Beginner's guide to fishing: Tackle box essentials

Tackle Box Essentials

At this point in the Fishing for beginners series, we’ve got all the basics; rod line, lures, and knowledge, and we’ve established our base. From here on out, we build upon this base with different gear, different locations, different lures, and different fishing styles and techniques. Your mental tackle box should grow at the same rate or quicker than your physical one. When casting and retrieving a spinner, or a bobber with a worm, start to wear on your patience, change things up with the following techniques.

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Top Water

If you’re having trouble getting into the cover, or you're getting hung up on underwater grass and snag ups, the top water method can alleviate these problems and also offers to be, in my opinion, one of the most exciting ways to fish. Typically used around sunrise or sunset ( I have found success at all times during the day however) Top water relies on you throwing floating lures and either creating distress on the top of the water, or allowing the lure to impart that action for you. Frogs are arguably the most popular of these methods and they are designed to be pulled through heavy matted surface vegetation and lily pads. The hooks are on top as opposed to other top water lures, allowing you to seamlessly pull through most vegetation. Quick pops, some gentle tugs, and pauses are all utilized to entice predatory fish lurking and watching from below.

The top water method lends itself to announcing to everything around that something is struggling or available to be eaten on the water's surface. This technique is not sneaky nor subtle. You should know within 20 minutes of casting whether the fish are interested in this style or if you’ll have to switch back to subsurface baits. Other than frogs, this method encompasses top water poppers and spooks which mimic dying bait fish, as well as jitterbugs, buzzbaits and torpedoes that are steadily retrieved creating surface commotion. Target areas of shade, underwater vegetation and structure, as well as structure visible on top of the water.I highly recommend having one or two of these options in your box.

Texas Rigging

One of my biggest regrets of fishing my whole life was how long it took me to learn how to Texas rig. Since learning and experimenting with this method using a variety of baits, it has easily become my highest producing method for pulling out big bass. The Texas rigged method, put simply, is having a larger offset hook on the end of your line and attaching to that hook, a soft plastic type of bait. In doing so, the hook is hidden within the soft plastic. With the hook hidden you are weedless and free to toss your bait into and around underwater grass, trees, stumps, etc. The type of soft plastic bait you decide to use will determine the action you impart on the bait itself. You can let a senko (stick worm) slowly flutter down into cover, twitch a lizard or brush hog along past cover, imitate a dying shad by using a fluke, or even drag a crayfish slowly along the bottom. The Texas rigging method is as versatile as it is effective. I carry two rods with me always. One is outfitted to throw lures, the other always maintains an offset hook which I can load up with whatever style of soft plastic I deem necessary.

This method is typically much more user involved and is a slower style of fishing that can pick apart locations of cover where bass should be holding. You'll have to maintain the slack on your line in order to feel the nibbles on your bait. Once you feel the fish has taken it, it's time to reel in all the slack and engage in a big hook set, because unlike with treble hooks where fish do most of the hook set work, you'll be required to get that single hook through the fish's lip. The timing of the hookset is important, and experience and practice will lend itself to more successful hooksets. As previously stated, you'll need to have your line tight enough to feel the bite, and then wait long enough to ensure the fish has eaten it, but not so long that its realized plastic is not food and spits it out. My go to soft plastics for texas rigging are paddle tail swimbaits, Senkos, and Lizards/Brush Hogs.

Jigging

The final method typically mimics what lives on the water's bottom. Jigs are weighted hooks, sometimes with skirts, sometimes without, and are paired with soft plastics, grubs and a host of other baits to entice anything hanging out down low. Curly tail grubs can be bounced off the bottom, as well as worms, crayfish and a host of other options. The most popular jigging method involves what's called a football head jig with a soft plastic crayfish attached. The large football shaped weight contains a plastic skirt to blur the area around the crayfish. They come in all imaginable colors and typically natural greens blacks and browns are the most effective. Blues and oranges can also be utilized if there are more colorful crayfish in your waters. The high protein meals travel backwards along the bottom and should be represented as such. Slow pulls with long pauses and shakes create a bottom moving crustacean that upon the pause will lift its claws into the “air” in a defensive posture. Jigging a football head jigs are incredibly effective verse largemouth and smallmouth Bass. You may need some heavier duty line with a strong leader as the lure is heavier than most and you’ll be dragging over rocks and debris.

Branching Out

The previous are only three basic categories of fishing styles and methods that will become available to you. Try to do or utilize something new every time you get out on the water. Every method will require some level of practice and proficiency and will bring with it the confidence that it can indeed catch fish. Force yourself out of your comfort zones in order to become a more proficient fisherman. Moving away from 1 method that worked one time will inevitably catch you more fish and allow you to approach a host of scenarios that once on the water you didn't plan for. A favorite method or style goes out the window quickly if the fish aren't into it that day, there is too much vegetation for it to be effective, or the fish have moved to a completely different location based on environmental factors. You will need a well rounded tackle box both physically and mentally in order to read a situation that the water presents you with and adapt to it. Other methods not covered here include the use of bobber stops to suspend bait in the strike zone, the Carolina rig, the drop shot method, walking the dog and several others that will be covered more in depth with coming articles. Stay tuned and continue to expand your knowledge!