No lure has enjoyed the recent popularity of the soft plastic stickbait, a revolution kicked off by the Senko. Since its introduction in 2000 by Gary Yamamoto Custom Baits, an estimated 3 million Senkos have been sold and countless look-alike lures have appeared in tackle stores.
Despite their short lifespan, the CITGO Bassmaster pros have developed some devilish tricks for squeezing every ounce of attraction out of these subtle stickbaits.
"There are quite a few little tricks that I do with a Tiki Stick," said Lance Vick, a Tour pro and Lake Fork guide. "Mostly the tricks are in the weighting of the bait properly based on the type of cover you're fishing. If you need the bait to get down to 6 feet of water on top of grass or around boat docks or something, you can weight the lure by using fluorocarbon line and a heavier gauge hook, like a Superline hook. Or if you're only fishing 2 or 3 feet deep and you don't need to sink it as fast, you can go to a monofilament with just a regular hook and it won't sink as fast. If you want to stay in the middle of 3 feet, you can sink it down a foot and a half.
"You need to be sure to have your line size properly match the conditions of the water color and cover present. If you're fishing really heavy grass, for example, you have to go up on your line size and your hook size. But you don't want to get in a clear water presentation and have a big hook and big line, because you're going to miss some bites."
The Senko and some of the other soft stickbaits have a common problem, as previously mentioned. They tend to wear out quickly, sometimes after a single strike.
Louisiana pro Mark Sabbides has a neat tip for extending the life of a single Senko. "I have found a trick that practically eliminates the loss of expensive Senkos," Sabbides explained. "I take a No. 5 split ring and slide it over the Senko until it's about the center of the bait about where you would insert your hook to fish it wacky style. Then you put the hook between the split ring and the Senko. The hook never actually goes into the Senko.
"It eliminates tearing the bait up or losing it on the cast. Not only that, but the split ring gives you a little extra weight that can come in handy in certain situations. If you have a heavy wind, you can throw it against the wind because you're not going to tear it."
Roland Martin gets "double duty" out of his Senkos by resurrecting a torn bait simply cutting it in half, hooking it in the middle and fishing it like a French fry-style bait. Also, he has found that a 3-inch shortened version of a Senko can be a deadly finesse worm.
And Florida pro Bernie Schultz often uses a Senko on the back of his jig. "It's a great jig trailer because it helps the jig fall straight," he said. "It's got a stand-up appeal to it. When the jig's on the bottom, that trailer stands up. I don't know why, but fish like that."