7 Best Panfish Lures to Catch Big Ones
I have not used live bait in more than two years and catch a lot more big red ear sunfish and bluegills than most anglers
I haven’t used live bait for panfish in years. Mostly because I wanted to prove to myself I could be as effective without as I had been with it. I am not here to convince you that you shouldn’t use live bait or that using live bait makes you less of a fisherman. Not at all. Red worms catch the heck out of ‘em and so do crickets. But I travel a good bit, and getting live bait is not always easy, convenient or even an option.
So I started testing baits like crazy about 3 years ago for bluegills, crappie, sunfish and more. And I have landed on a good array of fish catchers that I have been able to take all over the country and consistently catch panfish from the dead of winter to the middle of summer and every time in between.
I also have come up with multiple ways to present the baits so that you can handle any scenario of fishing you might run into. The point being to give you a handful of options that have proven to work all over the country, on small lakes and ponds to giant reservoirs. In dirty water and crystal clear water alike.
Jigs are the main game
I have been using several jigs for years and adding a handful more in each season as I hone in on better presentations for different scenarios. And as I fish with other good anglers, we share ideas and experiences that also open up some new and better baits.
My staples the last few years have been jig and plastics and hand-tied jigs. I use some micro cranks, topwaters, and a fly rod quite a bit as well as a few other baits here and there, and they can be really effective in different scenarios. But day in and day out, a jig just produces in the widest array of situations.
On the jig and plastic front, I use some plastics that have action (like flapping, swimming tails) and I use some plastics with no action. On the hand ties, I want something buggy— tempting morsels that look alive to the fish. And there are times when the fish like something that looks like a bug, and times when the prefer something that looks like a water creature (shrimp, baitfish, flea, etc).
The jighead is the problem with panfish jigs
My biggest pet peeve with finding good panfish jigs is there are hardly any good jigheads made for panfish. The two heads I use the most are a Decoy Round Magic, which is mostly sold in Japan. And a jighead I make myself using the right sized jig hook with a tungsten slotted fly bead in a pretty large size (5.5 or 6.4).
Because most of the time with panfish, I want a 1/16-ounce jig to get the jig down quickly and fish it like I want. And to be able to cast it farther. Most panfish jigheads are 1/32 ounce or 1/64 ounce that have the right hook in it. If you find a 1/16-ounce jighead, it usually has a No. 2 or No. 4 hook. And I want a No. 6 or No. 8 hook for bluegills.
Favorite jigs for ‘gills and red ear
So now we’ve covered the criteria for good panfish jigs, I can explain why these specific jig and plastic combinations have been so good for catching panfish all over the country. This year already, I have caught big bluegill and red ear in Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Illinois, Missouri and Nebraska. I’ve used it successfully in previous years in Indiana, Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, Minnesota and other states as well. So I’m well travelled with these jigs and can verify they work consistently.
Hand-Tied Homemade Bugs (tutorials soon)
I started throwing the Charlie Brewer 1-inch grubs about 5 years ago. And that sort of opened my eyes up to the idea I don’t need live bait for panfish. Same as a jig did for me in the early days of bass fishing and the early days of crappie fishing. And this one jig remains one of my all time best bluegill and shellcracker catchers. I believe I caught more shell crackers on hand-ties this year, but just barely. A large number of the other ones came on the Slider or the Panfish Magnet.
That also started me on the path of testing every small plastic out there for catching bluegills and panfish. Are there a lot of other baits that catch bluegills and red ears that aren’t on my list. Of course. I’m not here to tell you this is good and that is bad. I’m here to give you lures I know work everywhere consistently.
I got on the Itty Bit Slab HuntR years ago for crappie when downsizing to smaller baits gets you more bites (cold waters, high pressure). It turned out to be an excellent fish catcher for gills and sunfish too. I like these bodies but they can tear up a little quicker than most.
The Panfish Magnet products have become my go-to staples. The profile is perfect and the formulation they use in their plastics makes the baits last a long time on a jighead. I have fished them straight reeling, twitching and dead-sticked under a bobber and they are equally deadly. Paired with a 1/64-ounce Eye-Hole Jig and they are deadly for all types of panfish.
They are well made in the US, and it’s a company full of really good fishing folks. They spent countless hours designing arguably the best soft plastic system for trout and it is equally deadly on panfish.
The Z-Man Micro Finesse baits are really interesting because they are larger than most of the baits I use, but because of their soft material, they collapse well and big bluegills have no problem getting them in their mouths. Last fall, I had a month where I was bluegill fishing every day and keeping 20 of the biggest gills I had ever seen all on the Micro Goat and Micro TRD. I was blown away by the quality these baits produced and how easy it was to catch fish on them. But most importantly, I could rig them and never touch them for all 20 fish. I went for a week catching 20-50 a day on the same one Goat I rigged originally. A testament to how good they work and how long they last.
The last jigs are Starky Flies Gill Getters. And then similar hand-tied bugs that I tie myself. The Gill Getters feature buggy chenille bodies with rubber spider legs on a tungsten head and fly hook. They are perfectly sized and expertly hand tied by Tom Starkweather up in Indiana for me. Check him out on Etsy and tell him I sent you.
I fish his flies under a bobber although they are plenty heavy enough to cast on ultralight gear. I caught hundreds of giant gills this winter with a double bug rig in deep water and the majority of my shell crackers this year have come on these hand-tied bugs under a bobber.
Colors that work
I am admittedly not a crazy color guy, but I have found a few colors seem to produce more times than others. I think you can catch active feeding fish on just about any color. But highly pressured fish, compromised water clarity and other factors can severely limit which colors will work.
One of my staples has surprisingly been white and chartreuse. I think chartreuse is a great accent for gills. And you will see a lot of colors I use have chartreuse accents. I also like some of the more natural colors like Bison in the Trout Magnet and green pumpkin in the Z-Man line. You can never go wrong with contrasty colors like black and chart or black and green. Or white and chart. So get some naturals. And get some contrasts. And you will be good to go.
My favorites are
Natural (panfish magnet)
chart/white
black/green
green pumpkin
black
chartreuse
green with red flake
bison (gold/black)
orange/chartreuse
Why different shapes matter
So bluegills are like most other fish. They are opportunists at times. And other times they are finicky. So they will sometimes eat anything you throw and a lot of times be pretty tough to get on the hook. They are almost always curious. But getting one to come nose up and look and getting one to bite and get the hook are two separate things.
I have found that sometimes a kicking tail gets more bites and sometimes no action gets more bites. Sometimes you want it on the bottom and sometimes you want it suspending. I will talk about retrieves that are best in an upcoming newsletter, but for now, I think knowing that you need some with tails or appendages that move and some with nothing at all will help a lot.
Trout and Panfish Magnets produce and have hardly any movement. Sliders, Slab HuntRs and Goats all produce as well and have subtle shimmies and kicks that entice. Hair jigs have flowing pulsing type movements that make them look alive. And can be the most deadly presentations at times (like spawn)
Scent factor
I think bluegill are more apt to nose up to something than maybe any other fish. Panfish in general will nose up to things before sucking them in when they are leery of something. I think because of this, scent can play a key role in getting more bites at times. Now I don’t want to get too overboard with scent as if I’m messing with a lot of stinky messy scents, then I’m really no better off than using live bait.
Because of this I have settled on a favorite scent called Billy Rub. I have no affiliation with them. They have no idea who I am. But I swear by the stuff because I have hundreds of shellcrackers to my name that have fallen for jigs with Billy Rub on them. Now I have also caught hundreds on jigs with no scent. So make your own deductions there. But for me, it gives me a little more confidence that I’ve done everything in my power to increase my odds of getting a hard to catch fish like a shellcracker to bite.
Best jigheads
Maybe the thing I hope to fix for all panfishermen (working with companies now) is to make really good jigheads for bluegills, sunfish and panfish that are not crappie jigs. We shouldn’t have to use crappie jigheads on tiny bluegill sized plastics. We also all don’t want 1/32 ounce or 1/64 ounce jigs. A lot of us do work with 1/16 ounce jigs. So I’m working to get several better options added to several brands this year.
For now, my staples are the Decoy Round Magic 1.8 g in either No. 8 or No. 6 Hook sizes as well as the 1/20 Micro Finesse Jigs. Lately I’ve been taking No. 6 and No. 8 jighooks and threading a 5.5 or 6.4 tungsten bead on them and supergluing the bead into place and using those. The heaviest of the tungsten beads allows me to fish faster, deeper and get down and keep it on the bottom. This can be a huge advantage over lighter jigs that don’t cast as well and have a tendency to ride up and away from fish.
Put it all together
So try my system with a heavier head around 1/16 ounce on a No. 6 or No. 8 hook, one of these chosen plastics, a couple of Panfish Magnet Bobbers if you want to float them or hold them just over the fish. Get you a nice ultralight setup with 2-4 pound line. And get after them.
This info is golden.