Decades ago I use to only target bass and pickerel and bought lures that were generally too large for panfish. The only exception was fishing for small mouth bass using 4" Mr Twister curl tail grubs, not knowing that the mouth of a smallie is almost as large as that of a LM. Fishing bass tournaments was the fastest way to learn the best lures for bass. This is the list of must have bass lures:
crankbaits
spinnerbaits
skirted weedless jigs with pork frog
6--7" T rigged plastic worms
surface lures (Pop R, Z Spook)
4" tubes
etc.
Some cannot be used with more than one or two presentations whereas others are more versatile.

Once I stopped fishing bass tournaments, I figured, why not fish for other species thereby providing the most strikes? It's not as if larger fish couldn't be caught such as large bass, catfish, white sucker, pickerel and a few big carp. But going smaller meant going lighter using smaller lures, lighter action rods, smaller reels, smaller diameter lines and presentations.suited to smaller lures.
Numbers caught went up dramatically as did the size range of fish - from 3.5 inch bass and sunfish to 4 lb. bass and pickerel.
A trophy size fish BTW depends on the species. A 15" perch or crappie is one lunker of a fish that will put a serious bend on even a medium action rod!

So, which do you prefer to cast: lures that exclude smaller fish but only target large fish - especially bass, or lures capable of getting the most strikes and any species of fish?

A lot depends on water clarity…..and what kind of mood the bass are in.

If I’m fishing stained water; I’ll tend to want to fish something larger that displaces more water.

If the bass are in a negative mood; small plastics and small jigs tight to cover.

If I could fish ideal conditions all the time (five feet of visibility with the bass in a positive/aggressive mood)…I would only throw big topwaters and big swimbaits.

Jigs year around
You want bigger bass go to mop jigs I build them with 7" to 8" skirts 6/0 mustad light wire black nickel hooks I started building mop jigs backing the 70s using Uncle josh big daddy pork. Im using them now.

That's one huge skirted jig!!
Like to see a photo.
My skirts are never longer than 3" tied on Arbogast weedless jigs that are 1/2 oz. or lighter.
I made a copies of Uncle Josh trailers of different sizes in plaster of paris and pour in hot plastic from the microwave. It does just a good for pennies!

Do you use living rubber and/or silicone skirts?
Are your jigs weedless?

This one fills the bill for both types.

Back in the mid 70's I used 3/4 oz arkie head (hilt mold) still use it today. Back then we use living square rubber in fine and medium grade there were 6 colors I would tie up Brown, Black, Purple, Brown/black. Brown/purple, Black/blue all 7" skirts.Then later the 80's round rubber & musky silicone skirt pads started in and square rubber was fading out so I made the switch. And I add flashabou accent colors. The trailer of choice was Uncle josh big daddy pork ( Ribbit ears )
I still make them today. 3/4oz arkie or now 3)4 football with either using a 11 fiber custom fiber guards and a 18 fiber custom fiber guard using .018 diameter fiber for 11 fiber fiber guards and .021 diameter fiber for the 18 fiber fiber guards. Kayser lure corporation makes the custom fiber guards. Winter time Big Bass Baits.

Amazing the number of various soft plastic trailers that can be used with skirted jigs! The Brush Hog and other creature lures do just fine, and though I still like the large (#1) pork frog copy, It's just one of many shapes. I got so much living rubber and silicone skirts stored I won't use in a lifetime (which is not say'n much since I'm 3/4 of the way there.

That's one fine trophy fish T Bird! Congrats!!





(Man, I still wish I wish I never left Wichita Falls....)

Interesting topic, SenkoSam. I've had quite an evolution in recent years. From 1981 to 2005, most of my fishing was bass tournament fishing, and while some of the baits I used were finesse baits (big bass of the year one year in a CAST division on a 4" ringworm), I mostly used big spinnerbaits and jigs. But a career spent doing heavy machine shop work cratered my joints (especially my shoulders) so badly that by 2005 I'd had enough, and switched to crappie fishing. That was pretty much all I did until I retired in 2021. But by then, I was discovering I could still have a lot of fun playing with bass if I stuck to spinning tackle and smaller baits. That got supercharged last month when I seriously tried out a Ned rig for the first time. I've now made four trips with that as my main bait, caught more fish from my usual bass milk run than ever, and have already caught two 6 pound bass on it, and I'm hooked. I'll still be mixing in some crappie fishing, and doing my bed fishing at Fork with tiny child rigs in March to May, but I'm thinking that most of the time, that Ned rig will be my primary bait going forward, on my home lake, Cedar Creek. Wish now I'd tried that years ago. Lol.

Oh, and while I'm sticking to Zman baits on the Ned rig, I'm making my own jigs for it, so still enjoying the lure making, just like I do with my crappie jigs and plastics.

SenkoSam Im looking for 4 colors in 101 pork chunks plastics can you pour them i need 25 on each color
Watermelon red/black flake, brown/purple flake, junebug/emerald blue flake,Root beer/red/gold flake
For my finesse jigs I tie.

Bassjiggin, those are superb looking jigs!!! No doubt they catch bass on the hardest days.
The only plaster of Paris molds of pork chunks I copied are #4 and #1 U. Josh Frogs. Both would work great with those beauties!

The trailer colors you mentioned would be easy to produce seeing as how I have gallons of plastic and dye left over from when I was big into making soft plastic. These are the colors of glitter I still sell occasionally and have sitting in my basement collecting dust:
glitter source Other tips and links are included on my site. One of my copies:


Also called jig head worm fishing.

I know there is a weedless version, but I prefer a non-weedless jig and small soft plastics that have NO action tail. In fact, I was fishing a curl tail grub and had the tail bit off by a pickerel. I figured, why not cast it and see what happens. BANG! fish after fish after fish!
This small bass was the first fish caught on it:

After that, I sky's the limit with shapes I discovered that did just as well:

The shape will catch anything that swims. The action is a wobble & dart with rod tip twitches and pauses.