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By ED WALKER
© St. Petersburg Times, published November 28, 2000
Cold water and the disappearance of scaled sardines means it is time for artificial bait for inshore anglers.
I enjoy it. Not only do I get to hang up the cast net, but it is satisfying to fool fish with a piece of plastic.
My favorite is a soft-plastic jerkbait. This arguably is the most effective lure in water less than 3 feet deep. Its nearly neutral buoyancy allows it to be subtly worked -- fish in shallow water often are spooked by noisy baits jigging up and down too quickly or coming at them.
The key is to rig a jerkbait weedless or Texas style on a worm hook with no weight. If you stick one on a weighted jig, it is just a jig and defeats the purpose of using a jerkbait. The lure is designed to float, and you adjust its sink rate by changing hook size. I prefer a 4/0 but occasionally will use a 5/0 if I want to go a little deeper.
I scale my tackle down to 6- or 8-pound line when fishing jerkbaits. The lighter line lengthens your cast. Chances are the fish 80 feet away don't know you are there.
For trout and redfish, you usually don't need a leader. If there are bigger fish around such as cobia or snook, I add a section of 20-pound fluorocarbon leader.
I usually work the lure with a "twitch ... twitch ... pause" action. The fish usually strike during the pause as the soft lure slowly sinks. Big trout are suckers for lures fished this way, and the really big ones usually are in the shallowest water.
- Ed Walker charters out of Palm Harbor. Call (727) 944-3474.