Good point, I'd rather buy a $2 lure and have to tune it or modify it a little than buy a $20 one that I can fish straight out of the box.  That way I still have $18 and can buy 9 more of the $2 lures.

I also do this as well. I modify certain cheaper lures and have produced some good ones. It is fun and many times thet work well and even outproduce some more expensive baits. There is a lot to be said though when fishing for money and guuiding people to using a better quality bait at times though. Sometimes they just run more true and catch more bass. Bass Pro Shops does have some REALLY good deals now though on some baits that were higher priced and they have really come down. here is the link. Bass Pro Shops Sales

Northeast Bass Fishing For Trophy Bass http://delawaretrophybass.com

Hey WRB, tacklewarehouse is also having a big labor day sale. So stock up on the good stuff while the sales going on

 

www.tacklewarehouse.com

Thanks another guy who has good deals at times is Chuck here

http://nationwidetackle.com http://tempuri.org/tempuri.html">

Northeast Bass Fishing For Trophy Bass http://delawaretrophybass.com

My wife and I were talking to the clerk at the Willow Beach Marina, she said she sees Alan Cole (A.C. Lures) and Jerry Rago every once in a while. They come down to fish for big stripers in the upper end of Lake Mojave. They have both tagged big trout (both from Bishop CA althought Alan lives in Boulder City NV now), big bass and big stripers. The lures they design and sell are mainly used by dedicated lunker hunters I was looking at some lures on the internet and Rago's new trout tool, 13" and 13.5 os., is $300. I would be afraid to touch it because they might charge me for fingerprints. The 3:16 lure company sells lures that go up to $185, also out of my range.....but they sell them and people catch fish with them. An interesting note, an early soft swimbait, which caught some BIG largemouths, was the Worm King Dinasour, this was a lead head, swimmer tail like many popular salt water lures. It was (is?) 12" long and was designed for stripers. In the end, one uses the lures which work the best in their own situation. At least we should.

Yeppers!!

Northeast Bass Fishing For Trophy Bass http://delawaretrophybass.com

The links are great guys!  I have purchased three Spro hard swimbaits for $20 each  ...I thought that was a little salty but I viewed a fishing show about how to use these and so I have put them to work.  I must say, they look & act like live bait!  I am using steel leaders with them as the tiger musky are hungry around here...

 

 

LM since 2005 Bushwacker Deputy Sherif from S.E. Pa.

Those are nice baits. I have those as well. Want to see some other really nice swimbaits??

Swimbait Pics







Northeast Bass Fishing For Trophy Bass http://delawaretrophybass.com

I personally use Tru-Tungsten's 4-inch Tru-life swimbait. It has a very realistic action, and unlike Spro's version, it has 2 hooks, not one.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hey WRB. How do you like Matt lures Blugill ( I have the ultimate series and it looks amazing). I haven't caught any on it yet as I don't use it often, but I've hade quite a few followers. I recently added some scent to it, so hopefully that works. I'm curious how you feel about it.

Well honestly, I like the way it looks better than most any other baits that imitate a Bluegill. But.. Some of them are a little tricky to work properly at first until you tweak them a little and/or practice with them. I really like the Tru-Tungsten bait A LOT!. I am also VERY happy with all the baits by SEBILE, especially the Magic Swimmer.

Northeast Bass Fishing For Trophy Bass http://delawaretrophybass.com

New LUCKY CRAFT BAITS

Northeast Bass Fishing For Trophy Bass http://delawaretrophybass.com

If you are looking for good soft plastic baits, check out www.bandlures.com. The prices are very reasonable.

Here in n.j. we dont have a lot of deep water so we use a lot of shallow lures .I love useing a manns baby one as much as i can and they are only about 4 bucks. and i will not spend over 8 bucks for a lure which i could lose after one cast and i also use senko worms  which are also cheap.
my name is Jim and i live in new jersey Have been a life member since 1996.

I happen to think Rapala lures are the end all, be all of hard baits. The original floater, original jointed, original shad rap, husky jerk, rattlin' rapala, and taildancer are all mainstays in my box. It's hard to knock Rapala prices for this reason - they are all hand made in Europe. The exchange rate for the dollar to the Euro is not favorable right now. That is part of the reason Rapala lures have gone up in cost. I don't think $8 or $9 for hand made, tank tested lure with VMC hooks and quality split rings is unreasonable. However, I have also caught fish on some so called bargain lures. Both the Bass Pro and Cabela's brand lures have produced for me, and they are some of the cheapest out there. I will say this: I have never caught anything on a Lucky Craft lure. I've owned several different models, cast them to some promising spots, and never once come back with a fish. Once I changed baits because I just knew the spot was holding fish, and ta-dah, up came the bronzebacks. Maybe they work better in the south, I dunno, I live in PA. As far as I'm concerned, Lucky Craft lures are the worst value known to man. On another note, I've watched Kevin Van Dam videos where he nails one fish after another on Strike King lures. Most of their hard baits can be had for under $5 and before KVD endorsed them, they were known as a bargain brand lure. I think the most important thing in choosing a lure is whether you, the angler, have confidence in that lure. A lot of anglers waste time on the water constantly changing baits because they lack that confidence. One final note - I have probably caught almost as many bass, walleye, and trout on soft plastics as any hard bait. Some of my soft plastics were good brands bought in clearance bins, making the individual cost of the bait less than 10 cents, sometimes under a nickel. Right there proves that cost is meaningless. Again, having confidence in the bait and knowledge on how to use it is all you need.

Just game across this thread.

Site I found this winter with good price's and flat shipping. Not a huge selection though, but not bad.

http://www.overstockbait.com/

I have ordered a couple of times and they have processed and shipped quick.

 

Hi Bill Hope you are doing well. B&D are great baits at a good price. Here are some more baits at a good price as well  BAITS <<<

Northeast Bass Fishing

WOW!

All this talk about how good these high priced baits can be.

I really like the post about NOT using them were the fish are so you don't loose them. IMHO it seems the folks that make these high priced baits have caught the fish they are after when they sell them. By the way, what was it that the new big fish ate? Oh yea, Live Bluegill and lets not forget Spotty, how many times did that fish eat the wrong Live Crawdad? We all know that to be successful we must be versitile, at $20.00 + a piece how versitile can you be?

Life member N.A.F.C. A.M.I. Washington State. Good luck and be safe.

You just fish for fun sometimes on the weekends huh? lol The bass he caught before that that was the third largest bass ever caught in Japan was on a 300.00 swimbait. lol Have you ever fished in california or other areas? Without some of these baits 90% of the time you would be OUT OF LUCK. lol If you haven't been out doing this for a living for 40 years and fished tournaments in some tough places, then there is not much else I can say. For weekend anglers the other stuff is just fine, for true trophy hunters and bass guides and tournament anglers it really matters a lot.

WORLD RECORD AND TROPHY BASS FISHING

I do fish a bit more than that,lol.

I have watched the big swimbait thing for some time,and I have to admit that I use them in the fall for Walleye and Smallmouth.

The ones that I use are 3 to 4 inch.

The reason I use this size is because, I have never seen much of anything bigger in the bellies of the fish out here. Now I know you are going to say that I would need them in say California or Mexico, maybe Florida for big Bass. I disagree.

Some of the old timers out here used to use 10+ inch Rainbows.

But they were fishing for Sturgeon.

 We see a lot of ten plus Walleye here and even they do not seem to feed on large prey. It would be interesting to know the size of the Trout Stocked in California. Wonder if they might be the size of those big swimbaits.

The swimbait is nothing new.

The original Jig and Pig has and still does put some of the biggest Bass and Walleye in my boat every year.

 

 

 

Life member N.A.F.C. A.M.I. Washington State. Good luck and be safe.

Large stripers are caught in Pa trolling 8" rainbows or swimbaits.  I do understand the premis that if ya want to catch big fish then use big baits.  But ya know, when your fishing for pike and catch them on 1/16 oz jigs (5+ lbs) and watch them catch 20+ lb pike in Canada with small baits, it makes ya stop and wonder...I guess life is simplier when your not tournament fishing...LOL!

 

LM since 2005 Bushwacker Deputy Sherif from S.E. Pa.