Bass Fishing Hacks
Simple Hacks and Tips to Help You Catch More Bass
Do you use a swivel with a spinner bait?
The quick answer is usually no. You do not need to add a swivel to your spinner bait. BUT you can if you want to. Let’s as that you are fishing in a lake that has a whole bunch of northern pikes in it and you keep losing your lures. The pikes keep cutting your line with their sharp teeth and you want to add a metal leader.
The best way to add a swivel to the spinner bait with with a split ring that fits tightly over the bend in the spinner bait where you tie your line. Get a small split ring and push it down tightly over the bend where you tie your fishing line to and then you can add a swivel to the spinner bait with ease.
This also helps stop your line from sliding down the wire of your spinnerbaits. Even the best of our fishing knots will slip from time to time. The line will slide down the arm of the spinnerbait and cause all kinds of problems. AND no self respecting bass will ever bite a lure that is swimming oddly in the water.
The action of the spinnerbait will usually not be harmed to any large degree when you add a swivel to the lure. However the design of the spinnerbait is such that it requires the line to be tied directly to the wire because the direct pull of the line is what keeps the spinnerbait running true in the water.
A swivel might let the spinnerbait wobble and turn in the water more and not run straight. You definitely do not want that. That will affect your hook sets and the weed less qualities that spinnerbaits give you. Be careful that you are not affecting the lure’s performance by adding a swivel to it.
I am a Bass Fishing Charter Guide on the Treasure Coast of Florida. I have been catching bass for more than 40 years in the lakes, canals and ponds all over Florida. Keep reading this article to find out more modifications that you can do to a spinnerbait to help you catch more bass.
Add some scent to the spinnerbaits to get more bites. This is especially true when you are fishing in dirty water. The bass rely upon their olfactory system more in dirty water than when they are in clear and clean water.
You have to imagine what it must be like in the shadows and deep areas of the lakes and ponds where bass live. Those places are dark would be spooky for us if we went scuba diving where the bass hang out. Those bass in the dark water have to rely upon their senses of smell to find food when they can’t see it.
When the water is clear, the bass can rely heavily upon their sight and their sense of hearing/feeling to find their prey items. A bass perceives it world through its senses. The more senses that you can stimulate, the better the odds of getting the bass to eat your lures.
Let’s think about a spinnerbait for a minute. The bass can see it. The bass can hear/feel the vibrations of the blades as they send out those low frequency vibrations that bass love. AND if you add some scent to it, then it can smell it too.
The bass might be thinking,”That looks like something good to eat but I’ve been tricked before. It sounds like something good to eat but I have heard that sound before and got a hook in my face. It smells like something good to eat. Okay. the other ones didn’t smell delicious. I think that I will eat that thing swimming by me right now.”
There are tons of different companies that have scent additives that you can put on your spinnerbaits to get more bass bites. I am not going to recommend any of them because they are pretty much the same if you ask me. You want something sticky and stinky that will not have to be added to the lure very often.
You will have to add the scent more than once during a long day of bass fishing but you will catch more bass. This works especially well in bodies of water that get a lot of fishing pressure. Those bass have had just about every shape, size and color of lure pitched at them over the years. Having your lure stimulate another one of their sensed might be the difference between getting the bite or getting ignored.
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