Basstrike Fishing Blog

Swimbait is a kind of fishing lure baits that imitate many fish. Sometimes it with plastic "paddle tail", regardless of size or appearance. Usually we divided swimbaits into three types: hardy body swimbaits, soft body swimbaits, paddle tail swimbaits. Let's learn them one by one.

Hard Body Swimbaits
The hard swimbaits lures constructed from wood, hard plastic or other composite materials. As the name implies, they are rigid or hard in nature. Some hard jointed swimbait include topwater baits, jointed and glide style swimbaits.

Single Jointed

This kind of swimbaits made up of only two hard body sections hinged together. This hinge connection allows the lure to "swim" even during retrieval. Sometimes the connection is in the middle of the swimbait or close to the tail.

Glide Baits

This type of bait is similar to the single jointed bait but more longer. The glide feature allows the bait a broader "S-shaped" swim action than a standard hard body swimbait. They are great for slow presentation and are awesome tools for the stop and go technique, like a jerkbait action.

Multi Jointed

Multi jointed swimbait made up of multiple body parts hinged together. It possesses a smoother and wider swimming action, unlike the single jointed swimbaits. Hard body baits come in varying lengths, with the longer baits having more joints than the shorter ones.

Soft Body Swimbaits
These model of baits are usually made of soft, full body plastic. Some examples include hollow belly, full body baits, and line through. The differences in these categories of swimbait are based on its full body structure.

Soft plastic swimbaits come in different styles and shapes that mimic almost all types of forage fish like include: bass, hitch, shad, trout, and bluegill. There are various styles in this category which includes the whole water column. Lures may come with internal rigging, or it may not be included hooks.

Full Body Swimbaits

They are solid rubber lures with treble hooks as baits attached to their belly, quite similar to a hard body swimbait. These baits are usually bought separately as most models of full body swimbaits hooks do not come with them. To rig them you should attach the eyelet to the hook rings via the body of the bait.

Line Through

These swimbaits are specially designed as a shield for the bait to protect it from damaged. They are also useful in keeping the bass tightly hooked during the struggle by eliminating the advantage they usually have of shaking off when you use a full body lure. To rig this bait, you pass your line into the nose of the lure through a hole on it; the line enters a narrow tube which passes through the lure and out the top end or bottom. With the line now out of the bait, you can then attach a hook may be treble hook to the line. With the bait properly rigged in this style, any fish that get caught by the bait slides up during the struggle to prevent it from being torn up or destroyed by other fish.

Top Hook

Top hook swimbaits mean the hook is on the top, it usually has a standard hook running through the body and coming out the top of the bait. The head of a bait's hook usually comes weighted and sometimes unweighted. Because of its large hook exposure, it guarantees better hookset but not weedless. Some models come with a hook ring at the bottom for attaching a treble hook.

Paddle Tail Swimbaits
These are small soft body swimbaits. They are sold in multiple packs just like soft plastic worms. They usually come without hooks so you will need to buy separately and to rig them paddle tail bait is perfect for fishing in heavily weeded sites because it can be rigged without weed.

All these baits have the same action when used in water; the only difference is in the hook style you use which determines how the good bait will perform. Making a decision on what hook to use jig head hook, straight shank hook, swimbait hook depends largely on the body type of the fish you want to fishing. The big paddle tail lures are very useful to catch giant fish.

Hollow Body

For better performance of the bait, hollow body paddle tail swimbaits are mostly used alongside swimbait hooks. Swimbait hooks have a wide gap with a screw lock or an offset shank to keep their head in place. These baits are made with a "belly weight" on the mud section of the shank of the hook or they sometimes come unweighted. Its hollow body makes them softer so that the hook is exposed when a fish bites on the bait, allowing for greater hooksets.

Solid Body

A swimbait hook can also be used for this version, but its solid body does not give room for a good hookset. Despite this feature, the solid body paddle tail swimbait lasts longer and stays rigged much longer than a hollow body swimbait does. A jig head or straight shank hook would also work well with this bait and can be used like a top hook swimbait.

When, Where and Why Use Swimbaits

Swimbaits can be used in both clear or dingy water. They are can be used not in mud water. They are fished on the surface to a maximum depth of 50 foot. A buoyant or unweighted swimbait can be used just below the water surface, while a bait weighed with lead head cannot exceed 30 feet depth. They work well in cold as well as warm water. There's no particularly bad time to use a swimbait while fishing. But we like to use them on days with slightly windy and cloudy skies. Not so bright or dark either so that it is enough to break up the swimbait's silhouette.

The weight of the bait or sink rate is usually determined by the condition and area of fishing. A heavier bait is used when we want to fish at the bottom of the water (greater depth) and a lighter sink lure for vegetation and near cover.

Most fishermen usually prefer the bait that caught their biggest fish. This is the reason bass fishers prefer swimbaits and would recommend it to anyone even if they can’t find suitable lure for their type of fishing.

Swimbaits are the best lures for catching lunkers. And though they have mostly been used in times past when fishing off the coast, swimbaits are now quite popular in bass fishing.