12/16 pesky lil #%^

[Fiskadoro]

Originally Posted by SquidJig

Key things to look for: uneven 'hips', the wide points of the jig and big or off-center front holes.

I like it in the vid when he says: " Went kinda crazy the belt sander" I also like it when he's holding the Killer and says: "If the hole is really huge like that, I don't care if it's off to one side or not." I hear that. Killer jigs have those big holes specifically to give them more action. Great surface jigs.

As I said above: With casting it's the chasing or the cleanup that creates irregularities or idiosyncrasies. What he's talking about is how much they sanded it or if they drilled the hole off to one side, he's talking about the chasing. He likes jigs that have irregular hips because they sanded one side more then the other or an offset hole do to the fact the drill twisted off center. That's not a reflection of the mold so much as the hand of whoever is doing the chasing or cleanup.

I've got a buddy Mike who's really into the irregular jig thing. His take is that if the jig off center due the hole being to one side or the fact the sanded more on one side then the other, it then will have a more erratic kick or an irregular action which makes it more attractive to the fish.

I don't know if you've experienced this but sometimes with surface Iron I find the fish just want a steady retrieve, but other times if you bounce the tip around and get a little more erratic action out of the jig you will get more strikes.

I've found this to be case with other lures as well. Before the swimbait craze we used to fish big Cordell 7" Redfins for big stripers.

Out of the box with a straight retrieve they have a very nice rapala like swimming action, but take the same Redfin drill a 1/4" hole in it a inch from the front and it will fill with water and have a completely different action. It increases the weight so you can throw it a lot farther but it also makes it sit deeper in the water and if you retrieve it with short jerks you can get an excellent walk the dog action out of it with the lure swinging back and forth subsurface. Total old-school you hardly ever see anyone doing this any more but it really kills them at times, and I've caught Yellows numerous Calicos and a ton of barracuda using this same trick as well. The thing is once you've drilled one it will never swim normally again so if you look in my box about half the Redfins are drilled and the rest are still stock. When they want irregular dramatic action I use the drilled ones if they want a smooth swimmer I go stock.

In a similar manner I like to vary my retrieve when fishing Iron until I see a pattern and then I fish it the way they want it. I think it's the same with irregular jigs like he describes. I own them. There are times that they do work better, and honestly there are times when a more stock jig works better. It all depends what they want. Ultimately it's the jig you believe, that you fish the most that get's bit.

To me the whole irregular jig thing is not as interesting as the reason why two non-irregular, virtually identical jigs will sometimes have different actions. I mean if there is some obvious mechanical difference you can see it makes sense that that mechanical thing, that visible difference in the jig is creating a different action. What's more interesting to me if there is no obvious difference, yet they still have different actions. That's a little more of a mystery.

Jim