On the fifth day of Christmas my true love gave to me … five purple worms … four rebel lures, three weedless hooks, two spools of line and a fishing pole complete with a reel.
Purple worms? Yes, purple worms! I love fishing with rubber worms and my most favorite color for them is purple. I’ve caught so many large bass and pickerel on purple worms. Don’t ask me why the fish like purple – they just do! When the water is clear and it’s sunny or cloudy, purple worms out-fish the other colors by almost 2 to 1! The only other color that I’ve found that comes close is a black rubber worm.
So what kind of rubber worm do I use? My favorite has always been the Mann’s grape jelly worm. Here’s a picture of what it looks like:
I also like the Berkley power bait rubber worms. In fact, I have a whole tackle box full of different color and different manufacturer’s rubber worms! You can never have enough rubber worms!
So what about you? Do you have a favorite color worm? Drop me a comment please?
Catch you later.
-Mark
In the colder pre-spawn wrtaes, I have had success with texas rigged plastic worms. You can’t go wrong with jig n pigs, natural color tubes, hair jigs, and creature baits. Fish them slowly. Also, Rapala husky jerks and X-Raps have caught me some fish. They suspend when the retrieve is stopped and stay in the strike zone longer for lethargic fish. The fish are still slowed as they have come out of their winter lull. With these, I would use a jerk, jerk, pause retrieve with very light jerks and twitches of your rod. Also, I would allow a pause of about a minute to a minute and a half. If this doesn’t produce, experiment with your retrieve and length of pauses until you find what the fish want. Now in the spawn itself, the water has usually warmed up by then, so your retrieves can be quicker and more aggressive. Anything that imitates crayfish is good and if you can find heavy cover, I would suggest a weedless texas-rigged worm, as bass like to find cover for bedding to protect their eggs. If you can get the lure right by the bed, these bass will aggressively attack it. If you catch a bass this time of the year, release it as quickly as possible. The longer its out of the water, the longer bluegills have to raid the nest. That’s why we aren’t allowed to keep fish until mid-June here. Hope this helps and tight lines!