Mann’s Has Opened A Whole New Can Of Worms
By Ron Kruger
New lures and new techniques keep the excitement of fishing fresh. Innovative contraptions and refined theories of presentation have been reviving my angling itch for over 50 years.

To me bass fishing with artificial baits is a thinking man’s sport. Most of the time, I can’t wait to try something new, even though most of the time these attractive new trinkets and presentation wrinkles turn out to be mostly just another way to fish more dollars from the pockets of angling Americans.

  
Every once in a while, however, I stumble upon something so good it makes fishing seem more fun than ever.  After 50 years of fishing and 30 years of writing about lures and techniques, it takes a very innovative and productive bait to get me this excited.  The last thing you might expect to cause such a stir in my angling soul is a plastic worm.  After all, what could possibly be so new about a plastic worm?

Nevertheless, Mann’s Bait Company has come out with a patented process that is truly ingenious, because it solves an age old problem inherent to all plastic baits.  They call it their "Hard Nose" series, and as the name implies, the nose, or head, of the bait is hard–very hard–while the rest of the bait is very supple.  It doesn’t slip off the head of a worm hook and down the shank, even when you set the hook.

Having a plastic bait slip down and ball up in the bend is one of those problems we fishermen have taken for granted for many decades.  It’s a pain, really, because they not only slip down and ball up at the business end when we set the hook, they often slip down and ball up as we are retrieving them through cover.  Solving this most basic problem everyone has just taken for granted as part of the process of worm fishing is nothing short of genius.
  
Hard Nose baits have been out for a few years now and fishermen have discoverd that they have very practical applications for every method of soft plastic rigging, and I’m confident they will eventually become the most popular plastic bait in the country.  But what has me as giddy as a young boy with his first big bass, is how they make a unique and highly productive technique work like magic, especially during the spring when bass move shallow.

Last spring, Betty and I loaded a little john boat into the back of our truck and drove over to Davenport Bay on the LBL portion of Lake Barkley.  As usual, there were a number of tournaments going on that weekend, and as usual, this bay was loaded with competitive anglers fishing the flooded brush and submerged flowers.  They come and they go.  They run and they gun.  Every patch of flooded flowers was beat to death with spinnerbaits and such by the time we slowly paddled over to them.  While this almost
steady stream of competitive anglers tore quite a few flowers from their roots, we only saw them catch a couple of short fish.

Coming along behind these weekend pros, Betty and I managed to catch 11 keepers in just a few hours.  All but three of them were four or five pounds each, plus we lost a couple of really big bass too.  We probably could have won any tournament on the lake that day.  (This is far from the first time something like this has happened. It’s just the most recent and probably the most dramatic.) -- The difference?

Betty and I were fishing Mann’s Hard Nose worms WEIGHTLESS.  More than the worm’s natural attraction, it was the hard-nosed design of this bait that made fishing them without any weight so possible and so productive.  Any other soft bait without a weight up front to run interference would have bunched up in a highly unattractive and unproductive ball when pulled through this underwater jungle.  Without any weight, these worms slide and glide and slowly sink among the thickest cover with a natural ease. They are as weedless and life-like as any bait can get.

Rig it on a heavy, 4/0 or 5/0 worm hook by inserting the hook point a little further through the center of the head than you might for a Texas or Carolina rig, so that when you push it past the kink, the pointed head of the worm covers the eye and the knot.  This way, even the knot is protected by the hard nose.  There is no wear on the knot and without weight line abrasion in general is almost totally avoided. When you insert the hook point into the body of the worm to make it weedless, however, be sure the worm is straight so it swims properly.
  

Rigged this way (see picture ->), the pointed nose doesn't lodge in jaggedrocks or hang up in thick brush, and it doesn't pick up weeds and other junk drifting about.  It allows you to fish in the last "secret spots" of this GPS age: those places so rugged and tangled that fishermen with weighted baits simply pass them by.  And because there is no weight, and they are fished on a relatively slack line, bass don’t feel anything unnatural when they pick them up. With no weight, and usually no resistance, they find no reason to spit it out, and you’ve got plenty of time to set the hook. 
Watch the line for movement.  Early detection of the strike is more a visual matter than one of feel. Florescent or high-visibility line helps.  On windy days with choppy water, I coat some of the line, except for the first few feet next to the bait, with silicone fly line dressing. This keeps it floating like a cork.

  
 
It is finesse fishing with the finest refinement, but it is much easier to fish effectively than any finesse method I know.  You don’t need what they call "good hands."All you really need is some patience, and some Mann’s Hard Nose worms.

When you’re in weeds, brush, flowers and such, fish without much rod movement, and don’t hold it up high in the standard macho pose.  All that catches is a lot of wind and puts a big bow in the line. Keep the rod tip low and simply turn one crank or so of the reel to take up slack.  Let the worm slide through the stuff naturally and let the line go slack before taking another crank.

One June day a couple of years ago, I found another use for this weightless worm rig, and this is really cool.  I was fishing a patch of lily pads for bluegill and noticed a bass bust something in the middle of the thick vegetation, so I cast this weightless rig, held the rod tip up and reeled just fast enough to keep the worm’s head on the surface.  It slides right over the big leaves, and the flip tail on Mann’s six-inch worm wiggles wildly behind.  It looks like a small snake, and bass try to kill it with splashy shows of admirable exuberance.  This is the most fun of anything not outlawed by the Bible.

Mann’s also recently introduced a 10-inch Hard Nosed Snake, and I can’t wait to try it in the lily pads, across milfoil patches and as a general weightless topwater lure next spring when snakes come out of hibernation.  This could be a real hog buster.

They also make a nine-inch worm.  Big worms have become a standard summer lure on large lakes.  This is not some fad or fluke.  It is a seasonal standard with at least a decade of consistent proof.  Big worms have become a dog days phenomenon, a go-to bait for the hot months.  The thing that elevates Mann’s above the rest of the long worms is, again, the hard nose.  They won’t slip down on the hook while you’re fishing (a major problem with other long worms).

My favorite still is the six-inch worm, but also highly productive is their Hard Nose Soft Craws, either fished weightless or with a small split shot.  This bait, when eased along rip-rap banks or rocky points will put any swim-jig to shame.  With little or no weight, it can be fished much slower than any jig, and hardly any bass can pass up an easy meal of a tasty crawfish, even if they are crammed full or just not in the mood to chase anything.  Especially with no weight, and only the slender line protruding from the nose of this bait, it looks and swims more like a real crawfish than anything you can throw.

Mann’s Hard Nose series not only solves the oldest and most frustrating slippage problem of plastic baits, they open up a whole new world of weightless presentation possibilities.