ESOX HUNTER
Soft Baits For Sharp Teeth
By Uli Beyer    July 7, 2007

Soft Baits For Sharp Teeth

               Pike and Plastic go together It is one of those days where pike seem to be lazy and not really aggressive for my lure presentation.   Actually I fish a 9 inch shad, which is presented in a short zigzag over the bottom.   After a hard rod-rise my lure swims slowly back to the bottom.   I am very concentrated, because I feel the lure movement through the rod.   When it is on the bottom, I immediately raise my rod from 9 to 11 o clock position.   The rod moves back and I reel in the any slack line to keep it tight.   “That makes lure-swimming much slower”, I explained to my friend, who is not convinced about soft baits.   He follows everything that I am doing.   Sometimes I have my finger on the line to feel what is happening with my lure and sometimes I look at my clear-green visible line.   “What about visibility for your prey?” he asks and I show my rigging in the end: “Against teeth I use a short titanium-leader and against visibility you have two choices.   First you can introduce 3 to 5 feet fluorocarbon leader - material in very clear waters with very shy pike or, if your fishing water that is a little bit stained, it is enough to color it a bit darker with a felt-pen.

In a moment we are discussing about catching-efficiency of soft baits, and then I get a hard “bump” on my rod.   My reply is a hard strike and immediately I feel a good fish on the other end.   “Good one!”, I say to Jürgen, who is astonished about my “lucky-rubber”.   Some minutes later we get a good “meter-pike” (40incher) in the boat.   Meter-pike are the magic size here in Germany and I am happy to convince Jürgen about soft baits with such a good fish!

Jürgen continues to fish as I explain to him that he should snap his rod harder – like striking after a bite!   Then allow it to glide back, but concentrate and keep an absolute straight line!   If your line has slack the lure drops much faster to the bottom and that takes all your catching-power. Soft baits should swim on a circle-line slowly to the bottom.   “It is not so easy to keep the line straight, while the rod moves back!”,                                   Swallowed 9 inch plastic shad Jürgen remarked.   I replied: “If you reel faster while moving back the rod it will be better!   It is not a problem if the lure swims in your direction, while your rod moves back!” Jürgen reels faster and his line is much straighter.   “FISH ON!” he cries and some moments later his first soft bait-pike is landed and in the boat.   Another fan for soft baits is born and by the end of the day we got 8 good pike.

If we talk about fishing with soft baits, we mean especially the combination of simple big shads and a jig head with some weight on it.   The right combination of both makes a good catching lure.   Beside colors and sizes (for pike I use frequently shad-sizes between 6 and 12 inch), I found some other factors that are rather important to consistently catch fish.   These factors are:

• stiffness of the material in soft baits
• weight of the jig-head
• style of presentation
• rod, reel and line

How stiff must a lure be? I fish soft baits very often and I carry many pounds of different lures in my boat.   If the water is cold and pike are in deeper water, I typically fish with very soft plastic-materials.   The movement is more active and also slow retrieves keeps the lure moving.   On the other side, sometimes pike like hard vibrations as for example in more stained waters.   They feel the vibration better with a harder lure with a heavier weight jig head.   It is also a good time to use stiffer plastics (saltwater – choice) when pike are feeding on everything, because you can catch more fish using the same lure.   With softer baits you may only only get one fish before its destroyed by sharp teeth.   Everyday there is one big question to be answered: Harder for good vibration to the lateral line of the fish or soft for action on very slow retrieves?

Jig – heads are important! Many anglers check only the hook sharpness and fail to worry about the weight.   We found out that only ¼ ounce weight difference can make enormous differences in catching fish!   Normally I recommend light lures for slow sinking-speed, but it is difficult to give clear advice for the right weight under different conditions.   To give you a rough idea, I fish mostly the following weights in calm water (rivers and drifting boats need more weight):

• Shallow water up to 6 feet: ¼ - ½ ounces
• 8-15 feet: 5/16 – ¾ ounces
• 15-30 feet: ½ - 1 ounces

Also the pike’s daily activity seems to influence the preference for more or less weight.   It is worth the time to experiment with different weights as you do with sizes and colors.   In addition to weight, the shape of the jig head should be adjusted for various situations that you will fish.   I use banana shaped jig head with hook size 6/0 for shallow waters.   If the water has many obstacles in it its more efficient to fish with front-fixed head. In streaming waters and more vertical presentations I prefer a center balanced head like Erie-Jigs, also with bigger hooks in sizes about 6/0.   As good compromise for changing conditions, standard-balanced heads as round-heads do a good job!   If you chose very big soft baits (bigger than 6 inch), a single jig-hook is not enough to guarantee a good hook-up in a big pike’s mouth.   In these cases the jig-hook functions mostly only as “lure-holder” and we have to adjust a hook-rig.   After long experiments, I have developed a hook rig made of                Another beauty on a 9 inch shad wire-leader and two stronger treble-hooks.   The small loop in front will be switched over the hook-eye.   After connecting the swivel of your leader to it, it holds the system together very well.   ATTENTION: Don´t chose your leader-material too thin!   Plastic-coated leaders with breaking-strength of 40 pound+ are best, because otherwise your risk breaking the material while fighting with a good fish.

Styles of presentation If you talk to 10 experienced fishermen you will surely get many different answers, and they are mostly all right!   In my opinion, you need different styles of presentation.

A constant retrieve: Most beginners try presentation first, but soft baits like other lures work better if fished with different speeds.   Sometimes this presentation works, but this method doesn't take advantage of the soft bait’s capability.

Zigzag short pulls: They become deadly as described in the beginning, if you present in a zigzag-curve and lazy, big pike-ladies like “short pulls”.   After a short acceleration, you let the lure drop back to the bottom.   Short means only movements (1 hour angles).   It should be noted that in Europe we fish with much longer rods and the style of presentation could be slightly different. I never tried seriously presenting soft baits on rods shorter than 8 feet.   My favorite soft bait-rod is a 9 feet long rod.   I developed a special rod for this style of presentation (we call it “ULI BEYER SPECIAL”) and today most anglers here fish this hard action.   A very hard tip-action allows very good acceleration (not only for casting – more important here is acceleration under the water!) of the lure, which is in my opinion a very important part of presentation.   The better (but short!) you can accelerate your soft bait, the more frequent your strikes will be.   They also seem to hit the lure much harder too as the lure swims back to the bottom.   More than 90 % of the pike-attacks come while the lure swims slowly back to the bottom.   I think, the acceleration is important to attract predators attention by view or through vibrations to the lateral line and the moment of dropping back is the point of “weakness” of the prey, pikes chance to attack it.

Zigzag long pulls: If pike are really aggressive and maybe a little bit higher over the bottom, you can make bigger rod-movements.   We pull in these conditions the rod from 9oclock-position up to 12oclock and the lure moves longer ways.   Sometimes pike prefer this style to smaller jumps.

Step-method for higher suspended pike: Sometimes you find the pike higher suspended in the water and you see them 3-6 feet suspended over the bottom. That´s the moment for the “step-method”, where you accelerate your soft bait in 3-4 steps (9-10 o'clock, 10-11 and 11-12 o'clock) before you let it swimming back to the bottom.   Also here you get your lure more attractive with sharp and short accelerations.

Vertical-fishing: Sometimes pike are suspended in open water and you see them on your fish finder.   If you drop down your lure slowly and jig with your soft bait at the right depth while you drift or move with your electric motor, you can get very hard bites while you see it on your “TV-screen”.

Pike on the screen	zig zagging

My preferred style in colder water is zigzag short pulls and in warmer water zigzag long pulls.

Fishing-gear: As you need very good accelerations, you need a really hard rod with a very fast action.   I cannot say, how good shorter rods function, but in my opinion a 9 feet long rod is the best length and I would have difficulties with shorter rods, because my technique has been tuned over a long period of time.                Uli uses a spinning reel These movements however are less important as the lure becomes larger.   If you fish 9 inch or bigger shads, pike are easier to convince.   As in other spinning-methods, braided spectra-lines (we have dyneema fibres) are the best choice for good hook sets and fastest accelerations.   Astonishing for many anglers in U.S., but I fish a Shimano Stella – 4000 Spining reel.   I don´t have tangling problems in casting and the speed of the reel is necessary to keep the line straight under windy conditions or in faster moving waters.   Once there is slack in the line it is hard to get it out.   Lines for presenting soft baits should be rather thin! Breaking-strength of 15-20 pounds is generally heavy enough and keeps a much better (straighter) contact to the lure than stronger lines.   Thicker lines destroy often a good presentation.

Also your leader-material in front of your soft bait should be thin and uncoated.   In clean waters without many snags you can use titanium leaders.   If you fish in risky areas, sevenstrand-leaders with 20-30 pounds test are more economic.

Hopefully I have convinced you to try a great pike-catching method.   My personal best fish, I wish it to you – (nearly ten years ago) was 18,4 Kilos (40 pounds+ and 1,35 Meter/53,2 inch)

The following picture shows a vertical hold; Uli did this as we all have, before he understood that a horizontal hold was better on the fish

               Uli with a 40lb pike

Articles to follow (not so fast): Soft bait-types, colors for soft baits, how to rig soft baits.

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Last updated on ... September 3, 2007