Freshwater Fishing Lure

Best freshwater lures : how to fish better?

Best freshwater lures for pike, black bass, zander, trout, perch, and catfish fishing. The soft lure and jig head category allows you to cover the right depth where the active predators are located. The soft lure is a versatile type of lure, different shapes and colors allow you to face the fishing current conditions. For example, a shallow lure is ideal in warm water when the lure is close to the vegetation or obstacles. The best hard lure in this case is called Jerkbait minnow. For freshwater predators, such as black bass, a selection of lures with a retrieve speed adapted to the mood of the predator allows you to quickly identify the best lure during the fishing session.

During warm weather (May to August), surface lures take the lead in the category of the best lures. Stickbaits with a walking the dog action and floating poppers are used for accurate surface fishing for black bass, pike, and also for perch.
The color factor of the lures is a determining factor in finding the best lure. For running water such as rivers, neutral to natural colors are preferred in clear water. We try to attract the attention of the fish by a natural presentation, close to the behavior of forage fish in the area (bleak, roach, ...). This selection of the best lure with customized colors is done on the water, in the case of a flooded river or muddy water flashy colors are superior, getting a contrast with the low light of the water.

Building your fishing tackle box for from the ground up can be a daunting task. Fishing baits and types of fishing come in such a wide range of choice that it can hard to know where to start. Figuring out how lures work, their swimming action, how they attract fish, whether you need to throw a soft plastic worm or a topwater lure for example; not everything will catch fish an any given time. Freshwater fishing lures is different from live bait or even saltwater fish and requires basic know how that we'll try to explain here. The chase for predator fish is really a mental game.

Zander fishing in rivers and streams: the best soft lures

To begin with, the most versatile soft lure used for zander fishing is the paddle tail Shad, this model presents different geometries and is the most versatile model thanks to the different techniques that can be used.
For fishing from a boat or a float tube, the best technique for zander fishing with the best soft lures is the vertical one. At first, when you don't know the area, you use the soft lure shad.
The rounded jig head is suitable for most vertical fishing. When faced with difficult fish, the use of a sabot jig head is perfect. It allows a natural presentation of the lure on the bottom with the head down and the tail up like a feeding roach. The drop-shot rig option, simply held under the boat, allows an efficient vertical presentation to find the depth where the fish are active.

It is possible to make this drop shot rig with a Texas-type hook which allows vertical fishing of zander in the middle of drowned wood when they are inactive. In the absence of bites, it is good to have a second rod rigged with a finesse shad which allows to alternate the vibrations sometimes too important of a soft lure shad.

With a finesse shad, we choose a jig head with a weight as light as we could get away with. In this way, we offer a perfect and light presentation. This is important to oppose the least possible resistance to the zander when they bite. This setup often presents the best soft lures for zander fishing in difficult conditions or in calm weather.

We use the "do-nothing" retrieve, which consists in supporting the lure slightly lifted from the bottom, the float tube or the boat takes care of moving the lure thanks to the drift. The use of short rods for float tube or boat fishing is ideal for optimal handling of the best soft lures.

Targeting big pike with the best lures

To begin with, in order to find the best lure for pike fishing there is an alternative choice between a soft or hard lure. Indeed, this allows overcoming a strong fishing pressure on the area where pike are used to a type of lure, sound, and vibration. This range of models allows us to identify the best lure by matching the size of the prey to the lake. To boost the attractiveness of your lure, choosing an aggressive color on an overcast day will increase the aggressiveness of the pike. This increases the contrast between the lure and the watercolor to allow pike to target its strike. Identifying the best lure for pike at the time of your fishing trip is possible by taking into account the water temperature.

Indeed, as soon as the water becomes cold, the pike targets big fish in order to optimize its movement/food ratio. The use of large soft lures such as creatures and crayfish on a Texas rig is preferred for fishing around cover. Among these favorite spots: submerged woods, structures, vegetal cover, and any other obstacle which can offer a hiding place for pike. On the other hand, in warm water, the metabolism of pike is accelerated, it consumes more and smaller prey. To respond to this feeding behavior, a linear retrieve, stop-and-go, or punctuated by twitching/jerking, with hard baits called jerkbait minnow, is ideal. Finally, to target the biggest pike, active in the coldest months of the year, a big swimbait (soft or hard) is effective.

Black bass : what is the best lure to fish?

First of all, the black bass is an opportunistic and game fish that has no equal in challenging the angler. To find the best lure for black bass, the seasonality of fishing guides the choice of lure type. With moderate to warm water temperatures, fishing with surface and subsurface lures are preferred. Two categories of hard lures are effective: stickbaits and poppers. In case of heavy fishing pressure on the lake, it is good to fish on the surface with soft lures Texas rigged. A soft worm or slug lure will produce the same zig-zag, walking the dog, action as a stickbait.

At this time of year when the water is warm, you can do some sight fishing for black bass, with a pair of polarized glasses, by searching near the foliage of trees but also on the edge of the vegetation cover. For this type of area, fishing with a very lightweight Texas rig with a soft lure is very efficient. To conclude, if you need advice on how to choose the best lure for your fishing trip, contact us.