Spence Scout

"Strike King's venerable Spence Scout has been catching fish for a long time. The new, more versatile model will really improve your catch. It has two line-tie positions. When your line is tied to the ring closest to the bill, the lure has an extremely wide wobble and runs very shallow (less than a foot) much like the old wooden model. When your line is tied to the "nose" ring, the lure has a narrower wobble and dives deeper for an altogether different action!. Try tying to both rings at the same time for yet another action. Another technique is to tie to the lower ring for the wide wobble and hold your rod tip high during a slow-to-medium retrieve. The lure will "walk-the-dog" on the surface film without your having to impart any action yourself! Try the new Scout with its one-two-three-four punch!" Shaw Grigsby

In Strike King Journal entry #26, George Cochran talked about using Strike King's Spence Scout ...

Question: Tell us how one of your Strike King lures saved the day.

Cochran: Thinking back to one of the first times Strike King saved the day, I was in a B.A.S.S. tournament, fishing Kentucky Lake. I'd been catching fish in thick cover with a spinner bait. Going into the last day, I was in the top five fishermen. Well, by noon I'd fished my best areas with the spinner bait and had caught only one bass and lost two or three more. The bass just didn't want that lure.

I guess the bass had seen the spinner bait in this area, and I'd caught all the good ones or all the ones that were easy to catch. The rest of those fish were getting hard to catch. So I set down in my boat at noon with only 2-1/2 hours to go. I opened my tackle my box and started looking. I said to myself, "What can I do to catch these bass? I know they're there, but I can't catch them on that spinner bait like I'd been catching them." I looked in my tackle box and suddenly saw the Strike King Spence Scout.

I can't tell you how many times I've fished logjams and really thick, shallow cover in the old days with the Spence Scout and caught fish on it. That's I keep some in my tackle box. I'd brought them with me just for a situation like this. I tied on a chartreuse-and-white Strike King Spence Scout. On my second cast, I caught a bass that weighed about 3 pounds. Next I took another one about 2 pounds.

Then I got to a lay-down log and caught one about 4 pounds. However, as I was fighting that bass and got it up to the boat, the bass went underneath a log and broke me off. I about had a heart attack. But I had one more Spence Scout. I tied that one on. I caught a good stringer of bass. I finished second in that tournament. If I'd caught that 4-pounder that broke me off, I'd have won the tournament. And don't forget -- we're talking about what happened in two hours during that tournament.

You never quit learning as a pro. My best advice to anybody listening to what I have to say is to never give up. If you're in an area where there's bass, and you're not doing very well on two or three baits, sit down in the boat. Study your arsenal. Sometimes, like me, you never even think about a particular bait until you open the drawers in your tackle box and see it -- like the ole Strike King Spence Scout. Once you see that bait, you may know it'll work. Strike King certainly saved the whole day for me on this tournament day.

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