Cylinder Bites

[John McKean]

Prompted by a top soft plastic lure designer, and based on my own extensive experiments over the past three years, I've witnessed that hundreds of my best bluegills fell head-over-fins for a tiny CYLINDER placed on a small jighook's bend. I merely carve 1/4" high  "cans" from  rugged Fishbites (a very effective, popular saltwater oriented scent material) rounded minnow and shrimp bodies. During straight retreives these aromatic circular chunks, which apparently freshwater bluegills absolutely LOVE, acquire water pressure in such a manner that any light hair jig wobbles and swims much like a Rapala plug! Even during the drop , a  1/32 oz to 1/20 oz jig will slowly dive with an alluring side to side shimmy. Strikes,even on tough days, are most enthusiastic, with big 'gills zeroing in on the tasty,action creating cylinder!

[John Sheehan]

Can we see a pic here John ?

[John McKean]

Hi John, Nice to hear from ya,ole pal! I'm terrible at getting or posting photos, but you can see my set-up,in a slightly larger version for crappies and saltwater panfish, as illustrated  in an article by a Canadian author last year ,discussing my cylinder concept. However ,my original discoveries and most fishing were directed right at our ole favorite,Mr Bluegill! that story is at :

http://www.outdoorcanada.ca/How-to-give-your-jig-incredible-action/

[John Sheehan]

JOHN-This is great and GORG PYZER ,Doug Stange's pal did the article !Very cool John ! Excellent ! Still got some of your tin can cut out lures around i tried and caught with years ago .

[Slip Sinker]

I do something that might be comparable with one of my most popular bait set-ups… I either thread it on like a grub, start threading like a grub but short it to the first segment of the waxie or pierce the bottom and thru like shown… when done this way the bait combo actually vibrates. When using on 2# mono setup this summer experimenting with lines and line types I could not feel the vibration due to the insensitivity of the line but is readily apparent on thin super lines.

It only vibrates when hooked up in this manner. Is your little cylinder setup similar?

[John McKean]

Slip, Yep, you have to use thin line,tho' 4# "tourny' (not over test) mono  works well with the bigger diameter cylinder. As you show, of course, a small jighead and tiny hook allows this lure to "rock"! On what I can see with your rig, if you would stand the grub UPRIGHT, I feel you can acheive a more dynamic side to side swim,by acquiring the water pressure better.

[Slip Sinker]

… yeah... it makes sense... going bigger i can see it will certainly cause some excitement with b.crappies and SMB's in my neighborhood.

with this bait ive really scaled down the line to 2# NanoBraid, 4# Nanofil or 8# Gliss these lines are all below the 2# mono diameter

thanks for sharing i will certainly give it a try on the bigger hair jigs especially for crappie... i very rarely go over 1/32 oz nowadays... what type of hair on the jig do you use?

[John McKean]

Slip, I usually tie on a 1/28 oz tin jighead carrying a very well sharpened ,"old fashioned" #8 Gold Mustad O'Shaughnessy jig hook (like the length, strength, and hooking angle). and usually tie a sparse pinch of white/gold "wedding dress" material from Jo-Ann's fabrics! Sometimes, I also tie with colored "Finnish Raccoon" hair,but, again, very sparsely. The key attraction should always be the cylinder tail piece, and I prefer these in bright chartreuse.

[Kelly Peterson]

Bought some of your jigs earlier this year. Didn’t have any luck with the jigs until I tipped them with the same “grub” (Gulp Alive Waxies) that slip sinker showed in his photo. I had been using the waxies on plain jigs with lots of success.

So you are saying that installing the grub in a vertical position on the hook bend is better?

[John McKean]

Hi Kelly, Yeah, even when I first started tipping with cylinders on our jigs,I wasn't satisfied with the action, UNTIL I rigged 'em upright like a sitting can,to best receive water pressure. In some cases,pinned these wide  discs up higher on the hook point to acquire even better swimming action. So,if your using a grub,pin it so it sticks straight up -will look strange but gives the extra shimmy that fish love!

[Kelly Peterson]

John could these “cans” tipped on plain jigs be used ice fishing?

[John McKean]

Kelly, I haven't tried em thru the ice (yet) but often vertical jig with a can on the point/bend of the hook, and see very nice wobbling action downward. I've taken nice bluegills,bass, and crappie while doing this, and the fish really hangon to Fishbites tasty cylinders! So, yeah, this combo should be a winner for ice jiggin' ! By the way, I've fished straight downward with plain jigheads & cylinder (even better swaying action without any drag from tied material), as well as wiggling,small ice "spoons".

[Kelly Peterson]

Is this how one should rig the “grubs” ie Gulp Alive waxies we are using re the bottom two jigs?