Favorite Red/blue Ribbon Smallmouth Lures

[Gavin]

Dunno for sure if rubber skirts on spinnerbaits & buzzers are illegal...I use silicone rubber to tie some rubber legs on perfectly legal flies...I dont worry much....my hair tied spinners, buzzers, and jigs...work just fine anywhere.

Cant remember the last time I tossed a teeny Rebel Wee Craw..Effective...you catch everything..but its not selective...If you want to catch....15" fish....consistantly...you need to up the anti to the 3.5"-5" range..bottom, middle or top.

[Al Agnew]

I don't think silicone skirts qualify as soft plastics. I doubt if you'd get in trouble using them. Like Gavin, I tie rabbit strip trailers on a couple of my homemade bucktail twin spins...have caught several 18-19 inch smallmouth on them in the trout water. Other than that, pretty much use the same hard baits I'd use anywhere else in the summer, jerkbaits and hair jigs in the winter.

[Ham]

Sure would be nice if they could write the laws to exclude Power Biat and soft plastics like that and still allow smallmouth fishermen to fish the soft plastics we would prefer to use.

Would a skirted jig with pork be legal?

[awhuber]

Silicone is rubber. A rubber skirt would be no differnt than rubber legs on a fly.

[ozark trout fisher]

I've always considered MDC agents to be very reasonable people on the whole, and while I can't be sure, it's just tough for me to imagine them handing out a ticket for using a spinnerbait or a rubberleg fly. Because that is not against the intent of the regulation, and may not even be against the letter of the law. Now put a soft plastic trailer on the spinnerbait and then you've got a problem.

[moguy1973]

Is the fish swallowing plastics the problem?

[awhuber]

My tool maker isnt doing anything today, I think i'll have make me some worm molds. I have some red and black silicone and chloroprene in stock.

[stlfisher]

Is the fish swallowing plastics the problem?

Pretty much.

[LittleRedFisherman]

My go to lure on those waters is a marabou jig. I do anything from jig them back to the boat, and sling them with my TFO. Also still a big fan of a Rebel Craw.

[moguy1973]

My go to lure on those waters is a marabou jig. I do anything from jig them back to the boat, and sling them with my TFO. Also still a big fan of a Rebel Craw.

What size jig do you use? And what colors? White I'm assuming, any others? I'm guessing too that you get a lot of trout doing that.