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Video transcript:

Jeremy Francis:
The number one, most underrated bass fishing lure that we're probably all not using enough is, what we're talking about in today's MONSTERBASS video.

Jeremy Francis:
What's going on guys? Welcome back to the MONSTERBASS channel, my name is Jeremy. I run a page and channel called, Fishing the Lonestar. So whether you're on Instagram, Facebook or YouTube, we'd love for you to come visit me there, give me a follow, like, subscribe, et cetera. Whatever it is that you do on that platform, come do it, would love to see you there. Today's video, we're talking about one of the most underrated bass fishing lures that you probably have, and you've probably even used, but at least for myself, I find myself probably not using this lure enough.

Jeremy Francis:
And I just got back from a trip to Lake Okeechobee, I go there almost annually around the February, March timeframe, just to go have a blast fishing that lake, because I absolutely love it. And I'm always reminded of one particular lure that is heavily used there. That quite honestly, we probably should be using all over the country, especially around grass and timber, maybe even rocks, I don't know, there's probably better lures for rocks, but especially on grass and timber, and that is the speed worm, all right? Now, whether that be a speed worm, a swimming worm is probably a general term or in this particular case, the cutter worm by RageTail or Strike King. I believe it's one of the most underutilized bass fishing lures, and probably one of the most underrated lures that we have at our disposal that we're probably not using enough.

Jeremy Francis:
So in today's video, I'm going to talk about a little bit of how to rig this for better hookup ratios, right? We're going to get into rigging, we're going to get into the retrieval, we're going to get into the hook set and we're also going to cover color and sizes. We'll go through them pretty quickly, but all these tips and tricks are going to help you fish better with the cutter worm, swimming worm, speed worm, whatever you like to call it. All right, so let's start with some colors, all right? I've got with me, three different colors, the first one is a tequila sunrise, and that actually has some orange flake in an as well, so tequila sunrise orange flake, that's a great color. The next one is a blue craw red flake, and this is actually the one I have tied on, I'll show you that one in just a second. And then the last is a black and blue swirl, and I'll show you this one in a different size in a minute. All three of these are in the six inch version, all right?

Jeremy Francis:
And very quickly, let's talk about how I use each one of them. So first and foremost, if I'm fishing a high sun day, so very sunny day, not many clouds, and a relatively clear body of water, I'm going to use that blue craw red flake, all right? It's almost like a green pumpkin red flake, or just a watermelon red flake, but the blue craw just kind of gives you a little bit of color variation, and that red flake really stands out on a sunny day, and really helps draw fish in. Something about that red flake, fish just love it, trust me, I don't know what it is, but they love it. Speaking of flake, all right, this is the tequila sunrise and has an orange flake in it. I like this for kind of those partly cloudy days, and tequila sunrise usually seems to work earlier in the morning, later in the evening, and sometimes just, I don't know, there's just something about this color that seems to really get bass to bite in kind of some low visibility situations.

Jeremy Francis:
But if we're going muddier water, or a foot, maybe two foot visibility, somewhere in there, black and blue is hard to beat. The silhouettes or the presence of black and blue really stands out and I'll show you this six inch compared to the seven inch for a size comparison. So here you can see, this is the exact same color, black blue swirl, and you can see six versus seven inch, and even in the tail difference, there's a much bigger thump in the tail that you can see there, that rage tail that's added. So kind of depending upon where you're fishing and how aggressive your fish are, if they're pretty aggressive, feel free to step up to that seven inch, I'm telling you, even the little fish we'll eat it.I probably caught one of the smallest fish in Lake Okeechobee last weekend on a seven inch worm just like this, so the little fish will eat it. So don't be afraid [inaudible 00:04:12] to the seven inch, but depending upon the pressure and how active your fish are, you might want to just stick with the six inch, but you've got both size options there at your disposal.

Jeremy Francis:
All right, now, before we get into the full details of kind of the hook and rigging techniques I like to use, just want to talk a minute about this particular worm, all right? So this is the cutter worm and this tail here, gives a great swimming action in the water. It really kicks, there's a great swimming motion, and it really looks like a Bluegill or any other type of bait fish, the tail kicking and swimming in the water. So I will say rage tail, Strike King did a great job on the end of that, giving it some good thump in the water, and it looks great.

Jeremy Francis:
One of the ways I like to rig this, usually you have two different styles of hooks, all right? So first one is, a round bend worm hook, or an EWG hook, so let me grab them off my boat and I'll show you those differences. All right, so first we have a round bend offset worm hook, now I kind of prefer this one and I'll tell you why in just a second, but you can also throw the EWG hook as well. These are both a four [inaudible 00:05:22] in size both of them have a little bit of a ridge right here to help your bass stay up on the lure. But one of the reasons that I like the round bend worm hook, is you see how... If you... If I drew a straight line down from the shank, it would come down towards the middle of the bend, not over here.

Jeremy Francis:
So what that means is, I'm going to rig my worm in a minute to come down this way, at this angle, and it allows for what I believe, a little bit better hook penetration. However, depending upon how heavy of vegetation you're fishing, an EWG is really good too, because you can also tech spose this, meaning you can bury that hook tip and your worm is rigged straight perpendicular. So some people like to rig it on EWG, some people like to rig it on a round bend worm hook. My personal preference is the worm hook, but by all means the EWG hook works just as well. So let me show you how I rig it, and I'll kind of show what I'm talking about.

Jeremy Francis:
All right, so I've got my worm, and for those of you that are used to a Texas rig and how to do, it's pretty simple. I will say though, the distance from this bend to the top of the hook, is always how far I put my hook into the worm, about that far, all right? So once I put it that far, I'm just going to come out, you see to there, I'm going to push that all the way up here to the tip, and when I get to the top right here, I'm going to hold the plastic, I'm going to... I set my hand this way, I'm going to turn it this way, and I'm going to turn until that plastic slides right up there, okay? So now we're left with this. Now for this part, I'm going to put my thumb down here on the bottom, let me move this weight out of the way. Okay, I'm basically going to measure where that hook is going to go into the worm, so I'm going to put my index finger and my thumb right there, I'm going to bend it 90 degrees. Now, instead of pushing it all the way through, like I would on a EWG hook, I'm going to push it almost out, but to where that hook is still sitting right in the thick of that plastic, okay?

Jeremy Francis:
Now here's why I like the round bend worm hook better, is there's a little bit of an angle here, so when a fish bites, all right? And their mouths comes down over this, you can see it's creating a pressure point right there where that hook is going to come out and expose. So what that means, is when you're fishing and you get a bite, all you have to do is kind of sweep and lean, and reel into them. You don't have to just give them a hard jacking hook set, because the way this worm is angled on this hook, the hook is going to stick out just like that, and penetrate the fish's mouth.

Jeremy Francis:
So, I just believe I get a tad better hookup ratio on an EWG, I'm sorry, on a round bend worm hook, then I do on and EWG hook, that's just my personal preference, both work great. Now, in terms of the Texas rigging portion to finish it off, I normally add a peg, a bait peg, or a bobber stopper, and then I add my monster bass tongues in, this is the one quarter ounce, one quarter or three eighths, depending upon again, how deep you're fishing and what your vegetation looks like. The great thing about this setup right here, is you can fish it from the bank, kayak, a boat, et cetera, and it's pretty darn weedless. So, that's what I really like about it, especially if you're fishing from a bank, you're going to be able to get this lure back almost every time.

Jeremy Francis:
All right, so let's talk about really quickly, the equipment that I'm using. I'll just say my personal preference, you can make modifications however you like, but I like to use a relatively higher speed reel. Now, this is an 8.3 to one, I don't necessarily think you have to go that fast, somewhere around a 7.3 to one, or a 7.5 to one, works really well. In this particular case, I use an 8.3 to one, this is Lew's HyperMag, I really like this reel because it is super light. Now, the Lew's HyperMag is on the higher end of the spectrum of reels, but it is incredibly light. And for covering a lot of ground, making a lot of cast, I really like the lighter reel, okay? But, you're more looking for gear ratio, in my opinion, that's just a personal preference, that I also like the lightness of the HyperMag.

Jeremy Francis:
I'm throwing this on, in my particular case, a TFO, I use a heavy rod depending upon how parabolic your rod is, you could use a medium heavy, but I use a heavy seven three, fast action. You can use a seven three, medium heavy, fast action, a seven foot, medium heavy, fast action, somewhere in that range. And I would say between 15 to 20 pound floor carbon, we fish in Texas around a lot of thick timber and that particular case, the thicker floor carbon does better, so this is 20 pound for me. I was on Okeechobee last week and we were using braided line, just because of all the grass that's there, there's not much timber, but there's a lot of grass. So depending upon where you're fishing, you're fishing around grass, use more braid, if you're fishing around timber, use more floor carbon, but that's just my personal preference of what I'm using and the setup that I use.

Jeremy Francis:
Now, let's talk about retrieval. All right, retrieval is super simple, when you're retrieving this, you're literally going to truly retrieve it almost like a swim bait, if you're swimming. In this particular case, we'll talk about just a steady retrieve, but you're just going to point it right at the lower, and just have a steady retrieve back, all right? It is just a point, I would point right at it, and steady retrieve and you can slow it down or speed it up, depending upon how fast you need to fish it. Some cases, you can burn it across top of the water, if there's really thick vegetation, so you can roll it pretty quickly. If you're fishing deeper water, say five to 10 foot, you can slow it down, add three eights or even a half ounce weight, and fish it deeper, fish that worm on the bottom.

Jeremy Francis:
The other way that you can retrieve this lure, is just like a normal Texas rig, okay? So yes, it's got that swimming tail on it or that paddle tail on it, but it works just as well if you're just dragging or hopping on the bottom, all right? So that's what I like is the versatility of this lure, is at any point in time, I can slow it down, I can dead stick it, I can hop it, I can crawl it, drag it. And any slight little movement, that tail's still going to give a good wiggle and movement in the water, and create some attention that hopefully bass will come up and eat, and that's why I really like this particular lure.

Jeremy Francis:
So that's it guys. The most underrated lure that I personally think, we're probably on it, all not fishing enough, is the swimming worm, speed worm, cutter worm, et cetera. Make sure you pick up a pack, make sure you subscribe it here to the MONSTERBASS channel. And if you disagree with me, it's okay. Leave me a comment, and let me know if you fish this a lot, if you don't fish it very much, if you like to fish it more, or if you think there's maybe another lure that's more underrated than this one, let me know the comments, would love to hear it. And again, my name is Jeremy, Fishing the Lonestar. This is a MONSTERBASS channel, while here to help you fish better.