Entry 39-1
Mark Davis
Mark Davis' Five Favorite Strike King Lures
Editor's Note: Thirty-eight-year-old Mark Davis, of Mount Ida, Arkansas, won the BASS Masters Classic in 1995, the Angler-of-the-Year title in 1995, 1998 and 2001, and is ranked third by www.bassfan.com for bass-fishing expertise.
Question: Mark, please list your top-five favorite Strike King lures.
Davis: My number-one lure is the ½-ounce Strike King Bitsy Flip. I like it because it’s a very-compact jig that weighs ½-ounce. You can flip it on big line and penetrate heavy cover or put a finesse jig into a lot of places you normally can’t.
What makes this lure so good is its flipping hook. So, when you get a bite on your big line in that heavy cover, you can get the bass out. To go along with that is the Strike King Bitsy Bug Crawfish trailer, which is designed to work on both the original Bitsy Bug and the Bitsy Flip. This crawfish trailer matches the colors of those lures with them.
Question: Where do you fish this lure?
Davis: I flip it in bushes, logs and matted grass -- anywhere I’ll fish any other rubber jig. I’ll even fish it on rock banks, rip-rap and rock piles. Its small compact size makes it different from my other jigs. Often, especially on highly-pressured lakes, simply downsizing is the key to getting bites. Most of the crawfish that bass eat are small anyway. A number of our jigs are often too big, especially in cold-water situations or where you have a lot of fishing pressure. That’s when downsizing is the way to go.
The Bitsy Flip is the only ½-ounce jig that I know of that has that weight. Strike King has put a lot of the weight on the shank of the hook. And the jig head is small, about like a ¼-ounce. Another good thing about this ½-ounce Bitsy Flip is the way it falls vertically, just like a crawfish. When you throw a crawfish in the water, it doesn’t sink tail first or head first. It has a vertical fall. When a crawfish falls, it swims and moves its legs and pincers and falls vertically. This jig falls vertically as well.
Contents:
- Part 1: Mark Davis' Five Favorite Strike King Lures
- Part 2: Davis On 3X Soft Plastics
- Part 3: Strike King Series 4S Crankbait Tactics
- Part 4: Davis on the Strike King Series 3 Crankbait
- Part 5: Mark Davis' Quad Shad
