Why Micro Jigs Catch More Fish Now

Ultralight and micro jig finesse is becoming the staple for all types of fishing ... again

I love fishing. In all of its forms.. I spent the better part of three decades chasing bass on heavy baitcasting gear only to fall in love with ultralight fishing and fly fishing again in my 50s like I did as a kid. And I’m not here to try to sell you on swapping your heavy bass gear for ultralight rigs. However, anglers across the country have found it hard to deny how effective ultralight gear and micro finesse lures have become for fishing for everything from bass to bluegill in recent years.

Now that we are able to be very efficient with our casts and presentations, sizing down makes a lot more sense and ultimately has become way more productive. When I had to get a bass’s attention from 100 feet away, a large aggressive obtuse attractor on a lure makes a lot of sense—think Whopper Plopper, 8XD, 1-ounce spinnerbait, giant spoon, big glide bait and many others.

But now that I can land a lure right in front of a fish, suddenly those obtuse presentations have become somewhat overbearing much of the time. Still phenomenal at calling from a distance, but way too much when the lure lands just a few feet from a fish.

Let me give you an example a lot of anglers who are good with electronics can relate to. Two years ago, I could take a hover strolled minnow, throw it by a stump in April and May, and catch 50 big smallmouth bass a day. Fast forward to this year, and you can still get 50 smallmouth to follow. But not even half of them will bite. A jighead minnow is already a pretty finesse presentation and even it is becoming a little too memorable to highly pressured fish.

That is the issue with lures that have a lot of “memorable features.”

^{Watch this video to illustrate what we are talking about with these micro jigs in action}

THE ALLURE OF MICRO FINESSE JIGS

Today, many companies have hopped on the micro finesse train. But truth be told, there have been micro jigs that have slayed all types of fish for more than 30 years. Jigs like the Trout Magnet are what I consider a micro jig. I’m talking about 1 to 1 1/2 inches with a 1/64-ounce up to about 1/16-ounce in weight jighead. Tiny jigs, often thrown on 2-pound test line.

And oddly enough, that’s what I’m catching a large portion of my fish on these days. So while there is a rush to the “new” in fishing tackle. The effectiveness of some of these jigs now 30 years old, is proving to be even more substantial than in years past.

For a long time, I scoffed at the idea of throwing small lures because of the inability to cover water. Before we had robust mapping, side scan, down scan, 360, live imaging and more, we had to focus on lures that could cover a ton of water and help us breakdown massive fisheries in the short windows we had to fish. The notion of throwing a tiny little lure and hoping that tiny thing somehow intersected with a fish in these vast expanses of water seemed laughable.

Then as we got more dialed into things like the “spot on the spot,” we began to realize, in a lot of those situations, we were dealing with educated fish who would ignore our traditional search lures. Suddenly things like shaky heads, drop shots and later ned rigs became the staples, replacing much of the time, spinnerbaits, crankbaits and loud noisy lures, especially in the circles of tournament bass fishing.

There will always be times when the deep diving crankbait, buzzbait, and other big, loud, fun lures will light the fish up. But day in and day out, the trend is moving not only to more natural presentations, but also to smaller versions.

MICRO JIGS EXCEL FOR ALL SPECIES

So this all started to occur to me after realizing my most memorable days, and oddly enough, my biggest catches were coming more regularly on micro jigs. I’ve caught trout up to 14 pounds, bass up to 8 pounds, catfish up to 12 pounds, crappie up to 2 3/4 pounds, bluegill over a pound, red ears over 2 pounds and a whole bunch more thanks to throwing micro jigs more on 2-pound line.

The video above is a perfect example. I was throwing Trout Magnets on a small 1/16-ounce Tungsten Eye Hole Jig and I found a bunch of smallmouth bass in a small area feeding. They bit first cast when I would get the Micro Jig close to any irregularity on the bottom. I had thrown a Deps Sakamata Shad on an Owner Range Roller head earlier in the day with very few bites, but lots of follows. But when I switched to fishing for crappie with Micro Jigs, I started lighting up the smallmouth. And the fishing got stupid easy.

That has happened now more times than I can count. Last fall I started crappie fishing with the new Tungsten Eye Hole Pop Eye Jigs. A small 1-inch hair jig. I caught hundreds of crappie on a single jig all through the winter and quickly realized it was because the those micro jigs are so small and diminutive, they lack features that make the fish shy away or remember them.

I am convinced the smaller and more natural a presentation, the harder it is for a fish to remember it and get conditioned to it. And the larger and more aggressive a lure is, the easier it is for them to become conditioned to it and shy away. That is where the magic in Micro Jigs lies.

THE BEST ORIGINAL MICRO JIG IN MY OPINION

I am convinced the best micro jig you can fish with is a Trout Magnet. There are lots of good small plastics for crappie and bluegill on the market, but that specific micro jig has a profile that allows it to mimic multiple things in the water that all fish are used to eating at some point. They can mimic larvae, worms, chironomids, small hellgramites, small craws, small baitfish and more. They come in a range of colors and they can be fished in 1 foot of water or 30 feet of water equally well by just pairing them with the appropriate head.

I have had more memorable catches on a Trout Magnet in the last couple of years than probably any lure out there. And they are one of the original micro finesse baits, having been introduce in the late 90s. Back then, the idea of micro finesse plastics and jigs wasn’t even a notion in fishing. We had the Beetle Spin and some small crappie plastics, but no one was really thinking of a micro jig system that could carry over to multiple species and applications.

I really believe we are reaching a new period in fishing where the micro jigs will become more prevalent and most effective as fish continue to be more pressured than ever before. The fact that the Trout Magnet has caught so many fish for so many people in so many places for so long makes it one of the gold standards in fishing to me.

I readily admit and fully disclose that the owner of Trout Magnet, Jeff Smith, is a good friend as well as one of my marketing and consulting clients. So some will obviously see bias here. But I also could never work with Jeff ever again and would be a die-hard advocate for their jig because of how ingrained it is in my fishing now. And because of how I think fishing is evolving. I never go anywhere without my 2-pound line combo and a Trout Magnet or other micro jig on the line.

MICRO JIGS IN OTHER SHAPES AND SIZES

The Bobby Garland Baby Shad, the Z-Man Micro Goat, the D2 Jig, the Tungsten Eye Hole Pop-Eye Jig, The Charlie Brewer Slider 1-inch, the Original Pop-Eye Jig, the Road Runner and even things like the Flashback Mini Chatterbait are absolute fish catchers for a variety of species of fish that I would consider some of the staples in Micro Jigs.

There are a bunch of fun micro plastics companies out there now as well and lots of cool ways to rig them constantly coming out of Japan. And some pretty fun ones stateside as well. But I keep going back to what I feel like are the staples that have stood the test of time. The Trout Magnet, the Original Pop Eye jig made famous on Kentucky Lake, the Charlie Brewer Slider and the Baby Shad all just work and have for a long time.

New heads like the Eye Hole Jig allow you to add scent pellets naturally to your offering while enhancing the look of your micro jig. Jigheads like the Trout Magnet shad dart jighead or newer heads like the Drankcrazy Rocksy can balance these micro plastics perfectly for perfect natural presentations.

Light lines like 2-pound mono or 5-pound braid can enable you to cast lures as light as 1/64-ounce a long ways on an ultralight setup. Which makes them wildly versatile and effective in a multitude of places and a wide variety of fish.

If you haven’t fished these micro jigs on 2-pound line, much, you really are missing a valuable tool in fishing that could lead you to a lot more memorable days on the water.