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Six months ago I would have said a 4 inch Gulp swimming mullet on a 1/8 oz jighead (preferably a deathgrip jighead)

These days I've been converted to all things Vudu, with a preference for the shad, but could also be talked into using the
Vudu shrimp all day.

Saltshiner wrote:Six months ago I would have said a 4 inch Gulp swimming mullet on a 1/8 oz jighead (preferably a deathgrip jighead)

These days I've been converted to all things Vudu, with a preference for the shad, but could also be talked into using the
Vudu shrimp all day.

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I do enjoy the Vudu Shad as well, solid swim bait


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I've had good success with the Vudu shrimp. Great action. Works well under a popping cork too.

SWFinatic wrote:I've had good success with the Vudu shrimp. Great action. Works well under a popping cork too.

The vudus are great, but they always melt on me

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Melt on you while you're storing them?

My answer is easy - a Gulp 5" jerk shad, chartreuse pepper neon - it is the lure that has chosen me! A couple of years ago I tried to get away from it, but it just kept giving me fish, all fish, so I gave in and have it on all the time. I do change colors some, but tend to migrate back. It is on an Owner 1/8oz 4/0 twist lock, most likely.
one of my latest redfish at 30", though 36" is the largest it has brought in for me
These guys like it but tend to cut through the body.

Trout love it, flounder love it - my PB flounder at 23" swallowed it immediately when it hit the water.

SWFinatic wrote:Melt on you while you're storing them?

Ya it's crazy! None of the others do that!

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During the warmer months I store all my soft plastics in the spare fridge in the garage to keep them from melting. Gulp will do that too if it gets hot enough. The Vudu are soft but that's how they get a lot of action. Harder baits are generally going to have less action.

SWFinatic wrote:During the warmer months I store all my soft plastics in the spare fridge in the garage to keep them from melting. Gulp will do that too if it gets hot enough. The Vudu are soft but that's how they get a lot of action. Harder baits are generally going to have less action.

Great idea! Store it in the fridge!!!

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The Vudu do not play well with others and will melt if kept with other plastic lures. On the back of the package it tells you not to store them with other plastics. I keep them in a separate Plano box, and I haven't had any problems with them.

Saltshiner is onto this. It has nothing to do with the heat, but with different formulations (plasticizers) used in different soft baits. I had rigged Z-man and DOA shad lures overnight together in a plano box tray - just the trip home from East Flats - and they melted together. I can keep either one of them separate, and they last seemingly forever.

Since I'm here, I'll put in a plug for Z-man Texas-eye jigheads - 1/8-oz with 3" shad bodies.
Swimbait hooks - I almost never catch undersized trout on swimbait hooks - they try to eat them, but just don't get hooked.

Ron Mc wrote:Saltshiner is onto this. It has nothing to do with the heat, but with different formulations (plasticizers) used in different soft baits. I had rigged Z-man and DOA shad lures overnight together in a plano box tray - just the trip home from East Flats - and they melted together. I can keep either one of them separate, and they last seemingly forever.

Since I'm here, I'll put in a plug for Z-man Texas-eye jigheads - 1/8-oz with 3" shad bodies.
Swimbait hooks - I almost never catch undersized trout on swimbait hooks - they try to eat them, but just don't get hooked.

That's probably it. There not together longterm but when I go out they are for about 8-23 hours

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Saltshiner is right I've had that happen before too. But keeping them cool also prevents this. I keep a quart size zip top bag with a mix of 4 or 5 different plastics all together pre-rigged on jig heads including Vudu and no issues with them sticking together. As soon as I let them get warm they stick.

SWFinatic wrote:Saltshiner is right I've had that happen before too. But keeping them cool also prevents this. I keep a quart size zip top bag with a mix of 4 or 5 different plastics all together pre-rigged on jig heads including Vudu and no issues with them sticking together. As soon as I let them get warm they stick.

I'll experiment

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I believe the lures simply being rigged, used and stored in wet contact is enough to film the different chemicals together.

This is an easy one for me. Vudu shad, 3" green back. I've used the same lure and caught dozens of fish on it. Multiple slams, day time, night time, summer, winter, fall. It has been the most productive lure I have ever fished.

I’ve never used anything vudu or can’t remember using any, they do look good. Something like a DSL, saltwater Assassin or the like in that chicken of the C color scheme is pretty tough to beat for being versatile. I’d pick the DSL for durability.

Hard it is to stick to just one lure for the rest of eternity, though. Some of the fun for me is working a variety of lures, trying to get the action, depth and pace just right, a.k.a. Presentation just so to get the eats.

The confidence lure #1 is the best one. When that one doesn’t work, go to confidence lure #2.

I like the whole work up that goes like this: where are the fish, the searching and looking for clues, the finding them, the what are they and what should I throw at them, the how should I throw it at them, the how should I fight them to get them in the boat. Lots of healthy cogitation going on with all of that. Past experiences inform the day’s decisions, but the deck of cards gets reshuffled.

Fishing is good stuff. Figuring out your favorite lures is part of the fun.

probably more important than fun is versatility to match changing conditions - first off, different baits - you have to match what the fish are eating and even how they're eating it - water column, having a system to fish the strike zone in different depths, and at different speed retrieves.
While I've fished TSL on weighted swimbait hooks, and caught fish, I've never enjoyed fishing them that way.
And yes, having about 4 different lures to cover changing conditions from first light through big wind and high sun is the way to go.

If you want to pin it down to a day with winter glass minnows, YoZuri sinking Pins minnow on a long UL

1/4 ounce spoon followed by swimbait on a jig head. I'm still learning areas so pretty basic for me right now.

I always like working in some new to me color or lure, especially having a good day with one. Adding another confidence lure to the repertoire never hurts. A whole box of confidence, yea!

Days when I fish side by side with someone else is a good day to test out stuff. If I can be on the same boat or off the same pier or shoreline throwing lures to the same structure and same fish, that’s when really good information is developed about value of the presentation versus the importance of the particular lure. There have been days when only one particular color or even lure is going to get the eats, but I’d say most of the time it’s been about any color or similar lure can get a take if the particular presentation is spot on.

Away back in the late 60's through the early eighties, I remember the many days wading the waters of the Laguna Madre, from Corpus to well past Baffin Bay. Our equipment was one spinning rod, a Boy Scout canteen of water, a long stringer, and a vest pocket full of gold, Johnson weedless spoons (modified). By manipulating our retrieve, we could fish the one Ft. deep flats as well as the deep cuts. We seldom came back to the boat with empty stringers.

So, if limited to only one lure, I would have to revert to that tried and true spoon. If only one fly, I would have to choose a red fish crack.

My buddy just killed it one day on a gold spoon, probably a tony acetta #5. I didn’t have one in my box and suffered through one fish after next while we fished from the same boat. I went through my box with lure after lure with hardly a bite and then finally tying on a super shiny silver “wired” slider that did get me some fish.

Way back when in the 1980s, the old salts that took me fishing were all about gold spoons. We would wade side by side at Greens bayou of west Matagorda bay. That was my first lesson on presentation. They’d get 5 fish for every one I got. Same lure we all used, a johnson gold spoon, but my presentation was most definitely not up to speed.

DSL purple Chau with 1/8 oz jighead.

Anybody with a serious salt fishing history should have a history with Johnson's Silver Spoon and Sprite.
Black nickel in the back lakes imitates a crab as well as anything.
In high school, half of our fall jetty smacks were caught on gold Sprite, fishing through the gears on my Mitchell 300 - the other half were on old style spec rigs.

Ron Mc wrote:Anybody with a serious salt fishing history should have a history with Johnson's Silver Spoon and Sprite.
Black nickel in the back lakes imitates a crab as well as anything.
In high school, half of our fall jetty smacks were caught on gold Sprite, fishing through the gears on my Mitchell 300 - the other half were on old style spec rigs.

The gold spoons I use are all from before the 80s. Just found them in BAGS IN THE ATTIC!

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