Entry 131-4
Shaw Grigsby - How to Catch Bass in December
New Baits from Strike King
Editor's Note: Shaw Grigsby of Gainesville, Florida, a well-known professional angler, enjoys fishing all the Strike King baits, especially the spinnerbaits. He has a TV show titled "One More Cast" on the Outdoor Life Network (OLN). This week he will discuss what baits to use in December, depending on the area of the country in which you're fishing.
Question: Shaw, what's one of Strike King's new baits that you're excited about and why?
Grigsby: I really feel like the Premier Elite spinnerbait has always been the best spinnerbait on the market. But this year Strike King has added red wire to hold the blades and has put a red tear-drop-shaped bead and flapper on the wire, which I believe better imitates blood flowing out of a bait and gives the bass one more reason to key in on the spinner bait and attack it. What many fisherman don't realize is that often the subtle and the fine points of a lure are the difference in a bass's biting or not biting.
Even though you may be fishing an area that gets beat to death with spinnerbaits, when you're fishing a spinnerbait that looks different and better imitates a wounded baitfish, then you're going to get more strikes than a fisherman who's casting the same old spinnerbait he's always cast. I know and I've proven to myself that these bleeding bait spinnerbaits are more effective that the spinnerbaits that don't imitate a bleeding baitfish.
Question: I know you're a jerkbait fan. What's new about the Wild Shiner, and why is it one of your favorite new baits from Strike King?
Grigsby: Kevin VanDam spent a lot of time and energy developing this jerkbait with Strike King, and I know Kevin to be one of the best fishermen on the professional fishing circuit. So when I first got this jerkbait, I tried to see if I could truly tell a difference in what Kevin had done to the jerkbait that made it different or better than other jerkbaits on the market. After I'd tried and tested the Wild Shiner, I'm totally convinced that it definitely has advantages that other jerkbaits don't have.
This year Strike King has added about six more colors to this jerkbait series. One of my favorite new colors is the rainbow trout color. If you know anything about me, then you know I'm from Florida where the only place we see rainbow trout is on the menu of a restaurant. However, I learned just how deadly this color could be when I was about 16-years old. My dad had been on a fishing trip out of state and brought me back a rainbow-trout-colored lure. I decided to fish that lure and caught so many bass on it that I totally wore all the paint off the sides of the lure.
If you're wondering why a bass in Florida will eat a rainbow-trout-colored jerkbait when there's never been a rainbow trout in Florida and that bass in Florida has never seen a rainbow trout? Well, I don't know how to answer that question, but I think it may be because of an incline that runs the length of the bait and maybe the bass thinks that's a wounded spot on the bait. But I can tell you this; I don't hesitate to fish the rainbow-trout-colored Wild Shiner in any waters that I fish in any state. Not until we're able to read the mind of the bass will we ever know why they'll attack a bait that doesn't look anything like any of their natural food. But I know they do, and that's one of the reasons I'm so high on this new rainbow-trout-colored jerkbait.
Strike King has several new colors in the Wild Shiner that you'll like for a wide variety of reasons. I guess one of the reasons I like to fish new lures, especially those from Strike King, is because once I've learned to fish the Strike King lures, I know that if I can offer those lures that consistently produce bass in a new look or a new color, then I can drastically increase my odds for catching more bass.
