Dick Pearson Talks Topwaters

Puzzling is the seeming preference fish have for a particular type of sound that can persist over the course of an entire season and across a variety of conditions. “Fishing topwaters on Lake of the Woods this past summer was fascinating,” Pearson says. “I’ve done well on topwaters there for some time, but this year, lures I was very confident in fizzled badly. A fish here and there, but nothing like I’d expect, even under what I thought were ideal conditions.

“Meanwhile, a new bait called the Rumbler, with a completely different sound, was outstanding. The Rumbler is a tail-spinning topwater but with a more subtle, higher-pitched sound than a lot of tail-spinners. It outfished all other topwaters for me this year. You might find that interesting in and of itself, but across the lake from me over in Sabaskong, Doug Johnson in the Northwest Angle was having similar success with the same lure.”

Why the Rumbler, instead of others with proven records for productivity on that body of water? Hard to say with certainty, but the difference, Pearson suspects, has something to do with sound. The preference for that sound carried on through the summer. “As I moved away from early-season weedbeds to more rock-related spots, it only got more effective,” he says.

Speed

Speed is a vital factor in any presentation approach, including with topwaters. Speed has an effect on the sound, but there’s more to it than that. Conditions often dictate lure speed, but often in ways one wouldn’t expect. And at times, according to Pearson, the relationship between speed and water conditions is counterintuitive.

Situations that create optimal feeding conditions—maximum chaos—for surface-looking predators like muskies call for aggressive, rapid presentations, in order to stand out in a roiled surface film and to trigger the keen predatory instinct of active muskies. “I’ve had days where multiple 50-inch fish were boated on walk-the-dog topwaters fished as fast as we could turn the reel handle in huge rollers and heavy wind,” Pearson says. “Under calm conditions, the same bait might require pauses of several seconds between twitches to get any attention at all.”

Tune your speed not only to the fish’s level of activity, but to the conditions as well. And as always—according to Pearson—experiment. Like preference for sound, preferences for speed can change day to day and season by season.

New topwaters continue to hit the market, the Rumbler perhaps the latest. These lures often play on variations of established themes, mixing and matching sound and action in just about any combination—from tail-spinning baits with subtle sound like the Rumbler, to clattering, rattle-filled walk-the-dog topwaters like the Musky Mania Doc, which blends subtle action with aggressive sound.

For Pearson, the experiment continues with this ever-growing array of lures. He’s making up for lost time.

*Rob Kimm, St. Paul, Minnesota, is Editor of Esox Angler, an exceptional muskie angler, and a frequent In-Fisherman contributor.