March 23, 1912 
FOREST AND STREAM 
367 
Some Casting Lures 
By EDWARD FARNHAM TODD 
A bout two years ago a correspondent of 
Forest and Stream asked for informa¬ 
tion and advice as to artificial casting 
lures for bass, and as no one more competent 
to answer his query has yet done so, it may be 
that a brief description of those I have found 
most successful, and how to make them, may 
be of interest, especially at this season, when 
the first touch of spring wakes the fishing fever. 
First of all, though, I ought to describe the 
conditions under which I fish, as I have tried 
ing the prospective victim’s lunge, a floating 
lure should be used whenever the fish are in 
shallow water, as at this season. The situation, 
therefore, calls for an imitation floating frog, 
and as the only one I have been able to find 
on sale is much too light to cast from a free- 
running reel when there is any wind, as there 
generally is thus early, and is also too small to 
attract the “lunkers,” I produced the alleged 
frog shown in Fig. i, which I confess does not 
resemble anything on earth or in the waters 
under w'ater when reeled in slowly—if reeled 
quickly it W'ill come to the surface. I have kept 
the spinners at each end because I believe the 
ordinary wooden minnow is one of the best 
baits made and solely so because of the glitter 
•of the spinners in the water. The fault with all 
of them, though, is that, as sold, they can only 
be used successfully when armed with triangles, 
as it is impossible to attach single hooks to the 
sides by the method provided by the manufac¬ 
turers so that they will remain in any desired 
position. I have therefore used my large double 
hook again, attaching it to the belly by a small 
screw-eye for the ring of the hook to pass 
through with a pin a little further along to hold 
it close to the body out of the way of weeds, 
etc., until the fish strikes, as shown in Fig. 2. 
FIG. 1. 
FIG. 2. 
FIG. 3. 
FIG. 4. 
FIG. 5. 
Weight, 400grs. 
Weight, 297grs. 
Weight, 398grs. 
Length, 3%in. 
Weight, 432grs. 
Weight, 372grs. 
Length, 3%in. 
Length, Sin. 
Length, 4%in. 
Length, 3%iii. 
MR. Todd’s lures. 
to develop my tackle to meet them. They are 
not unusual, however, as my scene of action is 
a lake in Northern New Jersey about three and 
one-half miles long with an extreme depth of 
’sixty feet and a very heavy growth of weeds 
of various kinds,- strength and thickness during 
the summer—and of course the bass delight 
most to lurk in the worst tangle of these. This 
necessitates a fairly stiff rod with lures heavy 
enough to bring out its action, and after the 
middle of June, as nearly weedless as possible. 
We have both large- and small-mouth bass in 
the proportion of about three to two, accord¬ 
ing to the census taker, but catcb about three 
of the former to one of the latter by casting, as 
our small-mouth friend follows the habits of 
the somnolent cod as summer- progresses and 
can generally be taken only by still-fishing in 
the depths. He is active enough after being 
hooked, I admit, but the way of hooking him 
is too slow for me. 
And now one more preliminary before get¬ 
ting down to business. Six years ago I de¬ 
cided to give up live bait of all kinds, and dur¬ 
ing the five years prior to last I bought—or 
grafted—and tried out every casting bait put on 
the market that I saw advertised or in the 
tackle shops, so I had the ideas of many to 
choose from in the ones I finally selected or 
evolved. 
The season opens early in New Jersey, and 
in my unregenerate days I had found a "live 
frog most successful in the spring. Also, as 
much pleasure is added to bass fishing by see- 
under the earth, but which certainly has caught 
bass. I used cork for this, which is easier to 
work than wood, as it can be cut readily with 
sandpaper. It can, of course, be made any size 
and weight desired—mine is 3 3-8 inches long 
and weighs nearly an ounce—and as the weight 
is attached to the belly, it will always land right 
side up, an advantagee every live frog user will 
appreciate. After shaping it up, it can be 
painted green or speckled or any other color on 
top, but white on the belly, as that is really all 
that the fish sees, and the hooks attached. 
I tried this first with a single hook at the 
crotch, but after missing ten successive strikes 
and losing one of the few days of the season 
when all conditions were right and the bass 
rising freely, I switched to a double hook, as 
shown. This projects just beyond the legs 
when the lure is in motion and hangs strai.ght 
down when at rest and so gets them either way. 
The hooks I use are so large that a fish seldom 
gets both barbs at once, and so is not seriously 
injured if it gets off or you wish to return it 
after landing. I find this arrangement holds 
about two-thirds of the strikes, though before 
I abandoned triple hooks as unsportsmanlike, I 
rigged with one of them and never lost a strike 
—which was butchery. 
As the water gets warmer and the weeds be¬ 
gin to come up, a surface lure begins to lose 
its attractiveness, and so one that will swim 
near the surface is indicated, as the doctors say. 
My idea here is simply a wooden minnow so 
formed and weighted as to keep it a few inches 
The barbs should project a little on each side, 
and I find that this arrangement will hook fully 
three-quarters of the bass that strike for the 
side of the lure against less than one-tenth with 
single hooks screwed in the side sockets. 
For the body of the minnow in the illustra¬ 
tion I used a discarded commercial minnow 
which happened to be the right shape and 
weight, but a piece of shade-roller, which is a 
soft wood cylinder one inch in diameter, can 
easily be cut to the required dimensions after 
having been pierced by a long, slim wire nail 
which, on being withdrawn, leaves a hole for 
the wire support of the lure to pass through. 
This should have a slight kink put in it and be 
pulled through by main strength, so that the 
lure will not revolve on the wire when drawn 
through the water and thus twist the line. The 
bait can now be weighted to taste, spinners put 
on, the projecting end of the wire twisted back 
for rings to attach tail hook and line, and there 
you are. 
The water is now warm, the weeds thick and 
the bass either in water too deep to raise them 
by casting or in the worst of the weed tangle, 
and so we must go after them with a weedless 
lure. This is made by placing a half-egg 
shaped fender, as shown in Fig. 3, in front of 
the spinner which deflects the weeds, so that 
they do not foul the spinner, and it can be 
drawn tbrough the worst of them and still 
sparkle merrily in every clear space. I arm this 
lure with a large fly, which is also made weedless 
by a wire guard made by bending over the end 
