Umbrella Rig Season

It's been about a year now since the Alabama Rig leaped into the limelight with a few of major tournament wins and bass fishing was changed forever. Many new castable umbrella rigs emerged and pro anglers made a quick study of these unique rigs' best applications. Much of that story remains to be written, but for now the favored application is cool-weather fishing on main-reservoir structure.

In this video, Bassmaster pro Timmy Horton, whose home waters of Pickwick and Wilson lakes are in the heart of umbrella rig country, explains exactly how he uses a YUM YUMbrella Rig to enjoy some of the best fishing of the year. Prime season is just beginning and will continue until spring, so if you want to try out this technique, now is the time to gather your gear and plan some time on the water.

Back to 'Bama

In just a couple of hours I'll be hopping in my truck and heading back toward Alabama to spend a couple of days fishing and doing photo and story work with bass pros from Vicious Fishing and Phoenix Bass Boats. I always enjoy the fishing, the fine meals and the time spent with other writers and fishing pros on these trips. Even more so, though, I appreciate the great opportunities to learn tips and techniques that I can share in magazine stories and on websites and to shoot photos to help tell those stories.

Last week's trip Alabama's Shoals Region yielded a load of great story material and hotos, plus a few fresh video clips. Nathaniel just posted the first video from the trip, which features Tim Horton talking about  fishing YUMBrella rigs on the Tennessee River.

I'm not sure how much phone or computer access I'll have this week. If it's possible, though, I'll share some of what I learn soon after I learn it. So check back!

Alabama Bronze

The smallmouths were kind enough to make a strong appearance today, taking a bit of the bite out of a pretty chilly November day, with skies that ranged from blue to black, at times with cold rain or even hail falling. Most fish were on Tennessee River bluffs, and the bulk of them were caught on Yumbrella Flash Mob Junior rigs adorned with YUM Mud Minnows. However, individual Mud Minnows and Rogues also produced a few fish. The best bluffs were on the windy side of the river, with waves beating the rock and with big schools of shad running close to the bluffs. The best bite occurred when the wind was blowing steadily.

We're headed for the same main-river bluffs tomorrow to see whether the smallmouths still want to cooperate. I'm guessing they will, but we'll find out tomorrow morning. I know the morning cold will have just as much bite.  For now, I guess I'd better sleep!

Mob Ruled the Day

Reports told of stripers smashing Spooks a couple of mornings ago, so given a forecast of a dark drizzly day, we anticipated a day of surface action and began the morning with a Super Spook, Super Spook Jr. or Bomber Badonk-A-Donk on every line. As hard as we tried, though, we could not coax the Illinois River's stripers to come up. However, when Lawrence Taylor decided to go down after the fish with a YUMBrella Flash Mob Jr., his school of flashy blades and swimming grubs proved more than the stripers could resist. I didn't take long for all of us to rig similarly and tap into the striper action. Spooks produced one largemouth and one small striper, but the Flash Mob Junior rigs yielded the best action by far.

Interestingly, a full-size Flash Mob didn't draw a single strike, and apparently a Super Spook Jr. was far more productive than a Super Spook over the weekend. The shad, which were very abundant in the area where we caught the fish, were quite small and the stripers seemingly didn't trust offerings with larger profiles.

New Spin on Multi-Lure Rigs

Typically at the ICAST show, several new-product trends emerge: hollow-bodied swimbaits, micro eyes on rods, a new material for waders, better-equipped fishing kayaks, square-lipped crankbaits... Something that has been hot or has shown signs of getting hot typically draws multiple manufacturers to develop some version of a certain style of product or something that goes with that type of product.

Anyone who follows the fishing business at all knows that one major trend at this year's show will be multi-lure rigs and all sorts of stuff to go with them. Following the trend started by Alabama Rigs on the bass tournament trails last fall, there will be many types of multi-lure rigs for fresh and salt water alike, rods designed for casting and presenting such rigs, baits made specifically to go on the ends of the wires, specialized boxes and wraps for storing them...

YUM, which quickly emerged as a leader in this category with the YUMbrella rig, is introducing an entire line of multi-lure offerings under the collective dubbing of Bait School Technology.

One of the coolest offerings in this line, from my perspective, is the Flash Mob Jr. As the Jr. part of the name suggests, it is downsized from the original YUMbrella rig and can be cast on most fishing gear. The flash part is what sets is apart, though. Four spinnerbait blades positioned halfway down the arms create a bunch of attention-getting flash just ahead of the grubs or swimbait bodies or whatever you choose to put on the jigheads.

The folks in Fort Smith, Arkansas, where YUM Bait Company is headquartered, have been had huge fun testing the Flash Mob Jr. and the results have been seriously good!