MN Bound

[8point]

On Minnesota Bound last night Ron had a story on a guy who made his own muskey baits out of wood.

My question is does anybody on here make thier own baits of any sort? If so post some pics of them I would love to see some.

Thanks

-Kevin

[Bothun]

You will get more responses in the Muskey/Pike forum.

[8point]

Well I meen just any lure for any fish species

[Burnham]

kevin i remember last summer i was going to show you some lures my grandpa made, idk if i did but i'll show them too ya next time you tag along while im catchin fish

[polarsusd81]

I used to make some lures that were similar to suicks with a buddy and I have a large balsa crank for muskies.

Here they are. We made more but he kept some of the others. Caught fish on the suick look alike, some big pike.

This big crank is something I love, but haven't given it enough water time to catch anything with it yet. This thing wobbles wider than anything I have ever seen before, close to a foot side to side on a slow roll.

Just thinking about these has me wanting to make some more.

[Scott M]

That's good work polarsusd81! Next time you do that, snap some photos in a step by step process. Where'd you buy the balsa at?

I have a lure craftsmanship book that I haven't cracked yet. Makes me want to get around to it. Those things look nice!!!

[polarsusd81]

I didn't even have a camera when I worked on these, and I got my first camera about 7 years ago. I would like to get back into it though, we made some pretty sweet stuff. My buddy is the paint master, he could probably do one of these now to look better than anything you see available in the stores. When he gets enough demand he does taxidermy. The colors on the pics are somewhat hard to make out because of tricky lighting in my kitchen, but the suick style bait is blaze orange with black and the big crank is golden red tiger with that nice red prizm eye. I am not sure if I could do small baits as the eyelets are tough to hold in if you use small ones, big baits are pretty easy though. If you want to try it, a spindle sander will be your best friend, followed closely by a band saw for large chunk removal. It is fun though. And the reward you get when you do catch a fish on a big bait you made yourself is pretty awesome.

Thinking about it, that big bad crank would probably knock some big eyes trolling slow in the fall. It runs about 6-8' and has a wide rolling wobble, along with a good color (we hit em on a similar color on Mille Lacs). Better put a leader in front of it though as a musky would be prone to lift it as well.

Forgot to mention...I can't remember where we picked up the balsa but I would think it was a hobby shop. If you look around, you can probably find it. Try to start out with a 2x2 size if you want to make some big baits.