Entry 89-3

Chad Brauer’s Favorite Five Baits

Why I Like the Spinner Bait

Editor's Note: Chad Brauer of Osage Beach, Missouri, is only 31-years old but has been tournament fishing for 8 years. Married with two children, Brauer chooses for us this week his favorite baits and tells us why he enjoys fishing them.

Brauer: I like to fish shallow water and the heaviest cover I can find there. One of the biggest advantages that the spinner bait gives me is that it enables me to fish every section of the bank that I'm going down. For instance, I may be fishing a tree top or a bush top with a jig and a tube, and when I get through fishing that top, there may be 30 or 50 yards of open bank before I get to the next top. So, instead of just fishing from top to top, I'll use the spinner bait to fish down the banks between the tops. Many times I'll catch bass that I won't have caught if I only fish and pitch tops. In a 3-day tournament, by using the spinner bait to fish between the tops, you can often pick off one or two bass that can make the difference in how you finish in a tournament.

When I attack a tree laying in the water, I'll first fish it with a spinner bait to see if there are any aggressive bass holding in that top. Aggressive bass will usually take spinner baits. After I catch the aggressive bass, or even if I don't catch the aggressive bass, I'll fish the top with either a jig or a tube. Next, I'll pick up the spinner bait again and fish between the tops. The spinner bait gives me a three-pronged attack for fishing brush and heavy cover. I fish the spinner bait first, next I have the option of flipping or pitching jigs and tubes and then I go back to the spinner bait to fish down the bank when I'm leaving the cover. My favorite spinner bait is the Strike King Elite.

I choose the blades for my spinner bait based on the water and weather conditions. For instance, I like Colorado and Indiana blades when the water is muddy or cold. These blades allow me to slow down the spinner bait and produce more thumping and more vibrations than the willow-leaf blades do. If I want a fast retrieve, or if I'm fishing in clear water, I prefer the willow-leaf blades. I also like the willow-leaf blades when I'm fishing in or around grass. The willow-leaf blades seem to come through the grass better than the Colorado blades and the Indiana blades.

The good thing about a spinner bait is that it gives you many options, depending on the fishing conditions. You can not only change the blades, you can use different colors and lengths of skirt, various colors and sizes of trailers and different profiles. In deep clear lakes where you're fishing for spotted bass or smallmouth bass, you may want to fish with a small spinner bait. But if you're fishing in lakes in Florida, Texas or Alabama, for instance, you may need a large spinner bait. By carrying a box full of spinner baits in different sizes, with various blade combinations and colors and lengths of skirts, you can adapt the spinner bait to almost any fishing condition you encounter on any lake at most times of the year.
 

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