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OK. Kidding.
If you are a fisherman and haven’t heard about it, congratulations. You have demonstrated an amazing ability to block out visual and auditory stimuli.
So I am doing a story on this craze and am looking for angler opinions — good and bad.
Who loves ‘em?
Who hates ‘em?
Why?
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While growing up in rural Southern Oregon, Mark Taylor developed a passion for the outdoors while he and his younger brother tagged along with their father on fishing, hunting and camping adventures.
Graduating from Northwestern University in 1988, Taylor spent four years as an officer in the U.S. Navy based in Norfolk before moving into journalism.
After five years writing about the military for a Norfolk-based publishing company, he became the outdoors editor at The Roanoke Times in 1998. He lives in Roanoke with his wife and twin daughters.
I was crappie fishing at Buggs Island last week and saw a fellow casting one of these. I never saw him put anything in the boat,though.
Yes, Why indeed ? I cannot fathom buying a $25 rig and hanging another $10 on it and then doing the penance of casting this contraption all day. But then again I never understood spending $20 + on a hard bait either. I can’t see flinging this from my canoe or kayak on the James. I might troll one for stripers on SML, since it’s just a scalaed down saltwater umbrella rig that we used on the Chesapeake years ago.Perhaps all the saltwater fisherman are either broke or have torn rotator cuffs and freshwater fisherman are teh next target market.It’s definitley a fad/craze and will be over as soon as a pro fisherman catches the winning sack on the next fad, which I hear on good authority will be a self retereiving lure retreiver with built in treble hooks!
I just talked with Lanny Deal of Mann’s Bait Company, which has the rights to the original Alabama Rig. He was quick to point out that A-rigs “aren’t magic bullets.” But, he said that when they work, they work great.
They are new and exciting. And winter is one of those times when they tend to work. So people are catching fish on them. That builds confidence, which means people keep throwing them instead of changing lures every five minutes. Which means they catch more fish.
John — The lure retriever joke very well could have longer legs than this craze!
how do they cast them and not get each lure all tangled up? i dont agree with them . might as well throw a net out and see how many you can catch. can you imagine getting one hung up in tree overhanging the bank???
Mark, Do you know if the State is going to stock Carvins Cove in the near future? It should because its the cleanest water in the valley and you don’t have to worry if its safe to eat the fish.You never hear anything about the Cove. Thanks,Butch
A Tech fisheries professor once told me:
“It doesn’t matter how nice of a rod and reel you have, or what kind of fancy lure you’re using… just down the riverbank there’s a kid with a cane pole and a worm who’s catching bigger fish than you are.”
I have a friend who is using the smaller versions very effectively at SML for Stripers. Also you can purchase them for a lot less then $25 these days. It seems someone new is building one every time you turn around. One tackle dealer at SML has unrigged units for $10-11 these days. I cannot wait to get on the water to try mine. It is one of the smaller units (crappie size?) that I ordered online for $9.99 unrigged from a Richmond website.
I’ve used them before but found they were more effective when using different length leaders on opposite sides or in the middle. They can be cumbersome to use until you get used to them but if you have a ‘good bite’ going they can be awesome. I prefer not using them though. They work pretty well to locate fish sometimes on the lake as you are trolling. And sometimes will get them biting if you are able to cast past their location and retrieve slowly through the school.
I’m not a fisherman, so excuse my ignorance. Who would logically expect five fish to go for the same lure so close together? I mean, it would take a feeding frenzy to happen. I know, I said I don’t fish. Just sayin’… it looks like a way to ‘lure’ gullible guys into wasting money.
Jason — The wires are really stiff, and the lures hook directly to them which reduces the risk of tangling.
abdnva — Although multi-fish hookups are possible, usually you will have one fish targeting one of the lures — usually the center lure that trails slightly behind the other four. You know the saying about being chased by a bear: You don’t have to be the fastest runner, you just can’t be the slowest. Same goes for fleeing baitfish!
Mark, that sort of reinforces my thought. You just are NOT going to get five fish to bite on the same line side by side. I can even see double lures. Anything more than that seems silly to me.
That’s just me, though.
abdnva — It’s not so much about getting more than one fish to bite. It’s about showing those fish something they are used to seeing. Bait fish rarely are solo critters. They run in schools as a survival mechanism. Those schools are going to attract predators, and the predators are going to take their toll. But they won’t get all of the bait fish. It’s the whole safety in numbers deal.
When a predator fish sees a single bait fish go by, something in that predator’s tiny brain says, “Hmmm… There’s something a little fishy about a shad swimming by itself. And even if I did want to chase that thing, one-on-one isn’t the best odds. It may get away and then I wasted all that energy for nuthin’.”
But when that predator sees five tightly bunched snacks swimming by together, that brain says, “OK. I like those odds. I should be able to catch at least one of those things. That one trailing a little bit behind the others looks especially vulnerable….”
It’s like when someone brings in a whole pizza and puts it on the community table in the office. Everyone notices and attacks. But if it’s just one piece of pizza sitting there, people are wary. And that piece just sits and gets cold and stale.
There you have it. The inner workings of the mind of a predator fish, as channeled by Mark Taylor.
Mark, that’s what makes you such a master. Thanks for the 411 from an enthusiastic, if clueless, fan. Seriously, good info for this neophyte.
Hmm… Now I’m hungry. Let’s see, what does PapaJohns.com have going on? Thank goodness I don’t have to bait a hook to find out. I’d be skinny if I did…
Since Mega Millions is where it is right now, I’ll use that analogy. Mark’s telling me that I’ve got a 5X chance of catching one good fish with this lure than if I threw a single worm out there, so to speak. I get it. My odds are down to one in 60 million (based on my skill set, LOL).
Again, I’m just blathering on, upping your click totals, and thanking you for a very informative site where your dedication shows clearly.
abdnva — I appreciate the clicks! Good luck in the lotto! Now, I need to go get a pizza.
I was at Gander Mt. today. Since my most recent visit (last week) when they had virtually zero swimbaits (favorite lure for attaching to a Bama rig) in stock, they had received a whole new shipment of swimbaits and again sold out of about 80% of them within a few days, leaving only the less desirable sizes and colors for me to select from. The Gander sales guy I talked to said that the Bama rigs (they sell the Picasso Rig and a couple of others) were flying off the shelves and that they had sold at least 1,000 of them in the last few months, and they can’t keep swimbaits in stock. In fact today they had no Picasso rigs on the shelf at all. Crazy. Me? I cast one about 5x at Smith Mt. Lake last week before losing it. Bye-bye $30+. It did look pretty sweet swimming through the water before I lost it though. I talked with a guy who is certain that another factor in the rig’s success is that the fish in heavily fished public waters haven’t seen it before, and that it won’t take long for it to become somewhat less effective. But for the time being it’s apparently the hot ticket.
Mark, This is exactly the rig that Tyler Meighan used to subdue the musky in the photo I sent you. It is a very effective bait(s). So much so that it has been banned during some tournaments already. Tyler and his fishing friend Ryan won a College tourney at Claytor back in March using these things.