I suppose a better name for this piece would be “The lures of bass fishing” — plural instead of singular. Anybody who has ever gotten serious about their bass fishing fully understands what I mean when I say plural is more applicable; in fact, it’s a gross understatement.

When I first got into bass fishing as a high school kid, my tackle box consisted of a metal container about the size of a small shoebox with a dozen lures and a few additional accessories. I actually caught bass with that meager stash, but over time I saw the need to add to my arsenal, and to make matters worse, new lures were continually coming into the market, and I had to have one.

To this day, I am still a dedicated bass fisherman, and I try to stay up with all the new lures, equipment, and new techniques, but I must admit it can be a real challenge, especially when it comes to adding to an already profuse lure collection. I pity the poor guy who is just getting into bass fishing these days and is faced with the task of selecting the “right” lures to launch his fishing success. You know what I mean if you are not a fisherman and you walk into a Bass Pro/Cabela’s or even one of our smaller local tackle dealers and begin scanning the racks of lures available today, even if you’re a fisherman it’s still overwhelming at times.

Just about the time, I think I have all the lures I need, and I think I’ve given all the new techniques and presentations a fair trial something new comes along. I remember years ago, I worked hard at trying to master the various plastic worm presentations, you know, the Carolina Rig and the Texas Rig. After finally reaching a level of reasonable success along came a new soft plastic worm and a new way of fishing it-the “wacky worm.” It didn’t make sense that all you had to do was run a hook through the middle of a plastic worm, let both ends hang down and pitch it out and let it sink, but it really caught fish; needless to say a new batch of lures was added to my collection.

Of course, every time I think I’ve “caught up” to all the new lures and techniques, I find I have more work to do. I thought I had all the names of all the categories of lures figured out, and then I got my Bass Pro/Cabela’s catalog the other day, guess what — more new lures and categories. After finally comprehending the meaning of in-line spinners, spinnerbaits, weight-forward spinners, buzzbaits, stickbaits, propbaits, jerkbaits, crawlers, chuggers, crankbaits, minnow plugs, vibrating lib-less plugs and a number of others, along comes walkbaits, swimbaits, weedless chatterbaits and more.

While all this lure stuff can be frustrating at times, I’ve found the best way to approach all of this is to simplify and not be overly concerned with names and categories. When it comes right down to it, the bottom line is you need to be able to present lures from top to bottom using various presentations. You need to be able to work the surface; you must also be able to work-appropriate lures between the surface and the bottom, and finally, you need to be able to work the bottom as well. There are a multitude of lures that can bring success in all three of those areas, and I hope to delve into those choices in the weeks to come. With the dawn of another bass season upon us over the next several weeks, I plan to look more closely into each of these categories and hopefully shed some light on what is needed to put some bass on the business end.