Soft Bait Worm Fishing For River Smallmouth

[Brian Jones]

The only worm I throw anymore is a 5" Assalt worm. Usually fish them Texas rigged but in the winter I'll pinch about an inch of the head and thread them on a jig head. I have three really good colors that I like.

I fish a TON of soft plastics and would rather have a bad throwing them than a good day throwing something with treble hooks.

Guess I'm not very versatile.

[mic]

Thanks everyone.

Anyone got any good suggestions for a Spin Reel "worm rod"...something with enough backbone to set a texas rigged hook?

[Wayne SW/MO]

Buy good thin wire hooks and you won't have to cross their eyes. I don't use a special rod and don't know anyone personally that does on rivers.

[Gavin]

We beat the tar out of the rod topic recently...take a gander at that thread in Smallmouth Talk.

[RSBreth]

I use straight-tailed finesse worms and curl-tail worms, but not too often as I also tend to fish faster, and when I do want a slower presentation a mostly use wacky rigged Senko type plastics or finesse jigs. I do know a 4" Powerbait worm Texas rigged with a 1/16 or 1/8 ounce bullet weight will catch Bass when almost nothing else will.

I don't use any special rod - just a good medium power fast action rod for worms - but I also use the superline/leader setup so I have plenty of hooksetting power. I used to use basically the same 7' spinning rod when the only choice was 8-pound mono and had no problem getting the hook in them. 25-feet deep under a dock on a long cast at Table Rock maybe, but not on the river.

[skeet88bt]

^{Buy some speed craws and you will tear em up!!!}

[exiledguide]

I've been catching Smallmouth for a long time fishing 4" to 6" texas rigged worms with a EWG worm hook sized for the worm and anywhere from 1/32 to 1/8 oz worm slip sinker with 6lb to 8lb hi vis Trilene XL on a 5'9" Falcon light action spinning rod with a Spirex 2000 spinning reel. The only place I've fished the last few years is the James and the worm has caught me a lot of fish but I have to say from the fall of 2010 through last year the Gulp Alive 3" chartruse minnow has caught me a lot of fish and most of the bigger fish and I fish it with a 1/32 oz jig on a #1 hook a guy in Florida makes for me the light jig head lets me fish it as a jerk bait, swim bait or a grub and lets me bounce it along the bottom with out getting hung up.I don"t know if the bait is that good or if I'm the only guy using it on the river. After seing what Ron has been doing on the Black I'm going to try fishing this with a Road Runner head.

[exiledguide]

I don't like to worm fish frankly. i'm not a huge fan of soft plastics for river smallmouths. one, I have a hard time slowing down that much and dragging around stuff. secondly, I really do not like to take the chance on deep hooking a fish, which has a higher chance with plastic, especially texas or carolina rigged. If I do drop plastics its on a stand up/shakey head jig, that way i'm alway in contact with the bait and have a better feel of when it picks up the plastic. the jig head also tends to make them not want to swallow it as much.

I wonder if a circle hook would work? i don't see why not as smallmouth tend to pick up the prey item and slowly swim off with it. I might have to give that a try this year...

Yes they do but I used them first fishing for Walleye on the Saline River in central Arkansas using live baitand they allowed me to release all the Bass I caught without any of hooked any where but the lip area however when I tried to to use them Smallmouth fishing with soft plastics I got snagged in tree branches so much I was spending more time retying than I was fishing. If someone would make a weedless circle hook I'd try to fish with them all the time.

[Wayne SW/MO]

Best worm rig going for rivers and creeks.

http://www.basspro.com/Charlie-Brewers-Slider-Heads-Spider-Wide-Gap-Hooks/product/57988/106322

[Mitch f]

Best worm rig going for rivers and creeks.

http://www.basspro.com/Charlie-Brewers-Slider-Heads-Spider-Wide-Gap-Hooks/product/57988/106322

No doubt Charlie Brewer was kind of the grandfather of the do nothing worm, I love his stuff