Fishing: Spice Up Your Shrimp Menu

Everything eats shrimp.

That old fisherman’s saying may be true. I know I like shrimp, whether jumbos on a skewer or a fake version at the end of my leader.

There are a lot of fake shrimp on tackle shelves. My personal favorite is the Vudu made by Egret Baits. In the package or in the water, it has a very natural appearance—long, skinny antennae, articulated, floppy tail. Toss it in a bucket of live shrimp, and you’ll have trouble picking out the plastic replica.

In my view, plastic shrimp have clearly distinct advantages over the live variety. From a logistical perspective, they eliminate the need for heavy, space-eating buckets and noisy aerators, or the need to wait until the bait shop opens before getting on the water. Plastic shrimp attract evil, time-consuming nuisances such as catfish much less often, and better withstand the constant pecking of pinfish and other denizens of summertime grassflats, making them far cheaper in the long run. Most importantly, they can be presented in myriad ways, emulating a wide variety of forage species. “ RELATED: Banana Fanna Fo Fanna – Thumbing my nose at the great bad luck banana curse – with all due respect, of course

Ken Chaumont originally designed and marketed the Vudu Shrimp as a spotted seatrout lure to be fished beneath a popping cork in Louisiana. The position of the hook eye and nose weight allow it to settle horizontally in the water column, creating a much more natural presentation than typical plastic shrimp.

I have no doubt that’s an effective technique for schoolie trout and redfish, but I’ve never used popping corks, which I frankly find tedious. I prefer a more aggressive approach that covers more of the water column, and most importantly targets a wider variety of fish, and certainly bigger fish in my experience.

Hanging beneath a cork, a plastic shrimp gives fish too much time to study it. Fortunately, small fish aren’t real bright, which explains why trout often attack the cork rather than the shrimp. Fished on its own, a plastic shrimp can emulate many forage species. If a lure has eyes, comes from the right direction and pops up suddenly in front of a fish lying in ambush, it’s just another food item and is likely to draw a reaction strike.

With a ¼-ounce chunk of lead hanging beneath its nose, the Vudu excels at getting to the bottom quickly, a unique attribute which makes it my one-lure tackle box for pompano and flounder lying in sandy potholes and along channel edges. When it strikes the bottom, it’s heavy enough to create a puff of sand, emulating a shrimp or crab digging in the dirt. With the weight concentrated up front, the segmented tail stands up and waves enticingly. However, most strikes occur when the shrimp is popped aggressively upward, and then allowed to fall. This movement emulates that of many forage species—shrimp, crabs, minnows, pinfish—that have just been spooked from the seagrass or mud into open water, presenting predators with a very short feeding opportunity before the lure appears to be escaping back into the bottom structure. Boom. Reaction strike. In addition to pompano and flounder, this simple technique has accounted for many of my biggest trophy snook and seatrout. Redfish are a frequent bycatch as well.

The Vudu is available in four sizes—2, 3.25, 3.5 and 4 inches. I use the original 3.25 most of the time, switching to the recently introduced 3.5 with its standard rattle when stained water conditions dictate the need for a lure that fish can locate more easily. The heavy nose weight gives the lure a casting advantage over lighter plastic shrimp, particularly in the wind.

Although fairly weedless, thick summertime seagrass can sometimes make the bottom-bouncing technique impractical. Under those conditions, the Vudu can be fished as a shallow-running wake bait, employing a slow, steady retrieve and a light walk-the-dog twitch with the rod tip held high. Tossed upcurrent, this creates the very life-like appearance of a shrimp swimming downstream with the tide. I find this technique most effective on tidal flats early in the morning, and throughout the day for bass, crappie and large bream in fresh water when fished lower in the water column.

The Vudu is somewhat pricier than most replica shrimp. However, it is molded from tough TPE plastic, the same material utilized in shoe soles. To make it even more fish-resistant, it is constructed around a spine of nylon weave, rendering it virtually impervious to the impact of snook, trout, redfish and other typical flats fish. As long as I avoid nasty bluefish, barracuda or big Spanish mackerel, it’s possible to land over a hundred fish on the same lure. Although I did lose a brand new shrimp on the second cast when a 6-foot bull shark ate it.

As with all lures, I rig the Vudu with a simple loop knot to maximize its movement. In clear Florida panhandle water, I typically tie it to 15- to 20-pound fluorocarbon. When I venture into south Florida, I move up to 30-pound line to withstand the abrasive teeth and sharp gill plates of snook.