Fish Lure Guide

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Your Fresh Water Lure & Bait Guide

Selecting and purchasing lures and baits at any Sporting Goods store can be an expensive experience if we are not careful. Like a lot of anglers, I own a lot of lures that cost more than a few dollars that got fished a great deal and never caught more than a fish or two. I have carefully set those aside in an old tackle box. Perhaps someday they will be a collectors item. That will be the second sucker they caught. I was the first!

Hard Baits
Soft Baits
Swim Baits
Jigs

Your Fresh Water Species Guide

Each of the following pages is for one of the major fresh water species found here in North America. These will help anglers select the lures and baits that have been most successful for the species.

Small Mouth Bass

Large Mouth Bass
Walleye

Northern

Muskie

Salmon

Steelhead

Panfish & Crappie

Smallmouth Bass

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Smallmouth Bass are very a aggressive species and are wonderful fighters. They can be finicky about what they eat at certain times, but even then they will instinctively react when you drop a lure in front of their nose.

Smallmouth forage for crayfish, shiners, chubs, perch & other panfish, minnows & other bait fish, leaches, larval stages of flies, and anything else alive in the water of the right size.

Right size is of course relative. We all have managed to catch some smaller than the lure we were using. That is when you know they are on the feed!

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Stick Baits

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Stick Baits

Now, come on, did you really think that Stick Baits were a different lure than Crank Baits?

Nope! They are the same thing just with a different name.

With all of the different local names for the same lures, manufacturers and sporting good stores have fantastic marketing tools at their disposal.

My dad called these baits “Plugs”. Perhaps I should have a separate category for that name too.

Nope, decided against that.

Call them what you will, I have written about them over at Crank Baits.

Spoons

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Spoons come in an amazing variety of shapes, sizes, colors, hook styles, etc. etc. etc. All seem to be effective in tempting a fish to strike. Most spoons are aptly named, as they are thinner in the center and thicker at the edges. This design creates turbulence when the spoon is retrieved and gives it a wobbling movement in the water. Most anglers I know have their own favorite spoons they have found that work well in many situations. Largemouth, Smallmouth, Walleye, Northern Pike, Lake Trout, Stripers and Muskie all will strike a spoon.

In my mind it is hard to go wrong when you shop for spoons. My favorite brands include Dardevle, Krocodile and Johnson. The Johnson Silver Spoon is a great lure for use over thick Hydrilla or lily pads. I like the heavier elongated Krocodile for deep water jigging. For casting and trolling I use several Dardevle spoons. The Dardevle Imp is a big favorite along with the red and white, black and white, hot mackerel, and the Five of Diamonds. I laughed at that lure when it came out, but after seeing my fishing companions catch nice fish with it, I wised up and got several.

My brother taught me to have a pole rigged with a spoon when casting other lures. Dropping the spoon and jigging it or doing figure eights in the water after a follow up will often trigger a strike.
To get the most action and movement from a spoon always put a split ring in the eye.

Substituting Technical Locking Curve hooks hooks will aid in getting better hook sets. Wire hooks will help prevent the loss of a lure when hung up as the wire hooks can straighten out and release.

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Spinner Baits

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The safety pin Spinner Bait is a highly popular bait among anglers. Because of the long blade arm it may need realignment after vicious strikes and difficult hang-ups. This bait is well suited for deep and slow bottom fishing.

The L-shaped spinner baits are a hybrid with characteristics of other lure styles. They have lead jig heads with a straight piece of wire coming out of the head ending with a swivel and a spinner blade. The primary difference in this type and the safety pin is that the line is tied to the lead head, rather than at a bend of the wire frame. Their action in the water with a slow retrieve does produce strong strikes. It can be quite productive when flipping, but it does hang up easily.
In-line Spinner Baits are the lure of choice for many anglers. It performs well for many species, including; Smallmouth, Largemouth, Northern Pike, Muskie, and Lake Trout. In-line buzz baits are extremely good performers. You can fish them across the top of the thickest cover and they are stable, almost weed less and they have an excellent hook set percentage.

There are a large number of variations of blades, skirts, hooks and colors to choose from. For anglers that are just getting started and have yet to purchase a Spinner Bait, one can hardly go wrong by starting with a Johnson Beetle Spin and a Mepps Black Fury. Fish those two spinners to get started and while you are out on the water carefully observe what other anglers are using and how they work their bait. After a season of fishing, you then can judge what other spinners you should acquire.

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Crank Baits

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Bait manufacturers have a huge assortment of lures and baits that can be called Crank Baits. Crank Baits are generally shaped like a bait fish and have a lip that helps control the depth the bait will run. With multiple treble hooks along the body of the bait these lures have hooked almost as many anglers as fish. Be cautious in handling them.

Crank Bait manufacturers frequently have various sizes and colors of the same model. Each has been designed for a specific water depth. Usually the larger the lip the deeper these lures can run. Certain designs are intended to target specific species, but when fish are hungry they will strike at anything that looks like food.

But the depth your Crank Bait will actually run will depend on a number of factors. The size of the lip on the bait, the density of the bait, the size and type of line used and the leader, the speed of your retrieve and the angle in which you hold your rod will all affect both the action of the lure and the depth it runs. You can quickly learn how retrieve your lure so that it runs at a different depth for each cast. Regardless of the manufacturer claims, most of the running depth of a lure is under your control.

Color is very subjective, but the greatest criteria for color selection is based on the water you will be fishing and the weather conditions when you are fishing. The fish must be able to see your lure, so a black lure in turbid water on a dark overcast day is not a good choice.

While your local store may have a huge assortment of Crank Baits; regardless of where you are fishing or the species you are targeting you do not need an equally huge assortment with you in the boat. If you have more than ten, you probably have too many. What you do want are a combination of different sizes, colors, and shapes that allow you to vary your presentation. Unless you are testing new equipment, you should base your selection on those baits that when retrieved have the look and action of a bait fish and have performed well in the past.

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