Insider advice for choosing the best blade combos.

Skirts Plus, the maker of the silicone roll-up skirts for both those companies, also offers their Nature Scale Kit. With the simple tool provided, you can create your own skirts, matching colors of preyfish or adding highlights that may increase bites under various conditions.

For versatility in blade choice, Terminator and Secret Weapon Lures offer special designs. Terminator’s Jimmy Houston Speed Bead Series incorporates a small silicone bead on the wire frame that lets you swap the rear blade, and the Quik Clevis lets you change the front blade, too. Secret Weapon spinnerbaits feature a flexible arm with a snap at the end for changing blades, and an alternative color is packed with each spinnerbait for tinkering at home or in the boat.

For the ultimate in realism, check Millennium Lures, offering spinnerbaits with photo finishes of preyfish on the head and blades. According to company president Don Frey, images are dipped in rubberized clearcoat to provide a long-lasting finish to their special bent-blade willowleaf spinnerbaits.

Cliff Liddy of Persuader American Lures of California notes that western anglers seem more willing to break the mold when it comes to spinnerbait colors. His company offers blades with powder painted blades and heads, a process by which colors are electrostatically applied, which is more costly than painting but gives a more translucent look.

”Our chartreuse-blue combination has been a fast seller for several years,” Liddy reports. “We sell loads of them in Arkansas and Missouri, suggesting that many avid anglers are seeking new blade combinations but are having a hard time finding them among local manufacturers. Our new rainbow trout model has found huge demand out west.”

Frank Johnson, president of Johnson’s Jigs and Spinnerbaits of Quitman, Texas, notes another fact: Bass bite the spinnerbait you have tied on, not the one in the tackle box. “I’ve seen anglers catch fish on the most outlandish color combinations, then they try to find more like them, or else they call and ask us to make one like that.

“We offer a large array of colors that match many water conditions and common types of bass prey, but standard colors offer economic benefits to lure companies. Price discounts are associated with large purchases of standard colors, which result in larger profit margins for retailers. We get input both from the retailers who want the basics and from avid anglers seeking unique stuff.”

Overall, a trend to more lifelike spinnerbait skirts has occurred, matching them to traditional gold and silver blades. Stanley Jigs now offers primarily nature-based skirt combinations. “We see great demand for these new natural colors,” says company founder Lonnie Stanley. “Our Super Scales colors such as rainbow trout, peach perch, baby bass, crappie, Cajun crawfish, and sun perch have been successful, both for retailers and for anglers.”

*Kevin VanDam, Kalamazoo, Michigan, is a brilliant angler and bass fishing champion.