If a buddy goes to this August hotspot and tells you he didn’t catch any fish, he’s probably not telling the truth.
Gary Yamamoto Custom Baits’ Swim Senko has gotten into the swim of things in the swimbait market in a big way. How big? Well, during an FLW Tour event, the soft-plastic lure’s designer, Gary Yamamoto of Palestine, Texas, caught a 7-pounder on a Swim Senko on camera on his way to a top-10 finish. And at a B.A.S.S. tour event in January, bass fishing pro Ben Matsubu of Hemphill, Texas, caught an 11.30-pound bass on a Swim Senko that was topped only by fellow pro Shaw Grigsby’s 13.05.
But it’s the numbers of bass Swim Senkos catch that impresses Matsubu, who catches bass after bass on the 5-inch-long model when he rigs it under a 1/8-ounce worm weight and swims it through the grass at Toledo Bend.
“They’re a lot of fun because you don’t have to set the hook on them,” he said. “They set the hook themselves. The fish just haven’t seen it.”
Or anything like it. It isn’t your typical swimbait, according to Yamamoto, who used to work a 6-inch-long grub through the grass as a swimbait long before he made the Swim Senko.
Yamamoto took a few minutes from prefishing at Kentucky Lake the first weekend of June to talk about the soft plastic he designed and added to his growing assortment of productive soft plastics that bear the familiar black/yellow logo of Gary Yamamoto Custom Baits.
“When they had swim baits getting popular, there were a lot of shad-style and not very good for swimming,” he said. “The wide body was known for twisting, and there were big hooks or big weights in them for different styles. I just said ‘What if I make a Senko body with a tail.’”
Yamamoto, who will be 66 in August, thought about the short history of his Page, Ariz.-based company’s swimbait a minute and said, “I’m here at Kentucky Lake. It’s strange you’d call me here today — This is where I first used a Swim Senko. I’d cast it out to the bank and swim it back. It was surprising to see them come up and eat it as I watched it.”
It was spring then, he recalled. On that morning he was prefishing, he was using it a different way, which says something about its diversity. He was using it as a trailer on a 3/8-ounce Yamamoto football jig with one of his “spider skirts,” and working it in and around structure in 20- to 22-foot depths.
He was fairly certain he’d be using it in the upcoming tournament.
“This Swim Senko is a very versatile bait,” he said.
The 45-year-old Matsubu, who lives along Toledo Bend on the Texas side, knows all about the soft-plastic’s versatility. The 4-inch-long model is deadly when used as a trailer on a Chatterbait, he said. He knows of a pro who won two straight FLW tournaments doing that.
But the conventional Swim Senko was catching “lots and lots” of bass for many fishermen who were swimming it through the lily pads.
“Right now, the lily pads are up, and it’s the best time,” he said.
His favorite colors for Swim Senkos are (021) black/blue flake, (031) pearl white/silver flake and (912) green pumpkin/watermelon laminated.
Why is the Swim Senko successful at getting a bass to open its mouth? Matsubu believes he found one of the reasons, at least, one day after he put his boat on a trailer and pulled it up at Lake Fork. He was picking the grass off the boat trailer when he came across two eels.
“There are a lot of eels in lakes people don’t know about. I think that’s what it imitates,” he said, noting he found the same eels in Lake Guntersville.
Many bass fishermen prefer the 5-inch-long Swim Senko. Some swear by the 4-inch-long model.
But ever the perfectionist, Yamamoto has tweaked the line and come out with a 4 1/2-inch long Swim Senko. Bass anglers can get their hands on it by going to the company’s Web site, he said.
“We’re releasing it now,” Yamamoto said.
“The 5-inch has too big a tail. It wiggles the head. The whole body wobbles,” he said. “It works, but it wasn’t to perfection, as far as I’m concerned. The 4 1/2? I think that’s the best. I’ve spent all of last year perfecting that 4 1/2. Some stuff does not come easily. It takes a while.”
Matsubu, who threw the Swim Senko prototype about 4 1/2 years ago but hasn’t yet used the new 4 1/2-inch long model, said, “The 5-inch is probably my favorite.”
Matsubu even offered something that might get the wheels turning for Yamamoto.
After fishing at Lake Falcon, Matsubu said, “I wish they made about an 11-inch-long Swim Senko. Big fish want a big bait.”
Will Swim Senkos ever be as popular and coveted in so many bass anglers’ tackle boxes as a Senko? It could happen eventually.
Yamamoto, who also has had a house in Fourchon since 1999, and Matsubu agreed the Swim Bait is an excellent and effective soft plastic for redfish.
For more information about Swim Senkos and Gary Yamamoto Custom Baits, write to 849 S. Coppermine Road, P.O. Box 1000, Page, AZ 86040.
