How Do You Know???

[TommyBass]

Heres a question that Im not sure has an answer but here it goes....   You have all sorts of soft plastics in your tackle box.... worms, lizards, creatures, tubes, etc.  All pretty much immitate a crawdad type thing to fish.  How do you guys choose which type to start off with ?  I can catch fish on all of them but sometimes it seems as if one will do better then the other and I dont know why...  it seems like something like a brush hawg would catch the same fish a plastic crawdad does but it dosnt all the time.  So guess all I am sayin is how do you guys choose which type of plastic to go with when you have so many at hand to choose from?

[roadwarrior]

These are not really guidlines, I'm just telling you what I do:

Weightless in water <12' where I can fish slow. For me that's Fat Ika or Senkos. I have NEVER fished these plastics with weight.

For deeper water or where I have to fish fast (only because someone I'm fishing with fishes fast), I'll go with a Gitzit or a lizard. I also like Kut-Tail on a jighead around docks and steep or stepped blufs. I have not fished the Kreature much and have nothing, good or bad, to say about the lure.

I'm going to Bull Shoals in a couple of weeks and plan to devote a few hours to the Hula Grub (GYTC's version of the spider grub).

[Shad_Master]

A lot of it just comes with experience on that particular body of water.  If I am having a tough day, I may change baits 30 or 40 times until I find something that seems attractive.  I also try to keep a mental notebook (because I am too lazy to keep a real one :-[) about what worked where and when and will start with that.  Also, I have a tendency to be stubborn and sometimes will stay with something longer than I should when it is not working.

This past week end I lucked out and started hitting fish right away.  But when things slowed down, I made a change but kept in mind that the bait they had been hitting on had red flakes.  I had tried a green bait with gold flake in the same area and got nothing.  So when I changed, I made sure that it was to something with some red on it and they started hitting the new bait.

Also, keep in mind the structure and cover that you are fishing.  If the area has lots of weeds, reeds, etc. you may want to try someing with some wiggle in it like a lizard or a crawdad.  If you know what the forage is, this can help you also.

[fun_all_wrong]

I usualy change it up depending on what Im fishing or what I have rigged....  also on what fish are doing.

stumps brush- brush hog- yum wooly hawg tail

lay downs- worm/brush hog

rocky bottom/ skitish fish.

I fish a tube on a different rod than the above baits because of the way I rig it (usualy)

so I will throw it sometimes too- but not much lately- its been cold on me...

[BD]

I change baits hardly ever. I fish a worm matching the provided covers color. If the lake is clear but kind of greenish, I use a greenish worm.

etc.