Best bass lures for heavy weeds | Best baits for fishing submerged grass
As the sun comes up bass will move from open water and into either deeper water or a shallow water with cover.
Floating grass mats and deep submerged grass provide that much needed cover.
When choosing a bait, most of the bait clearly don’t look like something the bass would naturally feed on. But it’s the color and vibration the bait makes is often similar to what the bass normally eat in these areas. And so the bass has to make a split second decision on whether to eat your lure or potentially let an easy meal pass them by.
If you’re just getting started or want some insider information into strategic details on fishing in heavy grass, then do not forget to check out this complete report I wrote for you called: WARNING: Bass Fishing In Heavy Grass? [25 Mistakes To Avoid].
However, if you’re looking for a great list of baits to catch a grass dwelling monster than this is the report you must read over.
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Here is a great list of weedless bass lures for flipping into heavy grass:
Topwater Frog
Not only will bass eat the small fish and crawfish in the water they’ll always consider an easy surface meal like a frog.
Frogs are slow, soft, and lack any sharp spines so bass go crazy over them and they’re found close to shore and around both submerged and emergent grass.
This gives you the opportunity to capitalize on those facts.
Keep the colors simple. Green, white, and black
Examples of hollow body frogs
- Booyah Pad Crasher
- Strike King Sexy Frog
- Spro Bronzeye Frog
- LIVETARGET Hollow Body Frog
- Scum Frog Bassrat
- Soft plastic hollow body frog features a plastic with just the right consistency to ensure solid, consistent hook-ups while remaining weed- and snag-free
- Belly features 'chines' that make 'walking the frog' easy in open water, and it's just the right weight for pulling over slop or through the pads for big bass
- Realistic decoration schemes and adjustable spinnerbait-style legs seal the deal for big bass
- Drain hole at the tail of the bait keeps it working flawlessly
- Premium quality double 3/0 Hooks; 1/2 ounce weight; 2 1/2 inch length
- Hollow Body Frogs: Hollow body frogs are excellent bass fishing lures that can mimic the movements of real live frogs. Largemouth bass and smallmouth bass don't stand a chance with this topwater frog bait!
- IRRESISTIBLE TOPWATER ACTION: As topwater lures, these baits for bass fishing make a realistic splashing action that drives fish wild, making them a must-have in any angler's tackle box
- VERSATILE AND ESSENTIAL: Frog lures for bass fishing are versatile fishing accessories that can be used in various types of water, especially in lily pads, making them perfect weedless lures for your fishing gear collection
- LIGHTWEIGHT AND EASY CASTING: Our weedless bass lures are hollow and are lightweight and easy to cast, making them an excellent choice for anglers of all levels- the best frogs for bass fishing
- DURABILITY: Hollow body top water frogs are incredibly durable lures and can withstand the wear and tear of repeated use and bites from big bass, ensuring that they remain a valuable addition to your fishing tackle for a long time
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Spinnerbait/Chatterbait
Fishing a spinnerbait or chatterbait over and around grass can be a game changer for you. If you see bass exploding on fish that’s a clear indication that you should have a moving bait tied on.
Fish the channels, points, cuts, and parallel to the floating or emergent grass beds.
Simple colors such as white or sexy shad work great. If you know there are bluegill or perch around then made sure you have a couple of those ready to be tied on as well.
Spinnerbaits and chatterbaits may not look like it, but are great weedless bass lures. The front wire or blade will deflect the bait around snags and this vegetation.
Examples of best spinnerbaits and chatterbaits
- War Eagle Nickel Spinnerbait Double Willow
- Strike King KVD Finesse Spinnerbait Double Willow
- War Eagle Mike McClelland Finesse Spinnerbait
- Z-Man Original Chatterbait
- Z-Man Evergreen Chatterbait Jack Hammer
- Strike King Thunder Cricket Vibrating Jigs
- EYE-CATCHING LURE: Matching head and blade-color patterns, creating a totally different look while retaining the fish-catching action
- ATTRACTING POND MAGIC: Find out quickly that these are fish-catching machines
- BAIT DESIGN: Specializes in color and blade combinations that have been hand selected to match the forage base of smaller water
- TAILORED HOOK: Mustart Ultra Point 2/0 Hook Size making it optimal for Bass fishing
- EFFECTIVE SIZE AND COLORS: 60-strand ultra fine silicone skirts; 3/16 oz top water fishing
- Designed For Maximum Vibration
- Perfect For Cool- Or Murky-Water Situations
- Features A 55-Strand Bio-Flex Silicone Skirt
- The Skirt Undulates Like A Baitfish
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- Bladed Jig Vibrating Action – The new MadBite Bladed Jig assortment all have an irresistible vibrating action that is tournament proven to catch bass and a wide variety of fish throughout the year. Great in clear water or low visibility conditions. MadBite Bladed Jigs can be use with or without soft plastic trailers to elicit strikes even in tough conditions when other baits just don’t work.
- Multi-Color Silicone Skirts – The soft and supple silicon skirts are available in a wide variety of colors to imitate natural forage and add incredible action and movement to your lure presentations. Color options include Blue with Black, Summer Craw, Green Pumkin/Orange, White/Chartreuse and a Sexy Shad. Jig heads are hard painted to avoid paint chipping and all match the silicone shirt colors.
- Sticky-Sharp Needle Point Hooks – Every MadBite Bladed Jig uses only the finest, sharpest and most durable needle point hooks finished in black nickel plating. The sticky-sharp, heavy wire hooks stand up to hard use in heavy cover conditions and will stay strong even with the most violent hook sets.
- Money Saving 5 pc and 3pc Multi-Colored Kits – To save you even more money, MadBite Bladed Jigs are packed in either 3 pc kits or for an even better value, 5 pc kits that include the best performing bladed jig colors for use year-round. All MadBite Bladed Jigs are packed in durable plastic storage boxes to keep your jigs organized and ready to fish.
- Two Different Weight Options – Color and action are critical to catching more fish but equally as important is using the correct weight of lure to ensure your bait is working at the correct depth. MadBite Bladed Jigs are available in two most often used weights – 3/8 oz. and ½ oz. You’ll want to have a nice assortment of colors in both weight ranges to be sure you are ready for any conditions you’ll face.
- Flash of a spinnerbait, vibration of a crankbait, and profile of a jig combined in a single bait
- Exclusive hex-shaped ChatterBlade for maximum flash and vibration paired with custom heavy-duty, needle point 5/0 hook
- Work the entire water column by varying your retrieve rate—the ChatterBait won’t hydroplane on a fast retrieve
- Wide range of colors and weights to cover all deep and shallow bass fishing application, including 1/4-, 3/8-, 1/2-, and 5/8-ounce
- Customize your presentation by adding a variety of ElaZtech baits as trailers, including Turbo CrawZ, DieZel MinnowZ, RaZor ShadZ, StreakZ, and more!
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The Punch Rig - Best Lure for Heavy Vegetation
photo @venom_lures
Punch rigs are phenomenal weedless bass lures. The rig consists of a heavy flipping weight, a slender bait, paired with a stout heavy-gauge flipping hook.
Often the weight is pegged close to the hook right behind a plastic or glass bead.
Punching or flipping weights are commonly found in the 1/2 – 2-ounce sizes. The heavy weight needs to have a enough mass to punch through heavy vegetation.
Creature baits
The great thing about creature baits is they can be so versatile. It’s no wonder they have exploded in popularity.
Normally found with a longer profile, they are often found with multiple flippers and tentacles that just seem to drive the bass crazy!
Great for clear water and semi-murky water these work not only are these great for fishing submerged grass, these little guys flipped around tree stumps, docks, bluff walls and other vertical structures.
Examples:
- Zoom Brush Hogs
- Big Bite Baits Flying Squirrel
- Culprit Incredi Craw
- Googan Baits Trench Hawg
Beaver baits
When the beaver-style bait hit the market it filled a much needed niche in the bass fishing world. It has a large bulky profile that displaces a large amount of water and paired with a solid flipper tail, it was not seen by the bass until then.
The first beaver baits were the Reaction Innovations Sweet Beaver introduced in 2002 by Bass Pro Andre Moore, who founded the Reaction Innovations company. Since then multiple other companies have come up with their own versions of the beaver bait.
One of the most interesting features of the beaver bait is that the main “tail” section can be cut down the middle to add even more action.
Often viewed as more finesse than a flipping jig, a beaver bait often is paired with a punching weight to create one of the best baits for punching grass.
Examples:
- Reaction Innovations Sweet Beaver
- Gambler Ugly Otter
- Strike King KVD Perfect Plastic Rodent
- Z-Man Palmetto BugZ
- Yum Wolly Bug
- Flanges for consistent, subtle action
- For use behind the DB Structure Head
- Ideal as a flipping or creature bait
- The Wooly Bug has it all – great action, big water displacement, enticing glide, bass-catching profile and the most effective attractant on the market
- The total package creature bait is fantastic flipping, pitching or simply bumping bottom on a Texas rig for largemouth and smallmouth bass
- Provides a dangerous one-two punch to big bass
- Features a ribbed beaver-style body, claws
- Available in 10 of the most effective colors and 2 sizes
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Craw Baits
Like the beaver style baits, craw baits are also bulky and displace a lot of water and are amazing weedless bass lures. What makes them different is the craw pincer appendages will flap in the water creating an added disturbance.
However, too much of something is not necessarily a good thing. Many craw manufacturers will make the pincer appendages really big. Unfortunately, those pincer appendages will get wrapped around a branch, a twig, or something else and will prevent the lure from flipping into that deep grass.
So to solve that problem some lure manufacturers have made compact appendages that flap like crazy and will not get hung up, or will remain in a compact craw pincer shape
Examples of compact craw baits that are great for flipping into grass:
- Zoom Speed Craw
- Berkley Powerbait Chigger Craw
- Missile Baits Missile Craw
- Gambler Burner Craw
- Googan Baits Krackin’ Craw
- 2 realistic pinchers
- Long, slender body engineered to create turbulence
- Pack of 7
- Flanges for consistent, subtle action
- For use behind the DB Structure Head
- Ideal as a flipping or creature bait
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Fluke baits & Soft Plastic Swimbaits
Fluke baits are perfect for flipping and pitching into grass they’re long, narrow and bass go crazy with their soft natural feel…
And soft plastic swimbaits also have a similar body shape but have a little tail that kicks back and forth on the fall.
Made with the intention of looking like a real baitfish they are made in a variety of colors, anything from shad, to bluegill, to perch! If you’re first starting out with flipping a fluke choose a bream or bluegill color first because those are the most common forage fish you’ll see around grass mats.
Helpful TIP: If you’re flipping swimbaits make sure you pick a swimbait with a smaller paddle tail. It will prevent from it getting hung up or wrapped around a branch.
Examples of fluke baits and soft plastic swimbaits:
- Zoom Salty Super Fluke
- Berkley Powerbait Jerk Shad
- Lunker City Fin-S Fish
- Z-Man Scented Jerk Shadz
- LIVETARGET Twitch Minnow
- Ultra realistic details including scale patterns, gill plates, 3D eyes and flash foil inserted in the belly. Fishes won't be able to ignore this lure.
- Extremely lifelike swimming action. Features a hard-pounding paddle tail to create enticing kicks and wiggles to drive fishes crazy, luring them to attack.
- Work great for drop shotting. Also ideal for weightless, weedless rig. Even the easiest rig will make it a bass magnets.
- It is the perfect meal size for bass and other general freshwater species and rock fish.
- Pack of 6;Length: 2.76"/70mm; Color: Watermelon;Material: High Quality Silicone.
- Durable Product
- This product meets the customer requirements
- Made in the USA
- Gulp minnow can outfish the real thing
- Replaces the real thing for trolling or jigging
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Worms
Many anglers overlook worms as a good bait for thick grass fishing. But that can be farther from the truth. Worms are also long and thin and can shimmy their way through the heavy vegetation which makes them exceptional weedless bass lures.
If the water you’re fishing is fairly clear, then flipping a worm into that vegetation should be one of your options.
But the key to finding a good worm to use as a pitching bait is to make sure it isn’t super long and flexible otherwise, you’ll risk getting wrapped around a branch or something. Some of the worms also come with an added kicker tail.
Stick baits are great baits for flipping into grass. They’re long and thin, and not overly flexible, so you don’t have to worry about getting hung up.
Shorter straight tail worms can be great flipping baits too, especially if they have a little flipper or paddle tail.
Examples of best worms for fishing submerged grass
- Yamamoto Senko
- Yum Dinger
- Mister Twister Poc’it Phenom Curly Tail Worm
- Zoom Ultravibe Speed Worm
- Missile Baits Quiver Worm
- Versatile lure that catches bass whether they're feeding or not
- Soft plastic bait presents a very subtle life-like action that even highly pressured fish can't resist
- Unique hook slot that provides better hook-ups
- The Dinger can be Texas, Carolina and wacky rigged, weighted or weightless, and catches fish when other lures fail
- Classic worm look-a-like style gets inactive fish to strike like no other lure
- GREAT FISHING BAIT - The 5" Senko is a staple in the fishing world; The original soft-plastic stickbait is the #1 choice of anglers everywhere; The Senko has spawned thousands of imposters, but nothing beats the original soft stick bait
- UNMATCHED QUALITY - Versatility is a key attribute of the Senko, allowing it to be fished in a multitude of ways that all end up putting more fish in the boat; The only wrong way to fish a Senko is to not fish with the original Senko
- PERFECT FISHING LURE - The ORIGINAL soft stick bait is the bar by which all others are measured; The secret sauce to the Senko fishing bait is the formula; We invented it; We perfected it; And no one else has ever gotten close to it
- BEST CHOICE FOR ANGLERS - Beyond the perfect design and formula lies the Senko's ease of use; There's almost no wrong way to rig it, and whatever your preferred way is, the Senko soft fishing bait is the ultimate fish catcher
- SENKO SERIES - There's a Senko in the lineup for every possible application; Whether you fish it weightless, wacky-style, on Texas or Carolina rig, on shaky head or flipping jig, this slab of plastic will revolutionize your game and increase your catches
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Lizards
Let’s get something straight… bass hate lizards. During the spring, lizards and salamanders will raid a bass nest and will eat thousands of bass eggs throughout spring.
The lizard bait is slender, long, and can slip through small cracks and openings in the vegetation.
Keep it simple when it comes to choosing a size and color for flipping grass. Lizard baits between 4-6-inches will do just fine.
If water is clear or if the bass are skittish, downsize to a smaller lizard.
You really need only need four colors. For clear water, green pumpkin or watermelon red flake works great. stained to muddy dirty water, have a couple of packs of either junebug or black/blue.
Many anglers think the ol’ lizard has fallen out of fashion. But the surprising answer is ‘no’. In an article in Bassmaster magazine, a Zoom Baits employee reported that they are selling more lizards more than ever.
Examples of best lizards
- Zoom Lizards
- Yum Lizards
- Berkley Powerbait Power Lizard
“The thing that makes a soft plastic lizard special is the flat belly paired with a tail and legs that have great but subtle swimming action. As for the reason you don’t hear about it more – I think it’s because guys don’t want to spotlight it. They keep it kinda under the collar. But again, come check my boat, and you’ll find a box full of lizards right now."
- Package length: 16.51 cm
- Package width: 12.192 cm
- Package height: 0.762 cm
- Product Type: FISHING HOOK
- YUM Lizard’s legs and thin ribbon tail produce an irresistible swimming action
- Super soft texture that ensures solid hooksets and lifelike color reproduction
- Anytime bait lure that is sure to catch
- Curly legs that create motion and a long curly tail that pushes a lot of water
- Tough, durable plastic holds up to multiple fish, yet remains soft and supple even when fished in cold water
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Flipping Jigs
Saving the best for last, flipping jigs are by far the most used baits for flipping grass and are outstanding weedless bass lures.
Flipping jigs made out list of the top jigs for bass fishing.
Designed specifically for this purpose, the best flipping jigs have these main features: arrow-like pointed noses, a stout-but-flexible weedguard, and a thick unbendable hook. Many times you’ll also see them paired with a bait collar and a loud rattle.
The pointed jig head allows it to slide through cover and be incredibly snag proof.
The weedguard are often color matched to the jig head color to give it a more natural appearance.
The hook you’ll see on most flipping jigs are thicker and stronger than your standard casting jig. You need a stout hook that won’t bend under all the weight from the fish and the grass.
You’ll also see on the better flipping jigs is a collar that will hold the soft plastic trailer in place. As your jig is smashing through the grass you don’t want your trailer to slide off the hook.
Finally you may notice the jig will have either one or two rattles. The rattles will call the fish in like a dinner bell and get the attention of some of the biggest bass.
What are the best jigs for grass fishing?
The jigs that will most likely give you the most success are jigs that are normally considered larger in weight. Half ounce-to-three quarters ounce jigs are best go-to size if you’re just getting started.
If you’re punching floating mats… use a much heavier jig than that. Jigs that are ¾-1½-ounce normally work great.
In submerged grass that has less than 8 to 10 ft depth, reach for a half-ounce size, and anything deeper than 10 to 12 feet, go for a three quarter ounce size.
But wait…there’s an exception… If it’s windy automatically upsize your jig by a quarter ounce no matter what the depth is. This will allow you to stay in contact with the bottom much easier.
- Strike King Hack Attack Heavy Cover Jig
- Missile Baits Ike’s Mini Flip Jig
- Trashmaster Cover/Flipping Jig
- Compact head design
- Super-strong custom Siwash hook
- Large 0° line tie
- Ideal for flipping in clearer water
- GET UNDER COVER: Reaction Tackle’s tungsten flipping jigs for bass fishing are designed specifically to pitch or flip the fishing jigs into tight spots; Ideal for areas with heavy vegetation, weeds or pitching under docks, this flippin jig is the answer for anglers who need a responsive jig heads for fishing heavy cover
- LIFELIKE PRESENTATION: With high quality silicone skirts, Reaction Tackle’s bass fishing jigs have a vibrant and lifelike underwater presentation; More than simply jigs for bass fishing, our fishing lures also make great pike, muskie and walleye jigs
- WEED PROTECTION: People love our bass jigs for the practical touches we add to our fishing equipment; Each one of our jig heads features weed protection to allow your jigs for bass to pass through weeds with less snags; Spend less time tangled and more time doing what you love with Reaction Tackle’s weedless jig heads
- TUNGSTEN HEAD: Our bass fishing gear features tungsten jig heads for extra sensitivity; With 97 percent pure tungsten, each of our fishing jig heads lets you feel every rock, weed, strike and hit; Upgrade your bass fishing to a more tactile experience with Reaction Tackle’s tungsten jigs
- QUALITY: Each bass fishing jig has undergone stringent quality inspection and hours of development with professional anglers; Our fishing equipment and supplies are crafted to the highest standards; The Reaction Tackle promise is this; if we wouldn’t use these tungsten fishing jigs ourselves, we won’t sell them
- Compact head design
- Super-strong custom Siwash hook
- Large 0° line tie
- Ideal for flipping in clearer water
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Best flipping jig color
The color is more important than the brand. The color needs to match the surrounding forage such as green pumpkin, watermelon, sprayed grass, black and blue, and all black.
Depending on the time of year, use different soft plastic trailers. On a regular day (slight breeze, no clouds) a Strike King rage craw or a Berkley chigger craw works great
If the weather is cold and you decide to fish deep grass, you should thread on a Zoom Super Chunk or even an Uncle Josh Pork Chunk trailer.
Don’t forget about pork chunk trailers and cold water… Pork trailers will remain flexible and will maintain it’s natural appearance. Soft plastic baits in the cold water become stiff and will lose action.
One last thing to remember when you’re fishing bass that are held up in deep thick vegetation you want to use a trailer that has a narrow profile. This allows it to slip through the vegetation much easier than a big bulky profile.
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