Over my winter break I got the chance to check out a couple of fishing shows. It was at The Let’s Go Fishing Show in Collinsville, IL that I got to listen to a seminar by Bassmaster Elite Series Pro Kelly Jordan on the art of fishing swimbaits. Kelly Jordan has proven that he knows a thing or two about throwing a swimbait. He has used swimbaits to score a couple of top tournament finishes.
Kelly said that the biggest mistake anglers make when throwing a swimbait is that they try to impart too much action in the bait. Everybody wants to throw a swimbait out there and real it fast like a rattle trap or they want to give it a lot of added action with hops of the rod. The secret to presenting a swimbait is to try and reel them as slow as possible most of the time without imparting any action of the rod. He says it blows peoples mind when they get in the boat with me and I’m just throwing the bait out there and slowly reeling it back to the boat nice and easy. You want to also on the retrieve try and create a small bow in the line. That little bit of slack in the line allows the bait to swim with natural action which is key for catching the big ones.
When it comes to choosing what kind of swimbaits to throw he says that the soft plastic ones are the best. The pros have noticed that they catch a lot more and bigger bass throwing soft plastic baits like the Lake Fork Trophy Lures “Live” Magic Shad than the hard plastic jointed ones. The fish seem to hit these kinds of baits a lot harder and they seem to generate the most strikes. Sometimes the hard plastic ones will produce more but day in and day out your bread and butter swimbaits are the soft plastic ones.
Along with giving the bait the correct presentation you need to have the right kind of rods for the job. Kelly said you want to make sure you have a heavy action rod with a soft tip that is at least 7 foot. The line size to use is 17 to 20lb fluorocarbon because it sinks Sometimes mono line can work to your advantage if the situation arises where you want to float your bait a little higher on the retrieve say for instance if you are fishing grass. When it comes to setting the hook its best to hammer them. Kelly described swimbait bites as one of the most vicious strikes you will ever experience. Often times he says the fish will literally try and rip the rod out of your hands. The fish flat out hammer them.
The best conditions for throwing a swimbait according to Kelly are when it is sunny and there is a bit of wind. The fish are able to see the bait but at the same time the wind breaks up the surface condition just enough so that they can’t get the best look at it. The worst kind of conditions you can get for throwing a swimbait are when it is dead calm. Elite Pro Terry Scroggins was also at the seminar and he was able to chime in on what fishing a swimbait is like under the wrong conditions. He said it is truly amazing how many 6 to 8lbers you will see following your bait. He says it can get so addicting because you want to believe that one of them is going to actually commit to the bait but if it’s the wrong kind of conditions you are just setting yourself up for a lot of heart breakers.
After listening to these Pros talk about throwing swimbaits I can’t wait to get out on the lakes around here. There are plenty of Ozark lakes around here where there is enough water clarity for a swimbait bite to turn on it’s just going to take some practice to become a master of it. In order to check out the Lake Fork Trophy Lures “Live” Magic Shad please visit http://www.lftlures.com/categories/soft-plastics-lft-live-magic-shad
Good Fishing and God Bless!
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