HomeFeaturesThe Versatile Salt Flicker – with Bobby Myers 11/15/2011 – Much is written about what specific baits to use for specific conditions. A spinnerbait is good for windy or dirty conditions. A jig is excellent for flipping shallow cover or fishing on offshore structure. Each type of crankbait has specific sets of environmental factors that make it better and heavy tungsten sinkers with plastic creatures and craws are tailor made for matted grass. While so many modern bass pros talk of keeping things simple, their tackle boxes more closely resemble a puzzle needing complex algorithm to solve. Are there any lure available today that the everyday angler can use in several situations? Is there a lure that can be used in a variety of ways and catch fish in all of them. Bassmaster Open pro Bobby Myers from Tulsa, Okla. said there is. Myers said the most versatile bait in his arsenal is the Gene Larew Salt Flicker. The Salt Flicker is a lure that resembles popular lures on the market today, but also looks completely different, and it can be used in a variety of ways. “I can use the Salt Flicker in so many different ways,” said Myers. “From shallow water, to deep water, and it just requires a little creativity to make it one of the most versatile fish catchers in the boat.” Salt Flicker? What is the Salt Flicker? It is a soft plastic creation from the folks at the Gene Larew Lure Company. The Slat Flicker looks like a soft plastic stickbait mated with a Biffle Bug and an alien at the same time. The result of their union is the Salt Flicker; a soft stickbait with appendages and heavy ribbing on the bottom to stir up silt. “Most people see the Salt Flicker and kind of give it a funny look at first,” said Myers. “When they see it in the water, they tend to light up with all of the possibilities a lure like this presents.” Flicker Gear Myers uses the same setup for his Salt Flicker regardless of the technique he is going to use with it. He starts with a Power Tackle PT104 casting rod which he pairs with a Lew’s Speed Spool Tournament Pro casting reel with 7.1:1 retrieve speed. He bases his line choice on what he is fishing; both in the style as well as the type of cover he is targeting. He always uses Gamma Edge Fluorocarbon, and his choice of sizes ranges from 14 to 20-pound test. “I’ll use the lighter lines if I am fishing sparse cover,” he said. “But, if I get around rocks, heavy wood or docks, I increase my line size.” He prefers to use an offset shank, round bend worm hook on the Flicker because, “it has the right geometry for penetrating on a hookset,” he said. “The hook point rides higher than the line tie so I know I will get penetration; even on a long cast.” Weightless Flicker Like other soft plastic stickbaits, the Salt Flicker can be deadly when rigged weightless and allowed to fall on semi slack line around cover. Myers said that he likes to pitch it around grass edges, laydown logs and dock posts and allow it to fall on a semi slack line. The advantage of the Flicker is that it has a heavier weight, which is beneficial for someone like Myers, who suffers from fishing ADHD. “I have to admit that I’m not a very patient angler; I prefer to be moving around looking for bites,” he said. “The heavier weight of the Salt Flicker comes from its heavy Gene Larew salt content, and it gets to the bottom faster.” One additional benefit of the Salt Flicker’s weight is that it skips well. Myers said that the lure does well when anglers try to skip it under docks and overhangs. The Flicker’s weight carries it farther back into the cover and allows him to target bass in areas other soft stickbaits won’t go. Carolina Flicker Myers said that the Flicker is excellent on a Carolina Rig. “The appendages on the lure give it some great action even though it is a straight piece of plastic,” he said. “It also tends to fall quicker on the Carolina Rig and create additional disturbance on the bottom; which creates strikes as well.” The heavy ribbing on the bottom of the Flicker is designed to stir up silt on sandy or muddy bottoms, and when tossed on a Carolina Rig; it does the job he wants it to do. Plus, he said he gets added action out of the appendages on the side. Heavy Shakin’ The Salt Flicker is one of Myers’ favorites on a heavy, football styled Shaking Head as well. But, because of its bulk, he cautions anglers not to think of it as a finesse rig. “This isn’t the typical light line Shaky fishing,” said Myers. “Find a head that has a heavier hook and fish it much like you would a jig, or a Texas Rigged worm; they’ll crush it.” Buggin’ Tommy Biffle made Bottom Buggin’ a household name when he used it to win the Bassmaster Elite Series Sooner Run on Fort Gibson Lake in Oklahoma. While Biffle was throwing the Gene Larew Biffle Bug on a Tommy Biffle Hard Head, the Salt Flicker works with the head as well. He doesn’t know how to describe it fully, but Myers said the Bottom Buggin’ technique with the Salt Flicker gives anglers a totally different look. “I still get a lot of action out of the appendages, but the overall presentation is bigger,” he said. “This really gives me a new bait that increases the size of the bites I get after using the Biffle Bug through a school of fish.” A Fallback Bait While he isn’t the most patient angler, Myers has found that there are times when he has to slow down. One of those is on his home lake; Grand Lake O’ the Cherokees, in Oklahoma. He said that after a tournament; or towards the end of a long event, bass at Grand Lake can get wary of heavy jigs or even crankbaits that bang across the bottom. The Salt Flicker gives him a tool to combat that occurrence. “The bass at Grand; and other lakes for that matter, will suspend off the bottom over points when they get pressured,” he said. “They may not have left the area they were the day before, but they will not chase crankbaits, and they won’t go to the bottom to eat a jig. The weightless Salt Flicker falls in front of them and they will still eat it. “It has become one of my most versatile lures, I can catch bass with it a lot of different ways.”
