Muskie Baits That Burn

In other words, they developed their own variations. Johnson is a Harasser man and a burner of small bucks when the situation demands. Slow and methodical when necessary, high and fast when the conditions are right. When he fishes bucktails he is simply the “Johnson version” of the Windels system.

But everyone who fished with Windels, everyone who was there with this group of pioneers, agrees: No one covered water faster than Mark Windels, the master.

The French Blade Phenomenon

Down the road a few years, the small French-bladed Blue Fox Musky Buck went up against larger bucktails—including the Harasser—as an easy-to-burn bucktail that anyone could handle. Even as the industry trend went toward larger “big fish” bucks like the Eagle Tail, the lightweight Musky Buck held its own as a fish producer. Because it was so easy to fish and so easy to burn, you might say that the Musky Buck brought the speed-buck system to a larger muskie crowd.

Other things were happening. About a dozen years ago, my friend Al Jacobson expanded his lure-making operation beyond jigs and flies. He asked me to give him my specs for the ideal in-line bucktail. We decided that three factors—retrieve speed, castability, and hooking ability—were vital. The Jacobson Frenchie was born, sporting a #7 French blade and two 3/0 round-bend treble hooks, sparsely hair-tied on the wire, not on the hook.

At first it was just a few friends who used the Frenchie. Then—because the Frenchies were so easy to burn and were such good hookers—they, too, caught on. Again, an article in In-Fisherman in the late 1990s spurred this trend.

Frenchies have been particularly popular with tournament anglers, but the system flat works for big fish, too. Jacobsen continues to sell Frenchies direct. “We have sheets we send to folks who inquire. They prepay and we build them from their pick of blades, weight, hair color, and so on,” he says. “The Frenchies are pretty much custom-built.”

More Speed Bucks

At about the same time, Bruce Shumway created his Funky Chicken for use on Wisconsin lakes near his home in Hayward. Shumway’s bucktail has the same #7 French blade, but with marabou and hackle feathers instead of deer hair. Like the Frenchie, the body material is tied on the wire so the hook bite isn’t compromised with thread, feathers, and glue. This is a critical aspect for great hooking—and it’s important in castability, too. The marabou flattens like the hair on a rodent just out of the water, so it casts like a bullet. But in the water, behind a spinning blade, the marabou has bulk and gives the appearance of breathing.

Shumway makes a range of in-lines, including the original double-bladed Flashers, Giant Flashers, and a downsized Flasher called the Little Giant that qualifies as the speed buck of what might be called the bruiser group. The Little Giant Flasher has two #7 Colorado blades, a half flashabou, and a half-marabou body. “We call that one the Screamer because we can pull it faster,” he says. Then he laughs: “Believe it or not, two #7 Colorado blades are now considered downsizing.” The Screamer was my most productive speed bucktail during the 2007 season.