Davy Hite Talks Big On Jigs
May 8, 2008
Team Yamamoto pro Davy Hite of South Carolina is one of the legends in our sport. He's won the BASS Angler of the Year in 1997, the FLW Tour Championship in 1998, the Bassmaster Classic in 1999 and the BASS Angler of the Year again in 2002, including numerous first place, seconds and top ten finishes throughout Hite's fourteen year pro career.
In 2006, Davy won the BASS Elite event on Clark Hill Reservoir nestled between Georgia and Hite's home state South Carolina. Davy used a mop jig to win that one in 2006.
This past weekend he landed second in the Bass Elite event on Clark Hill. Again with the help of a mop jig. Sweetened with a GYB Flappin' Hog this time.
I gave Davy a ring at his home in the town of Ninety Six, South Carolina today, and here's what he had to say.
Please feel welcome to listen in and learn what insights Davy Hite reveals about mop jigs and jig fishing in general...
RUSS: Congratulations Davy! I know you used several other lure types on Clark Hill, such as soft plastic swimbaits in 2006 and topwaters in 2008, but for our conversation today, let us just focus on your use of skirted rubber jigs both times on Clark Hill, okay?
Something called the mop jig really was the key lure in your 2006 victory and 2nd place finish in 2008 there. Of course, the burning question on many reader's minds is, just what is a mop jig and how does it differ from an ordinary skirted jig?
DAVY: It's a living (latex) rubber skirted jig whereas most jigs nowadays are silicone. So first, it is a different material than usual. The living rubber is very different in that it flares out much more than typical for a silicone jig. The mop jig got its name from Kevin Van Dam because the rubber strands on it are so long, so thick and oversized. When Van Dam first saw one, he got this incredulous look. His first question to me was, "You don't trim that thing to make a smaller profile?"
I said, "Absolutely not," and he replied, "That thing looks like a mop you'd use to clean the kitchen floor."
The name stuck, and they're now known as mop jigs.
Relatively unknown outside the region crossing the South Carolina and Georgia border, mop jigs have had an awful lot of uses for me throughout my career I like to fish big baits for big bass. I am a power fishing type person, and I have high confidence that a big bait like a mop jig is going to get big bites for me. So that's what a mop jig is all about.
Editor's Note: Here is a link to a separate story about and photos of mop jigs made locally in Georgia. I first published this two years ago when Davy Hite won the Clark Hill event in 2006:
BIG RUBBER ~ Story by Russ Bassdozer
RUSS: It has also been reported that Alton Jones won the Bassmaster Classic in February, also in South Carolina, with the help of mop jig skirts on Jone's winning jigs. Do you think that, because of the publicity you and Jones are generating, we are going to get swamped with mop jigs and big rubber skirts flooding the market from major tackle vendors anytime soon?
DAVY: The mop jig is a regional bait that will work country-wide. It will work all across the country, keeping in mind it is a specialized "tournament" bait. As tournament anglers, we are only after five quality bass a day. Tournament anglers don't look to catch numbers of fish like recreational anglers do, and mop jigs typically don't catch numbers of fish, usually just a few big ones.
A good example is I filmed a TV show on the mop jig with host Charlie Ingrams. Between us, we only landed 6-7 bass during the entire episode. That's only a few fish for two guys all day long, but I think they were the 6-7 biggest bass ever caught on his show. So the mop jig is not a lure that will catch large numbers of bass. It is not a be-all, do-all bait for every angler - but it will stand to catch a few big ones on any given day.
RUSS: In the two years between the 2006 and 2008 Clark Hill events, how often and where have you fished successfully with mop jigs? Have you used them at pro tour stops all across the country throughout the past two seasons? Or are there only specific times and places where you use a mop jig, Davy?
DAVY: Within the past two years, I've used it across the USA at most of my pro tour events. For instance at Clear Lake and the California Delta last year, the mop jig produced nice catches at those places for me.
The Clark Hill event in 2006 was the first time when the mop jig actually produced most or all of my weigher fish for an entire event. However, I've actually been using mop jigs for quite a while longer than that. I probably started using big bulky rubber jigs such as these twenty-five years ago. In my first top ten finish as a bass pro, in 1994, big rubber jigs like these were what I used then. That event was 14 years ago. I have used these kinds of big, bulky rubber jigs most every day at most every pro event I've been in since then. They have not produced numbers of fish or full sacks for me, but they have produced one or two of the bigger bass I have weighed-in almost every day. As a bass pro needing to compete against the world's top bass pros, we do try to keep some secrets like these to ourselves. These big bulky living rubber jigs have been one of my best-kept secrets throughout my career.
RUSS: How often do you use mop jig skirts versus standard jig skirts? Are there any definable situations that would cause you to prefer one (a mop jig) or the other (a standard skirted jig)?
DAVY: Yes. Typically if I am on a known big fish body of water, that's the primary criteria for which I am going to throw a big rubber mop jig.
A second factor is if I am on an extremely clear lake, I am probably going to go to a standard size silicone skirt in order to get the smaller, more compact profile. It can be very important when you get clear water to have that smaller profile.
But even on a clear lake that is known for big bass (a good example is Amistad in Texas), I am going to use the mop jig.
A third factor that may tell me to go to a standard size skirted jig is, for example, Norman Lake in North Carolina or any other lake that's typically known for 1-3 pound fish.
RUSS: We often hear a jig is a big fish bait, and that's obvious with the big size of a mop jig - but even a standard size skirted jig is still considered a big fish bait. You just do not catch as many smaller fish on skirted jigs. Do you think the skirted jig in general has a special ability to produce relatively bigger bass than any other lure?
DAVY: Yes, for a couple of reasons. First, it emulates a crawfish, and big fish really like crawfish. Second, it represents an easy meal, and big fish like a good meal where they don't have to expend a lot of energy to get it.
Those two factors, plus what I've learned about crawfish, their high protein and nutritional food value, makes them a highly-desirable item for big bass, and a skirted jig represents that. I've looked at jigs in the water for 25 years now. If you take a mop jig, right out of the pack, put a Yamamoto Flappin' Hog on it and drop it in the water, then look at it moving, pausing and opening. The skirt opens up like a theater curtain to reveal the Flappin' Hog, with its back end down, and the pincers, flappers or whatever you call them standing up.
To me, what I've noted is it's very intimidating any time you see that stance in nature, and you see it often in any predator-prey or other animal confrontation. Whether its a skunk with its tail up, a porcupine, cat or dog with is back hairs standing on end, or a craw raising its pincers up when it feels it is going to be attacked, it is an instinctive defensive stance, a call to action, either to attack, to be attacked or flee. It's a decisive moment that a rubber jig presents when it does that, and a bass being a predator is going to react to a jig that does that.
Most of the time, I think a jig imitates a crawfish, and especially a living rubber mop jig, the material it is made from, the way it is wire-tied tightly to spring open, represents something alive (the trailer, a craw) in a defensive position. That's a confrontational instance to a predator, and a largemouth bass, being at the top of the food chain, the ultimate predator in many waters it inhabits, is going to attack it.
So a jig that displays that defensive position is going to get a lot of bites, that have nothing to do with a bass being hungry but because the bass is a predator and there's something in its area, the bass's territory that's acting defensive or aggressive toward the bass, a lot of times the bass (or any predator) will attack just to react, to eliminate the potential threat, not to feed.
The other philosophy a jig has going for it is that a jig presents an easy meal, slow and cumbersome, directly in front of a bass. A good way to look at it is, when my wife sets a plate of cake and ice cream into my hands while I'm watching the football game on TV, I am probably going to smile and eat it. If she says, "Davy can you go to the grocery store and get cake and ice cream," while I am watching the game, I am probably going to say I'd rather not because I am on a diet. So a jig that's an easy meal that drops right into a big bass's lap is probably going to get eaten. Another lure it has to get up, go out and chase after, it may not make the effort.
RUSS: You chose the Yamamoto Flappin' Hog as the trailer for your mop jig this past weekend at Clark Hill? Why the Flappin' Hog?
DAVY: I did because it is a compact yet bulky bait. That sounds like an oxymoron or contradiction - compact yet bulky - but that's the beauty of the Flappin' Hog. I wanted that mop jig skirt to suddenly spring open like pulling a curtain aside when I stopped it, and have that Flappin' Hog revealed in the intimidating defensive raised pincer stance suddenly confronting a bass, causing it to react aggressively.
RUSS: What other Yamamoto soft baits do you use as jig trailers?
DAVY: I use the double tail grubs as trailers on skirted jigs, and I use the skirted hula grubs on just a plain jighead too.
RUSS: Do you ever use skirted jigs without any trailer?
DAVY: No. Never.
RUSS: Do you use fish attractant or scent on your jigs?
DAVY: I don't. Especially with Yamamoto plastics used as trailers, once that fish bites down on a Yamamoto bait, even on a jig, they rarely spit it out.
RUSS: We read many fishing articles that prescribe, and through our own direct experience, many anglers find that skirted jigs are a springtime bait. It seems (and we read) that jig fishing falls off in the heat of summer. When it comes to fall fishing with jigs, most stories are written about swimming jigs in autumn as a fall technique. Do your experiences follow these seasonal ups and downs and tactical changes with jigs, Davy?
DAVY: It's true that summer does seem to be a time I don't use a jig as much - but I always have one tied on. So it's not like I stop using a jig over the summer.
Winter and spring are my two favorite and most dependable times for a jig.
In fall, I use the same bulky mop jigs and tend to swim them in mid-water more than bottom fishing with them in fall.
RUSS: At Clark Hill, it was reported that you and many pros keyed on finding spawning herring and/or shad, feeling that bass would be found following these spawning pelagic baitfish. Yet you used a brown jig and green trailer color. With this brown/green jig, were you trying to imitate the spawning herring and shad baitfish? If not, why not?
DAVY: I was trying to imitate crawfish, and as I say big fish love crawfish. Even when following and feeding on herring/shad schools, they'll prefer to grab a crawfish. I had ten rods I was working with on the boat, all rigged with my best herring/shad imitations - and then the brown jig for a totally different look. The bigger bass bit the brown jig.
RUSS: Speaking of lure colors, there are a lot of stereotypes - and as anglers, our fishing experiences seem to prove them out. What I mean is many anglers, even pros, don't vary much from using green pumpkin, watermelon or june bug soft baits; white or chartreuse/white spinnerbaits; and black, brown or black blue jigs. Why do you think dark jig colors (black, brown and black blue) work so well?
DAVY: There again, they imitate crawfish or things that live and skulk on the bottom - typically dark-colored critters that blend into the bottom.
I will tend to us a white or silvery white jig when swimming one higher up in the water column, to imitate colors of baitfish that live in open water.
RUSS: Before we say goodbye today, Davy, are there any general improvement tips you can share to help anglers be better jig fisherman in general? For instance, many anglers when they first try to use jigs, they seem to have trouble getting started using skirted jigs. Why do you think this is so?
DAVY: I always hear that. First of all, the first part of learning to jig fish is not that different than fishing a Texas-rigged worm with a bullet sinker. So I'd say to get good with a bullet-weighted Texas-rigged worm first. Then, if you know how to fish a worm, it is very similar how to fish a jig. The difference is, and the more difficult part, is a fish usually will not hold onto a jig as long as it may hold onto a soft bait like a worm. That's the knack that new jig anglers need to learn, to realize they have a bite and react before the fish drops the jig again.
Let's compare say a Senko versus a jig. You can look up in the sky and watch the birds and that fish is just going to pull, pull, pull on that Senko until you finally notice it. With a jig, a bass is going to inhale and exhale it about that quick.
So that means with a jig, you are not going to have all that time to feel the bite like with a soft bait. Instead you need to watch the line with a jig, and most anglers don't watch their line enough. I'd say 70% of the time I'll see my line twitch or it will move when I am not moving it, or I'll see it stop before reaching the bottom. So if an angler is not concentrating, not intently watching the line, they're missing most of the bites on a jig.
They don't pay attention until after they let the jig sink first, they may feel it's not quite time to start the retrieve yet, like with other lures, but the jig works just the opposite. It's often all about the initial fall with a jig, it's not about the retrieve, and lots of anglers get bites and don't know they're getting them on that initial fall.
It's very, very important to watch the line with a jig, to know the depth, say if it's five feet deep, and your jig stops falling at two feet, or if the line does anything on its own that its not supposed to, even though you don't feel a bite, you've got one.
RUSS: Those are very good tips for beginning jig anglers, Davy. What advice would you give now for experienced jig anglers who have gotten the knack of doing those things already? What would you tell guys who are good with jigs, to help them get even better with jigs?
DAVY: Be a more accurate caster or better flipper and get your jig into places other people aren't. Some of the best jig anglers I've ever met are also the best casters, flippers, pitchers I've ever seen. A good jig fisherman who wants to become an excellent jig fisherman should practice until perfect at casting, flipping and pitching.
RUSS: Thank you for sharing a few minutes of your twenty-five years of jig fishing success with us today.
Congratulations again for your second place finish in the Bassmaster Elite event on Clark Hill this past weekend.
We hope your next pro event will be your best ever, Davy.
DAVY: Thank you. I enjoyed our jig conversation today and I hope every reader can learn something from it.