that...but if you're doing a weighted wacky (1/16oz-1/8oz) a lot of the others get back that shimmy just fine. Something about the slightly faster fall on a jig-head wacky vs a bare hook. Steve Rogers shot a vid about exactly that, and he tested 21 different stickbaits.

 

So weightless, definitely the Yamamoto - but if i'm tossing weighted wackys, I'm putting a Yum Dinger on.

 

I also don't use rings but cut lengths of vinyl tubing that I use a $8 'nasal speculum' to rig with....you might recognize that tool as the same one that the fishing tackle guys charge $20 or more for...it's the exact same thing, but they upcharge cause it has 'fishing' in the name.

Tubing is $10 for 10', which is enough for 240 sleeves, and a tubing cutter is around $8

[JHoss]

27 minutes ago, MN Fisher said:

That's true for weightless, and I use Yama-Senkos for that...but if you're doing a weighted wacky (1/16oz-1/8oz) a lot of the others get back that shimmy just fine. Something about the slightly faster fall on a jig-head wacky vs a bare hook. Steve Rogers shot a vid about exactly that, and he tested 21 different stickbaits.

It is extremely rare for me to fish a weighted wacky around here. The cost saving is not worth the space they'd take up to get used once a year. 

[TOXIC]

It really does me good to see the positive reviews of the Senko.  So many won’t throw it out of sheer oppositional defiance.  It’s almost like they don’t want it to work.  Is it magic, no….does it work all the time, no….but on sheer numbers, I can’t say any other brand has come close.  I know that opens the door to all the responses like xyz brand is just as good, etc., and I say if that’s the bait you have confidence in, then by all means throw it.  I also quantify my Senko seminars with the statement that as soon as you weight a Senko, you might as well use a knockoff. I also don’t wacky rig.  I use Senkos in a number of weighted applications but it’s not because I think they work better, it’s because I am sponsored and Yamamoto  is the only plastics that are in my boat.  You might bring something different but you won’t see me throwing it.  Most often my friends just happen to leave their plastics at home when they get in my boat. 🤔😆

[MN Fisher]

14 minutes ago, JHoss said:

The cost saving is not worth the space they'd take up to get used once a year. 

There is that - while I'm tossing wackys; weightless and weighted; all season. Whether it's along weed edges, skipping under docks or tossing under overhanging trees - a wacky and I are good friends from spring through fall.

[C.Tucks]

The Daiwa/Yamamoto Neko Fat is hands down my favourite 

[RRocket]

I'm the opposite, I suppose.

 

I started off with Senko but ended up with Flick Shake.

[Big Hands]

16 hours ago, WRB said:

I have a difficult time calling a Senko a worm, it’s more than that.

Senko is #1

Flick Shake 4.8 is #2.

Roboworns Straight tails #3

Tom

 

Same here, except my number three would be a C3 Slim Pro (a local plastic artist). It's a Senko shape, but about the same diameter as a Flick Shake.

[Bankbeater]

Senko, BPS Stiko.

[Harold H]

11 hours ago, TOXIC said:

It really does me good to see the positive reviews of the Senko.  So many won’t throw it out of sheer oppositional defiance.  It’s almost like they don’t want it to work.  Is it magic, no….does it work all the time, no….but on sheer numbers, I can’t say any other brand has come close.  I know that opens the door to all the responses like xyz brand is just as good, etc., and I say if that’s the bait you have confidence in, then by all means throw it.  I also quantify my Senko seminars with the statement that as soon as you weight a Senko, you might as well use a knockoff. I also don’t wacky rig.  I use Senkos in a number of weighted applications but it’s not because I think they work better, it’s because I am sponsored and Yamamoto  is the only plastics that are in my boat.  You might bring something different but you won’t see me throwing it.  Most often my friends just happen to leave their plastics at home when they get in my boat. 🤔😆

I'm one of those people, lol. I know it works, I just don't want to throw it. So if a guy is slammin em next to me with it, will I slap one on? Maybe, but I have no confidence in it, because it doesn't suit my style of fishing, which is generally chuck and wind. Many have been stubborn towards a lure, color, etc., and missed a lot of fish over the years. But I can guarantee without confidence in what you're throwing, your results may not be good. But confidence in a lure is gained by putting the time in to throw it and catch fish on it.

 

Roland Martin told Gary that if he released the Senko to the public his company would fail, lol. I've seen Roland catch so many big bass on Senko's, I gotta learn how to use them

[GetFishorDieTryin]

There are so many good ones.  I really like GBs Rattlesnake, Gene Larews Tattle Tail, Zooms Mag Finesse, and Senko, but my favorite is a Zinker.  I dont lose many worms and I dont have to use an O ring.  Ive pulled senkos out of fish but not from their mouth.  Since a zinker stays on the hook really well they don't wind up a fish's stomach.  The only bad part about a zinker is the inconsistency.  The weight of the worm changes as the salt content decreases.  That changes the action and sink rate.

[GRiver]

BPS and Yum is what I use the most

[Big Hands]

11 hours ago, Harold H said:

I gotta learn how to use them

 

Try as I might, I just didn't get it for many years until I was out night fishing and ran into a friend at about 11:00 pm. I had been doing OK too, but he said he and his son were killin em on Senkos. So, I sat and watched them for a while, and then finally rigged one up and did the ol' monkey see, monkey do that is one of my most preferred learning styles.

 

What works for me is to rig it wacky style with the hook about two or three rings toward the more pointed end from the 'egg sack', often with an o-ring if I have them with me. On sloping points, I rarely fish them deeper than 10' deep. On steep shorelines, or bluff walls, I don't worry much about the depth because I am casting it right up against the bluff wall, or within two feet of the bank.

 

The bait itself does it's thing all by itself if you let it sink straight down. I leave the line fairly slack as it sinks, and I can often still feel a bite, or I see the line either jump or start moving in a way that tells me that a creature of some sort has it. I call the falling action the "wooba-wooba". I don't impart ANY action to the bait other than a couple of lifts after the initial fall. If I haven't been bit by then, I usually reel it in and cast again because my chances of getting bit after that go down substantially. 

 

When I get bit, I use the same 'hookset' as when dropshot fishing. I don't swing. Just lower the tip, reel down, and then a very firm lift. The fish will het set the hook when they feel the firm lift.

 

I don't know if you dare fish 10 lbs braid (I like hi-vis) with a 6-8 lbs fluoro leader on a medium light  spinning rod in your neck of the woods, but that's my preferred Senko combo. It's easier for me to let the bait sink straight down all on it's own with spinning gear, and this is EVERYTHING for this bait to work as it was intended to.

 

Lots of colors catch fish, but if in doubt, go with #297.

 

JMHO.

 

 

[33oldtimer]

Yum Dingers

[Harold H]

Has anyone tried the BPS Stik O? 16 for $5.99, the purple brown looks right up my alley

[Pat Brown]

Senko, Dinger, Trick Stick, Sassy Stick, Ocho, Bang Stick, Trick Worm, Mag trick worm.

 

Free rigging a wacky rigged bang stick is pretty cool.  You can let it float up and pull it back down.