Spinners, Floaters and Attractors

Beads

Plastic beads—Best choices come in metric sizes (2, 21⁄2, 3, 31⁄2, and 4 mm) or in 3/32, 1/8, 5/32, and 3/16 inches. Use small beads as attractors ahead of the hook on livebait snells, or for spacing between the hook and clevis on the tiniest spinner rigs. Larger beads add color, profile, and work best for spacing components on spinner rigs. Don’t let the blade overlap the hook, which inhibits a good hookset. (Spinning bright silver blades also reflect bead color.) Carry a wide selection of sizes and colors to match local preferences or to imitate forage types (orange and green to imitate perch, white and blue to resemble smelt). Northland’s new large-diameter Buck-Shot Rattle Beads add color, sound, vibration, and flotation to homemade or pretied snells. New Products Corporation packages beads in a handy plastic tube.

Snaps, Swivels, And Stops

Barrel swivels—#10 or #12, most often used to tie slipsinker livebait snells. A swivel prevents a sliding sinker from slipping down the line to the hook. It also creates slip three-way rigs or can be tied inline to reduce line twist.

Three-way swivels—#8, #7, or #6, for fishing three-way rigs with livebait snells, spinner snells, floater snells, crankbaits, or flutterspoons.

Snaps and snap swivels—#2 or #3 snaps. Use plain snaps for most applications; use snap swivels when line twist is a problem. Also use them for attaching and changing drop sinkers without retying. Snap swivels usually are designated by swivel size, not snap size. For example, a #2 snap and #10 snap swivel might have the same size snap, and sizes vary slightly by manufacturer. Berkley and Sampo probably dominate the upper end of the swivel market, though many imports are available, and a few specialized clips have their applications.

Lindy-Little Joe Swivel Clip—Quick attachment for snells with looped ends.

Berkley Not-a-Knot Fastener—For easy attachment to monofilament without tying a knot, or as a dependable attachment for superlines requiring special knots. Available on barrel swivels and snap swivels, too.

Split rings—#0 or #1, sometimes substituted for barrel swivels in livebait rigs. Split ring pliers help detach rings.

Bobber stops—Neoprene or string bobber stops create adjustable-length livebait snells and position beads and spinners a set distance ahead of a trailing livebait hook. A spinner-leech rig, like the Gopher Tackle Joe Fellegy Mille Lacs Long-Line Spinner, works best with the single hook positioned about 23⁄4 inches behind the beads, rather than tight against them. Don’t know why, but the walleyes do.

Line

Extra spools of 4- through 12-pound-test monofilament line, typically thin diameter and limp like Stren Magnathin, permit livebait to move naturally on slipsinker rigging. If you retie lots of long livebait rigs during a day’s fishing, use line off the extra spools instead of off your reel, to prevent your reel spool from emptying quickly. For spinner rigs, use a tougher, more abrasion-resistant line like Trilene XT, perhaps as heavy as 12- to 17-pound test, unless subtlety and lighter line are required. If so, check line wear from the clevis and retie often.

Attractors

Attractors are available in many shapes and sizes, though they can be separated into several broad categories.

Floating jigheads—Originated with foam heads, moving on to cork, hollow soft plastic, and other variations. Northland Fishing Tackle’s Phelps Floater is a small soft-bodied floater. System Tackle’s Bandit and Rattling Bandit are larger. Lindy-Little Joe’s Floating Fuzz-E-Grub floats high, perhaps the largest common walleye float on the market. Stinger Tackle offers weedless Bohn Head floating heads.