Soft Swim Baits

[zip pow]

River to sea 1 1/2 oz sexy shad they have lots of colors pick what you like I use them all

[Hooligan]

  On 10/6/2011 at 12:05 PM, Bass_Fanatic said:

So your turning the bait on its side and rigging it?

Exactly. We started doing it for pike on big swimbaits, and noticed that we were catching more big green fish rigging them that way. Works wonders.

RoLo, the only point that I might disagree on is that the body roll, or shimmy, is un-natural. If you see injured baitfish or bluegills in the water, they will hunch up and swim with a rolling action. Unless I'm misunderstanding you, that same action is what most paddle tails will do. For that matter, those baits that we have found that have no body rocking we've caught far fewer fish on side x side comparison to those that do.

I'm not going to name the swimbait I use because it's relatively unknown and already hard to get my hands on; perfectly snobbish and self-serving, I know. That said, I really dislike most paddle tail style baits. I don't like Hollow-bellies at all, usually. They're hard to get hooks through, and they're usually multiple layer laminates that tend to get torn up relatively easy. Worthless to me when I've got to re-rig after every fish. The most readily available bait that I fish with any consistency is the Bass Pro Shops XPS bait. It's got a great action and you can easily modify it to sink at better rates. It also has a relatively strong internal harness that will last through multiple fish. The Rago Line are all great baits as are the Trash Fish. The Trash Fish aren't terribly durable but you will get multiple fish from them.

[piscicidal]

Excellent post, Rolo!!

I agree with your rankings almost exactly. IMO, the skinny dipper/Big EZ are #1 and #1a, the nod going to either one on a particular day.

One additional comment I would make, though, is regarding the susceptibility to get weeded up. The skinny dipper has a very sleek, round nose on it. That bait slithers thru eel grass in a way that is nearly perfect in it's presentation, IMO. The Big EZ has a more blunt, squarish nose and does seem to hang up a little more often in the grass. However, I have caught some pretty big fish ripping that bait off of vegetation before, so getting hung up is not always a negative as long as you don't pick up the weed on the bait.

In general, I would say I catch more fish with the skinny dipper, but bigger fish with the EZ. When fishing eel/kissimmee grass, I usually start out with the dipper as a search bait and when I find them, change to the EZ looking for bigger fish.

[Dockhead]

Thanks everybody. Lots of great info. as usual.

Rolo, I love it when you reply to "Florida specific" posts. Your words of wisdom are becoming gospel to me. Haven't tried anything yet that you have suggested that didn't work out.

I'm not catching the hawgs that you post, but everything works as advertised none the less.

Still trying to get my hands on some of those Deps Deathaders, though.

Matt

[CWB]

  On 10/5/2011 at 1:18 AM, RoLo said:

For use in central Florida, the 'soft' paddletail minnow will rival any lure.

We've fished both ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ swimbaits, but our best success has been with "soft” swimbaits.

The reason is obvious, soft swimbaits are 'weedless' and can be fished smack in the best cover.

They're also cheaper than hard swimbaits, which is a welcome bonus.

For my own curiosity, I rated a small cross-section of different paddletail brands, based on

the 3 paddletail properties I feel are most important: Low-Speed Action - Tail Vibration - Body Stability

Low-Speed Action

Low-speed action is arguably the most important property, because slow-rolling and swimbaits go hand-in-hand.

The best paddletails remain active to a virtual standstill, and IMO those with tail lobes

that stall-out at low speeds belong in the dumpster

Tail Vibration

Generally speaking, the greater the area of the tail-lobe the greater the throb and vibration.

Thump and vibes are very important even in clear water,

because underwater visibility is sharply reduced in dense vegetation.

Body Stability

Although tail-action is desirable, body-action is not. Excessive body action might appeal to the angler,

but looks unnatural to the predator. The bugbear of the soft paddletail is "lateral instability", better known

as "Tail-Wagging-The-Dog". .Axial rotation is also unnatural, but is not as noticeable as sideward wagging.

In the shootout below, the 3 lure properties above are rated from 1 to 4:

4 = Excellent (12 = Perfect Total Score)

3 = Good

2 = Fair

1 = Poor

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

.............................................SWIM MINNOW SHOOTOUT

BIG EZ (Gambler)

Low-Speed Action..........4........Excellent.....(Tail-action persists to a virtual standstill)

Tail Vibration..............,....4........Excellent.....(Very large tail lobe)

Body Stability..................4........Excellent.....(Stability is further enhanced by flank-rigging)

TOTAL SCORE............12

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

SKINNY DIPPER (Reaction Innovations)

Low-Speed Action.........4........Excellent.....(Tail-action persists to near standstill)

Tail Vibration..................3........Good..........(Medium-sized tail-lobe)

Body Stability.................4........Excellent....(Some axial rotation)

TOTAL SCORE............11

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

SPLIT-BELLY SWIMBAIT (Berkley)

Low-Speed Action.........3........Good............(Tail quits a tad before standstill)

Tail Vibration..................4........Excellent......(Big vibes)

Body Stability.................3........Good............(Noticeable lateral shimmy)

TOTAL SCORE............10

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

PADDLETAIL SWIMBAIT (Basstrix)

Low-Speed Action..........2........Fair..............(Tail-action fizzle is the downfall of the Basstrix)

Tail Vibration..................4........Excellent......(Big vibes)

Body Stability..................4........Excellent......(Debatably the most stable soft paddletail minnow)

TOTAL SCORE............10

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

HOLLOW-BELLY SWIMBAIT (Berkley)

Low-Speed Action..........2........Fair..............(Tail quits too soon)

Tail Vibration...................4........Excellent......(Our top producer in 2009)

Body Stability..................3........Good............(Slight 'tail-wagging-the-dog' at high speeds)

TOTAL SCORE.............9

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

EZ SHAD (Roboworm)

Low-Speed Action..........2........Fair..............(Tail quits too soon)

Tail Vibration...................4........Excellent......(Great throb)

Body Stability..................3........Good............(Unstable at high speeds)

TOTAL SCORE.............9

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

BASS MAGIC (Lucky "E" Strike)

Low-Speed Action..........2........Fair..............(Tail quits too soon)

Tail Vibration...................4........Excellent......(Big vibes)

Body Stability..................1........Poor.............(Seriously "unstable")

TOTAL SCORE.............7

Roger

Roger-

Do you rig the Big-EZ and Skinny Dipper weightless and if so, do the remain upright? I'm sure the slower speed retreive will aid in this but if you speed them up, do the go off kilter?

[RoLo]

  On 10/13/2011 at 7:54 PM, CWB said:

Roger-

Do you rig the Big-EZ and Skinny Dipper weightless and if so, do the remain upright? I'm sure the slower speed retreive will aid in this but if you speed them up, do the go off kilter?

Wow, this query is an antique....just found it in my unread content

CWB, I don't fish swimbaits 'unweighted' but almost always use 1/4oz weight (more, but not less).

To exploit the weedless advantage, I work them over surface vegees, and keep them coming like a Johnson spoon.

The swimbait spends half its time climbing over pads and hyacinths much like a surface lure

But the 1/4oz weight gives the lure a subsurface bias and keeps the paddletail underwater (vibes are lost in the air).

Roger

[J Francho]

  On 9/24/2011 at 2:22 AM, gobig said:

one that I would have to add to this list is the Little Creeper Trash Fish.

Man, that's a good bait.

[gobig]

It is the most versitile soft swimbait I have come accross.