Let Mother Nature tell you where to target specks and reds this month.
Creek Chub’s first new product in 20 years was worth the wait.Just ask Andy Mnichowski of Marerro, a 13-year veteran saltwater fishing guide who owns Venice’s Fish-On Charters. He’ll tell you in a Nu Ahleans minute about the qualities of the Knuckle-Head, both the original model that was introduced in 2002 and the Knuckle-Head Jr. that came out in 2003.
The topwater lure, a one-of-a-kind popper with a jointed head, drives bull reds crazy, he proved late last summer during the BASS Masters Classic in Louisiana.
Mnichowski fished five days with Chris Gulstad, public relations manager for Creek Chub in Fort Smith, Ark., and several of those days with bass pro Sam Swett.
The Knuckle-Heads they threw wore the bull reds out while fishing Lonesome Bayou.
“We probably caught 50 bull reds in a couple of hours. It was every cast with the bait. Either you missed one or caught one. We did it for five days like that,” Mnichowski said several weeks ago.
“We had some of the best fishing anybody had during the Classic last year,” he said. “The Knuckle-Head was amazing, by far the most effective topwater plug for bull reds. We nearly caught them on every cast.
“They crushed it. They looked like submarines. They’d rise above the bait and come down on it and just crush it. It was amazing.”
Mnichowski doesn’t leave home on a fishing trip without Knuckle-Heads on board. How many does he have?
“A whole lot,” he said.
What’s so special about the Knuckle-Heads and Knuckle-Head Jr.’s, which are making a name for themselves among bass fishing experts and those targeting speckled trout?
• Mouth shaped for enticing action;
• Oversized, realistic inset capped eyes;
• A floating, unique “rolling” action;
• Weight for long casts;
• Two 1/0 saltwater-resistant sharp treble hooks;
• Marabou hair tail and strong, heavy-duty split rings.
An Arkansas lure designer came up with the idea for the lure around 2000, Gulstad said. Topwater anglers for years were clamoring for a lure with a tailfeather that would drop down in the water column, he said.
That’s what they got … and more. Creek Chub officials figured it would be a hit, particularly when they did “pull tests” on the Knuckle-Head.
Knuckle-Heads feature a patent-pending “Hold-Tite” link that holds the head to the body and gives the topwater the “injured gill” look that excites predator fish.
It takes more than 100 pounds to pull one apart, Gulstad said. The Super Knuckle-Head, a bigger version of the original, tests even higher, and it is hitting the market in 2004.
“If you hook something that tears it apart, you probably don’t want it in the boat,” Gulstad said with a chuckle.
Mnichowski’s favorite colors are bone/red head and parrot (lime green with red in it).
It works for several reasons, he said.
“It’s an awesome bait. The main thing is it’s the exact size of finger mullets we have down here,” he said. “And you can work it slow or you can skip it on the water. It just makes so much noise because of the concave head. It sounds just like mullets schooling and scattering on the water.
“You can get trout to hit it — real big trout,” he said, “and big redfish just can’t stand it.”
The fishing guide also said he likes it because of its castability and, naturally, durability. He believes only one Knuckle-Head went down during those five days of fishing for bull reds while the Classic was going on last year out of Bayou Segnette State Park.
Bass anglers near and far are getting hooked on the topwater lure, too.
“That Knuckle-Head Jr., you can actually walk the dog with it a little,” he said.
At Henderson Lake between Lafayette and Baton Rouge, Laurette Mequet said she has seen a steady increase in the interest for Knuckle-Heads. Bass were eating them up in late spring and early summer, she said.
Many anglers, however, were looking for black Knuckle-Heads, and Mequet said she was having a hard time finding that color to put in Cypress Cove Landing along the West Atchafalaya Basin Protection Levee.
Around Lake Guntersville, Ala., one of the top bass lakes in the South, fishing tackle stores can’t keep them on the shelves, Gulstad said.
“As soon as they come in they’re wiped out,” he said.
For more information on Creek Chub’s Knuckle-Head lures, call (479)782-8971 or log on to www.lurenet.com.
