Let's Talk Flukes

[FlatsNBay]

BassinLou's post got me thinking about flukes.

What is your favorite fluke and favorite color?

I've caught thousands of fish over the years on a Zoom Super Fluke..I always loved that fluke but noticed recently that they jacked the price up on them at over $5 a bag. I've searched for an alternative that was a little cheaper.

I liked Bass Assassin flukes over the years too. They are a little heavier and you can cast them farther but their action isn't as erratic as the Zoom. They are one of the few companies that make a gold pepper shiner (black/gold flake) that perfectly imitates a wild shiner.

I've tried the Yum Breaking Shad fluke and they are thinner and much lighter than the Zoom.

I just bought a bag of the H2OX flukes from Academy which were much cheaper and you get more per bag. I haven't used them yet. They are similar size and shape as the Zoom but differ slightly with subtle ribbing along the body. I'm not sure if the action will be any different.

I tried the Bitters version of a fluke but thought that they were too thin and light for my liking.

Favorite Colors: watermelon for clear water, gold pepper shiner for tanic water, white for during the shad spawn, and bait fish when they are schooling on minnows. Those are all the colors that I need!

[Pat Dilling]

I still like the Zoom Super Fluke, most often in pearl, and seasonally in Baby Bass.  I followed tips from Mike Iconelli.  I throw them on a spinning rod with 15# braid tied to a nickel crane style swivel, then 6-8 inches of flourocarbon leader.  Usually 12# test.  That helps the fluke sink a little and also imitates the fluke chasing something.  I use a 3/0 EWG hook and thread a #6 treble hook on as a stinger, if the cover allows.  I put the treble on with the single hook up so I can stick it into the tail of the fluke.  It is amazingly weedless that way and that treble has caught alot of fish for me.

[njpaulc]

I know it's not the "same" bait but I prefer the 4.5 inch Lunker City Sluggo in smoke pepper shad

[FlatsNBay]

NJpaul, I used to love fishing a Slugo. That's what got me started on that technique. Much more action than a traditional fluke but lighter. I remember when Charlie's Worms came out with their imitation called the Chug O. Killers!

[big g]

I throw a zoom fluke a lot.  I use a 1/32 bullet weight and Texas rig with a thin wire #3 WGH, this keeps it  weedless, and gives it a slow fall through the water column, but still allows it to jerk right and left when I snap the rod in a walking motion.  Too much weight kills the action.  It's good for peacock as long as you keep it moving.

  For bass I let it settle on the bottom and snap up and settle back to the bottom like a dying bait fish.  Slow is key here, with long pauses.
 Also throw it into weeds and just shake it a little and the pull it slowly, then repeat the shake and sit.  I found the light bullet weight 1/32 help protect the nose of fluke from pulling down the shaft of the hook in the weeds.    Watermelon red is my fav color for south Florida by far!

[FlatsNBay]

Those are interesting ways to fish it. I'll have to give them a try.

[Capt. BassinLou]

I mainly throw Zoom flukes or CPF lures Shad Jerks.

[Hobious]

very little luck on flukes. 

all my buds fish them on ball heads, so it just a jig to me at that point.  like swimming a sassy shad back in the day. 

the snaggiest lure I have ever tried.

I have fished a weightless fluke-like SKINNY DIPPER.  just cast out and burning it in with some success. 

[J.W.]

I have fished a weightless fluke-like SKINNY DIPPER.  just cast out and burning it in with some success. 

Weightless flukes are a fish catcher around here. One of my "panic baits."

[BASSCATLILDAVE]

My best color is a white pearl.

[FlatsNBay]

I just tried the H2OX Flukes from Academy. They worked great and held up for multiple fish. They are $3.99 a bag before any discounts and come with 2 more in the bag than Zoom. I think I paid about $3.50 for them. I'd buy them again.

[DMTJAGER]

First post by new member greetings from NW Indiana. Been fishing for anything that bites fresh water for over 50 years.

First year trying 5' Shadee Shads from Cabela's and 5.25" Zoom Super Flukes. Working them rigged weedless over submerged weeds between patches of lily pads. Started with using 3/0 EWG hooks had significant issues with hooking up switched to standard offset worm hooks and hook set percentage improved significantly, then gave Owner Twist Lock Lite hooks and Gamakatsu Super Line twist locks hooks a try and upsized from a 3/0 to a 4/0 and my hookup percentage again increased noticeably but more importantly my flukes coasting .60c each lasted much longer using the twist lock hooks.

My setup is a Shimano Intenza 7'3" MHFA spinning rod I use a size 4000 spinning reel with 20lb Suffix 832 a bearing swivel to 12 or 15lb Yo-Zuri co-polymer. 4/0 Owner Twistlock Lite hook or Gamakatsu 4/0 Super Line twistlock hook. Not sure yet which one has the best hookup percentage buy it's looking like the Gamakatsu is going to edge out the Owner but by such a slight margin it might end up being a wash. 

Working soft plastic flukes rigged weedless as jerkbaits over submerged heavy weeds between emergent lily pads has been wildly successful for me and my two sons as in beyond our wildest hopes. We have already caught more bass and for our lakes good quality bass from 2.5-4.5lbs using just flukes between Mid March and now then any other single lure or presentation we used all of last year. I personally are well over the 100 bass mark.

While fishing soft plastic flukes as weedless jerk baits we Have enjoyed many 4-5 hour morning/evening trips of 10 to 15 bass and 18-20 bass in 4-5 hours are not uncommon. I strongly suspect the fact there are just so many great areas of submerged weeds with still relatively narrow rows of lily pads to hold good numbers of bass we can easily and efficiently fish with flukes is the main reason for our success.

My sons and I have fished both spinnerbaits and chatterbaits in these same areas but with no where near the same level of success as soft plastic flukes.

The three local lakes I do 90% of my largemouth bass fishing in there is almost no weed free hard bottom as in best guess <30%. Good to great water clarity is normally 2.5'-3' Average water clarity is 2-2.5' and poor is 18"-2'. Rarely does water clarity in these three lakes get worse than 18".

Our most productive colors in order of success:
One brighter days and good to great water clarity:
*5" Cabelas Shadee Shad and 5.25" Zoom SF both in White Ice
*Now discontinued color 5" Cabelas Shadee Shad Ghost Shad shame because this color murderers the bass in my lakes in all conditions and water clarity
*5" Cabela's and 5.25" Zoom SF in Albino

On mostly to 100% cloudy days and less than 2' of water clarity
Or mostly sunny days but under 2' of water clarity
*5.25" Zoom SF in Watermelon Red Flake Pearl
If only a foot of water clarity
*5.25" Zoom SF in Greenpumpkin Magic tied with
*5.25 Watermelon Red Flake

If you asked me to recommend only one color for bright days and good water clarity it would be a tie between White Ice and Ghost Shad but No one I know of is making a fluke in Ghost shad
And one color for cloudy days and poor water clarity it would be a tie between Watermelon Red Flake Pearl or straight Watermelon Red Flake.

Going to list a few other colors that worked well, but because the above colors work so great we haven't given these colors a significant enough amount of use to give an honest and accurate evaluation of them VS the above colors, but they did work very well during their limited use. It's just difficult to get oneself to switch colors when the color your currently using is catching 3-4 bass an hour which for my lakes is a very good catch rate.

Cloud cover was <50% water clarity good to VG
*5.25" Zoom SF in Blue Pearl Hologram
*5.25" Zoom SF in Smokin Shad
*5.25" Zoom SF in Bait Fish
I am waiting for a day when our top performing colors aren't working then we will give the above three colors a hard multi-hour workout and see what happens. But they did catch just enough bass to be worthy of mentioning.

I have not had this level of success catching not just numbers of bass but numbers of quality bass for MY LAKES as in VERY rare is a bass we catch under 2lbs with any other lure since trying out chatterbaits first time back in 2018 and soft plastic flukes are without doubt out fishing chatterbaits by over 1.5x.

Hope this proves helpful to someone.
Also strangely enough we are catching one or two pike every outing now use to be one or two A YEAR.
Son caught one at least 36" but it wriggled out of his hands before i could snap a pic. I have over a dozen pike now 20-33" long.

Like to add back in early April was fishing flukes rigged weedless as I described above on a day with 50/50 clouds but good water clarity and another guy down from me was fishing a Rapala X-Rap standard hard sided jerkbait and while he caught as many bass as I did (it was a great day as each of us caught at least 10 bass) my average bass were at least 1.5-2x larger than his. For this I have absolutely no idea as to why. 

[FlatsNBay]

I just tried the Yum Houdini Shad. This unique fluke style bait has a tail that can be used in several different ways. The stock look has a spade style tail. You can takes out the center of the tail by tearing along the perforated lines. A third different way is to cut the tail to create a forked tail. I fished it all 3 ways. The full tail had a good bit of side to side darting action. Removing the center portion of the tail caused less darting action and the fork style had a good amount of action as well.

The plastic was hard and much harder than a Zoom Super Fluke. I didn't much care for the hardness of the bait. It does seem to be a little heavier than the Zoom. I caught several fish on it.

https://www.tacklewarehouse.com/Yum_Houdini_Shad/descpage-YHSD.html

[big g]

I have tried almost all of them over the years and always return to the zoom super fluke.  I like the walking action I get out of the bait and often fish it slow and deep with a 1/32 bullet weight Walking it along the bottom. Or working it weightless through the weeds and pads faster, with pauses in openings in the cover.  Have even caught a lot of bass fishing it wacky in deep water, snapping it off the bottom and then falling back to the bottom.  One of my favorite plastic baits.

[chrisD46]

Try wacky rigging a Strike King Caffeine Shad (hook through the bottom middle) - it can be deadly !

[coldfront]

I have tried almost all of them over the years and always return to the zoom super fluke.  I like the walking action I get out of the bait and often fish it slow and deep with a 1/32 bullet weight Walking it along the bottom. Or working it weightless through the weeds and pads faster, with pauses in openings in the cover.  Have even caught a lot of bass fishing it wacky in deep water, snapping it off the bottom and then falling back to the bottom.  One of my favorite plastic baits.

me too.  great lure.  have gone away from it a lot.  basically cause I'm impatient.  and it only gets worse for me in current.

know folks who fish it erratically... fast.  I get my best responses slow, often dead-sticked on bottom.  great, extremely versatile, bait.

i do enjoy putting a bit of scent into the hook slot.  preference is to fish it on a 3/0 or 4/0 EWG... 

green pumpkin magic, greenpumpkin-blue flash are outstanding bluegill imitators. 

[Jabezs_prayer]

Man... I wish I had more confidence in this bait! I've fished just about everyway I've seen posted on multiple forums and hadn't had any luck. I am certain it's the presentation but man I'd love to change my mindset on flukes. Keep catching them boys, I'll get there! Appreciate all the tips and techniques you all post.

[Capt. BassinLou]

Man... I wish I had more confidence in this bait! I've fished just about everyway I've seen posted on multiple forums and hadn't had any luck. I am certain it's the presentation but man I'd love to change my mindset on flukes. Keep catching them boys, I'll get there! Appreciate all the tips and techniques you all post.

Flukes are extremely effective baits. The mistake I see anglers make is that they fish the fluke way too with tight line. Slow down, twitch lightly, with a little bit of slack line, and the baits action will be amazing!

[Jabezs_prayer]

Man... I wish I had more confidence in this bait! I've fished just about everyway I've seen posted on multiple forums and hadn't had any luck. I am certain it's the presentation but man I'd love to change my mindset on flukes. Keep catching them boys, I'll get there! Appreciate all the tips and techniques you all post.

Flukes are extremely effective baits. The mistake I see anglers make is that they fish the fluke way too with tight line. Slow down, twitch lightly, with a little bit of slack line, and the baits action will be amazing!

Flukes are extremely effective baits. The mistake I see anglers make is that they fish the fluke way too with tight line. Slow down, twitch lightly, with a little bit of slack line, and the baits action will be amazing!

Thanks Lou! I hadn't completely given up of them... yet!!! LOL

[Capt. BassinLou]

Man... I wish I had more confidence in this bait! I've fished just about everyway I've seen posted on multiple forums and hadn't had any luck. I am certain it's the presentation but man I'd love to change my mindset on flukes. Keep catching them boys, I'll get there! Appreciate all the tips and techniques you all post.

Flukes are extremely effective baits. The mistake I see anglers make is that they fish the fluke way too fast with tight line. Slow down, twitch lightly, with a little bit of slack line, and the baits action will be amazing!

[SenkoSam]

As an alternative to flukes, I've been a big fan of Lunker City Fin-S-Fish for years in different sizes. Weedless and on a light jig head are most used rigs; for the smaller size - dropshot. Amazing how many species wack the smaller size rigged on a 1/16 oz jig!

[FlatsNBay]

My brother in law goes through hundreds of flukes every year. He fishes them on a jighead for stripers on Smith Mountain Lake.

[jwkelley51]

I generally have a zoom super fluke tied on. My best color is glimmer blue and right now I'm using a 5/0 owner thin wire weighted hook with the spring. I think it's 3/32 and doesn't seem to affect it much but keeps it down better. I like the cps spring and a nose hook pretty good too but they fall off a lot. Like the man says, they're getting pricey. Flukes and shakey heads are my confidence baits.

[bowhunter63]

Zoom Fluke in Arkansas shiner. That color kills here in Missouri