Help on soft plastic color

[Amdahl]

Plan on spending a lot more time with a piece of plastic on my jig this year. Curious as to what are your favorite body sizes, styles and colors. Will be fishing mostly natural lakes in MN. Leaning toward targeting active fish with Chartreuse, Orange & White in 4 inch Powerbait grubs for casting shorelines, maybe Pumkinseed for more negative fish.
Also looking at 5 inch jerk shad for snap jigging later this fall (same general colors). Any other suggestions/opinions? Thanks in advance for the best opinions I've found on the web!

Amdahl

Oh, one more thing...Putting some plastics together for late May early June Canada trip. How bout some colors, etc. for northerns.

[Neal/CO]

Those are good choices, but don't forget black! Black looks natural in clear water and is very visable in muddy water.

[Peanut]

All of the colors mentioned by you and Neal/CO are good. Probably the main ones. In the last year or two, we have also done fairly well on clear/silver fleck jigs. I would have both single and double-tails to use as needed.

As for Northerns - anything that moves will work. Plain yellow (not chartruese) and white are perhaps the most common in my neck of the woods. Don't spend $$$ on the Berkley powerbait or other scented ones, it won't matter. Plain old bulk jigs will do. Do, however, take several of both bodies and jig heads - Northerns'll wear them out.

In addition to jigs for Northerns - good old spoons work very well for casting as well. Len Thompson (size 1 or 2) white/red and 5 of diamonds have probably caught more northerns in Northern Saskatchewan than all other lures combined.

Hope this helps.

derrek.

CANADIAN WALLEYE OPEN UP AND SAY "EH"!

"On Sundays some men go to church and daydream about fishing. Others go fishing and think about God."

[Tom (N.W.Ont)]

My brother has always used an off-white/creamy glow coloured 4" twister tail. I've grown to like it as well...kicked some serious butt using that colour much to the dismay of those around me that don't! I put a twist on the rig by using a glow-headed whistler jig...the glow of the jig and flash of the spinner on the whistler is a deadly combo...not to mention the sound/vibration of the spinner. Truely a kick-azz rig. Give 'em a try and thank me later.

As for jerk-shads, I've had my most recent success on any orange-y or orange-browny colour. Both for smallies and walleye. They don't look like anything that swims, but I don't argue with success or fish!

-T

[Tom (mich)]

Last I counted, I had 3.4 bazillion packages of a variety of soft plastics for walleyes and smallies. That said, purple first and white second are the first colors to get wet.

[haugboss]

dont forget blue straight or combo with yellow white or chart.

[Amdahl]

one more shot...to the top

Thanks again guys/gals.

Amdahl

[perchjerker]

One thing I would try instead of plastic is a a strip cut from a balloon. Provides attraction without a lot of bulk. And you can get them cheap, in about any color you want.

[Homer]

Not sure how color selection for the Detroit River will translate to Minnesota, but a white power jigworm and the pumpkinseed jigworm were the ticket for me last spring. I added chartreuse to the mix in the fall, as well as power minnows. Couldn't see any difference in success between power jigworms and power minnows, but there were many days where they showed a distinct preference for one color over the others.

[Johnnie Candle]

The greatest soft plastic of all time is the 3" Berkley Tournament Strength Power Minnow. With te exception of Dunkirk New York, I caught fish on these at every PWT Tournament site last year. The best colors seem to be Rainbow Silver Fleck, Chartruese Shad and Glow.

These work best on a Jig 1/4 oz or smaller and work very well for drop shotting. Cast them, Jig them or even slow troll them and hold on.