It’s always fun to catch fish with a new lure, and this was the case during my visit to Shekak Lake with White River Air in the spring of this year. With a spring trip you are expecting cold weather and cold water, which means we were anticipating having to slow things down in order to boat the fish.
We had been wanting to try swim baits for a while, but frankly we’d been having so much success with our usual “go to” techniques, we hadn’t been pushed to try some new strategies. In preparation for the trip, I looked to a familiar tackle company, Waterwolf Lures / Bass Magnet Lures, who I’ve purchased products from in the past. I wanted to have multiple options available as far as methods and lures to catch fish, so I was speaking with owner Mike, explaining that the primary target would be walleye, but we wouldn’t turn our nose up at some big pike! Mike directed me to the Shift’r Shad, a swim bait that comes in 3.5 and 5 inch lengths. We agreed that in order to slow things right down we’d go with a light swim bait hook, in this case 3/16oz.
I was expecting tannin stained water (which turned out to be incorrect) so we chose colours that would work well in those conditions, and ordered in both sizes. In this shot you can see two of the colours / sized I used, along with the swim bait hook. The screw top really helps keep the bait secured, strike after strike. I don’t have a picture of the one that was most dominant (pearl white) as I used them all! You can see it in the accompanying video though. I thought this picture would help you put the size difference into perspective, I had luck with both.
There were a two presentations that were particularity deadly for us. First was simply casting them out, allowing them to drop, and then a super slow retrieve by sweeping the rod and then reeling in the slack. Almost every hit came at the conclusion of the sweep when the bait would have stopped. This worked well as we slid the bait down drop offs, or worked the edge of the emerging weed beds.
The second way we ran them was back trolling around high percentage areas, weed edges, points, transitions etc. We would occasionally sweep the bait forward but for the most part the extra slow speed from the back troll was just what the fish were looking for.
An added bonus of course was that were there were abundant walleye, we also came across large hungry Northern Pike who were equally attracted to the Shift’r Shad. We landed several large pike, including this beauty. It was an important lesson for us in being able to change up your tactics when the weather / conditions / bite changes. We didn’t introduce this technique until the back end of our trip. If we had been a bit more nimble in our decision making, I think we would have caught even more fish (though we shouldn’t be greedy). If you are interested, check them out at Bass Magnet Lures.,I purchased my own supplies. Also, please watch the video below where I talk more about them. Don’t forget, to say in touch simply sign up and have my most recent post sent right to you!
Makes sense they work well. We do very well with smaller versions for perch