Stan Fagerstrom
04-05-2005, 08:19 AM
Storm Swim Shads
“Great Baits For Big Bass”
By Stan Fagerstrom
Part 1
I know the first lure my pal Mike Pedersen is going to throw the next time we go fishing at Mexico’s Lake El Salto.
It’s a Storm Swim Shad. Mike, like a whole lot of other anglers around the country, has flat fallen in love with that homely hunk of plastic the Storm folks introduced a few years ago. He’s convinced it’s the next best thing to throwing dynamite when it comes to putting really big bass in the boat.
http://www.ifish.net/sfswimshad.jpg
Storm Swim Shad lures like the one pictured here have turned out to be a great bait for largemouth bass.
Before I tell you why he’s made that decision, let me provide a bit of the background on Mike. If you’ve a regular reader of my ifish columns you’ll recall I’ve mentioned Mike before. Besides being one of my best friends, Mike also assists me with photography I do on fishing adventures. Though he got his share of fish the first two trips we made to El Salto Lake, Mike was snake bit when it came to putting a really big one in the boat.
http://www.ifish.net/sfelsaltbas1.jpg
My pal Mike Pedersen, of Longview, WA, is a darn good bass fisherman, but he hadn't put a really big one into the boat until he started using a Swim Shad.
And it wasn’t because the fish weren’t hitting. As a matter of fact, some of the time they grabbed our baits darn near every time we cast. Those slab sided brutes in Mexico’s El Salto Lake do that every now and then. Trouble was the bass Mike got hold of just wouldn’t stay with him long enough for him to get them in the boat. He lost one big one after another. It was the only time in all the years I’ve known him I’d ever heard him cuss.
Mike is a good bass fisherman. He was still in grade school when I first met him. His mother worked at the same newspaper I did. I was writing the newspaper’s outdoor column. “Your fishing column,” his mom told me one day, “is about the only thing in the newspaper Mike wants to read.”
His mother also told me that the kids in Mike’s class had been assigned a special project. The students were told to pick a subject, then turn in a presentation detailing why they found the subject they had picked of interest.
As it turned out, Mike had picked me as his project. His mom eventually presented me with the work he had done. I still have it. It wasn’t hard to determine I was a hero of sorts where Mike was concerned. I knew one way or another I had to take that kid out fishing. I eventually did. Our first trip together was more than 30 years ago. We’ve been at it to one degree or another ever since. It has turned into a relationship I treasure.
Mike wasn’t along when I got my first look at El Salto several years ago. I hadn’t been there more than a couple of hours on that first trip before my partner had a 10-pounder in the boat. The five of us in our party wound up boating 40 bass from 8 to more than 11-pounds in just three days. I knew I’d have to get Mike down there to fish with me. I’ve lived long enough to know nothing’s worth much unless you have a chance to share it with someone you love. Though I’d been fishing bass over a sizeable chunk of the world for a half century, I’d never seen anything like the fishing at El Salto.
And the fishing wasn’t the only thing El Salto had going for it. Perched right there overlooking the lake was the best operated fishing lodge I’d ever encountered south of the border. Its name was Anglers Inn. It turned out to be even better than the things I’d heard about it before I had a chance to see it for myself.
Mike was with me when he caught his first 5-pounder in the United States. He was also along with me when he finally got one just shy of 6-pounds. But that was the largest he had to his credit by the time we made our first trip to El Salto.
Our first visit there was in December. There was a distant rumble of thunder when we launched at daylight the first morning. That thunder was an indication of things to come. A bit later in the day the skies opened and the rain came in buckets.
The rain lasted only one day. It didn’t keep us from catching fish, but we didn’t get into the whoppers for which El Salto is famous. Just before quitting time on our third and last day Mike flipped a Pop R into a cove surrounded by submerged timber. He gave that little bait a couple of blurps and---wham! The best fish we’d seen in three days of plug pitching smashed it and threw water all over the place in the process.
“There he is!” Mike hollered and set the hook. The pot-bellied bruiser he had hold of surged down and away. A few heartbeats later that “There he is” turned out to be “There he was.” The fish got down into the trees and pulled free of the lure.
That was the last shot we had at a really big bass that first trip. Stay tuned. In my next column I’ll tell what happened the next couple of times Mike and I visited El Salto. You’ll also discover why he’s so “hooked” on those Storm Swim Shad baits I mentioned in the beginning.
“Great Baits For Big Bass”
By Stan Fagerstrom
Part 1
I know the first lure my pal Mike Pedersen is going to throw the next time we go fishing at Mexico’s Lake El Salto.
It’s a Storm Swim Shad. Mike, like a whole lot of other anglers around the country, has flat fallen in love with that homely hunk of plastic the Storm folks introduced a few years ago. He’s convinced it’s the next best thing to throwing dynamite when it comes to putting really big bass in the boat.
http://www.ifish.net/sfswimshad.jpg
Storm Swim Shad lures like the one pictured here have turned out to be a great bait for largemouth bass.
Before I tell you why he’s made that decision, let me provide a bit of the background on Mike. If you’ve a regular reader of my ifish columns you’ll recall I’ve mentioned Mike before. Besides being one of my best friends, Mike also assists me with photography I do on fishing adventures. Though he got his share of fish the first two trips we made to El Salto Lake, Mike was snake bit when it came to putting a really big one in the boat.
http://www.ifish.net/sfelsaltbas1.jpg
My pal Mike Pedersen, of Longview, WA, is a darn good bass fisherman, but he hadn't put a really big one into the boat until he started using a Swim Shad.
And it wasn’t because the fish weren’t hitting. As a matter of fact, some of the time they grabbed our baits darn near every time we cast. Those slab sided brutes in Mexico’s El Salto Lake do that every now and then. Trouble was the bass Mike got hold of just wouldn’t stay with him long enough for him to get them in the boat. He lost one big one after another. It was the only time in all the years I’ve known him I’d ever heard him cuss.
Mike is a good bass fisherman. He was still in grade school when I first met him. His mother worked at the same newspaper I did. I was writing the newspaper’s outdoor column. “Your fishing column,” his mom told me one day, “is about the only thing in the newspaper Mike wants to read.”
His mother also told me that the kids in Mike’s class had been assigned a special project. The students were told to pick a subject, then turn in a presentation detailing why they found the subject they had picked of interest.
As it turned out, Mike had picked me as his project. His mom eventually presented me with the work he had done. I still have it. It wasn’t hard to determine I was a hero of sorts where Mike was concerned. I knew one way or another I had to take that kid out fishing. I eventually did. Our first trip together was more than 30 years ago. We’ve been at it to one degree or another ever since. It has turned into a relationship I treasure.
Mike wasn’t along when I got my first look at El Salto several years ago. I hadn’t been there more than a couple of hours on that first trip before my partner had a 10-pounder in the boat. The five of us in our party wound up boating 40 bass from 8 to more than 11-pounds in just three days. I knew I’d have to get Mike down there to fish with me. I’ve lived long enough to know nothing’s worth much unless you have a chance to share it with someone you love. Though I’d been fishing bass over a sizeable chunk of the world for a half century, I’d never seen anything like the fishing at El Salto.
And the fishing wasn’t the only thing El Salto had going for it. Perched right there overlooking the lake was the best operated fishing lodge I’d ever encountered south of the border. Its name was Anglers Inn. It turned out to be even better than the things I’d heard about it before I had a chance to see it for myself.
Mike was with me when he caught his first 5-pounder in the United States. He was also along with me when he finally got one just shy of 6-pounds. But that was the largest he had to his credit by the time we made our first trip to El Salto.
Our first visit there was in December. There was a distant rumble of thunder when we launched at daylight the first morning. That thunder was an indication of things to come. A bit later in the day the skies opened and the rain came in buckets.
The rain lasted only one day. It didn’t keep us from catching fish, but we didn’t get into the whoppers for which El Salto is famous. Just before quitting time on our third and last day Mike flipped a Pop R into a cove surrounded by submerged timber. He gave that little bait a couple of blurps and---wham! The best fish we’d seen in three days of plug pitching smashed it and threw water all over the place in the process.
“There he is!” Mike hollered and set the hook. The pot-bellied bruiser he had hold of surged down and away. A few heartbeats later that “There he is” turned out to be “There he was.” The fish got down into the trees and pulled free of the lure.
That was the last shot we had at a really big bass that first trip. Stay tuned. In my next column I’ll tell what happened the next couple of times Mike and I visited El Salto. You’ll also discover why he’s so “hooked” on those Storm Swim Shad baits I mentioned in the beginning.