Hey guys, today I’m going to talk a little bit about swim jig fishing for bass. The swim jig has recently become very popular. It has become popular because it really is deadly effective in certain situations.
For instance, today I was fishing in very shallow water and casting up underneath the undercut on the bank and the overhanging growth of bushes and grass. Fishing a swim jig allowed me to get back up under the cover where I needed to be without hanging up. On bright, sunny days, shade lines are key to target lurking bass ready to ambush.
This allowed me to be confident in my casts where fishing a square bill or something of the sort would have not allowed me to get up into the shadows where I needed to be without hanging up a lot.
Swim Jig Fishing for Bass – Color
The color of the swim jig depends a lot on the type of forge the bass are feeding on and also the clarity of the water. Today I was fishing and chocolate-milk-colored water so I used a dark purple swim jig with a strike king menace grub trailer in the same color. This creek has bluegill and crawfish as the main forage so that worked out great.
If I was fishing in clear water where minnows or shad may have been the best forage, I would have switched to a lighter-colored swimbait, maybe in a translucent gray or white pattern. I may have also thrown on a Keitech swimbait trailer instead of the flapping craw style. But again, that would depend on the water clarity.
That’s not to say that I couldn’t put on a smoked colored or white flapping craw or rage menace grub of some sort that would also get the job done. Sometimes you need to play with colors and trailers to figure out what the bass are keying in on.
Get Your Keitech Swimbait Trailers Here
Get Your Rage Tail Trailers Here
Swim Jig Fishing for Bass – Retrieve
Another thing that I have noticed, at least in my area of the country, is that many times I don’t need a pump my rod the way a lot of people fish swim jig if my trailer has enough kick. Sometimes I can cast it out and swim it back with little pumps or even a straight retrieve bouncing it off the structure on the bottom. I would also try to play with that cadence and retrieve to see what is triggering the bass in your body of water.
I know that on a long day of fishing it sure is easier to cast and retrieve and let the trailer do the work than to constantly work the wrist.
Today I brought a Tokyo rig, a spinner bait, and a swim jig. I ended up sticking with the swim jig because a weather front came through last night and the fog blew off this morning, giving way to blue bluebird skies. There was also very little wind which made the swimbait a more practical choice than the spinner bait. I was hoping that I could catch them on a reaction bite with swim jigs instead of flipping and today it paid off.
My advice would be that if you have never fished a swim jig that you give it a chance. On the right day in the right conditions, it can be magical. Well, I didn’t catch too many fish today, I also didn’t have to finesse fish as much as I sometimes would’ve in the past. It seems that more and more the swim jig gets the nod when I’m looking for a bait to start my day.
Don’t be afraid to try different retrieves or to get the jig up in the thick stuff and swim it out. When it’s bouncing off of cover and swimming through thick cover is when the swim jig shines. It is definitely a bass fishing tactic that will stay in my arsenal for the years to come. Swim jig fishing for bass can be deadly effective and super fun.
If you like this blog post feel free to give me a comment down below. If you have any questions or videos or suggestions I would love to hear those as well. Be sure to bookmark this page and come back for future articles and videos that I will be posting here.
To Your Bass Fishing Success,
Jonathan Burke