Favorite fall lures of the Pro's

 Legendary NY surfcaster Al Bentsen, Surf Guide Bill Wetzel and Sharpie Lou DeRicco Talk about their favorite lure

This article originally appeared in the Fisherman Magazine,

Did you notice just how many new wood, rubber or plastic lures have hit the market in just the last few years? Never in the history of our sport did the surfcaster have as many choices in shapes, colors and sizes from a myriad of builders than today. Do they all catch fish at some time? Probably. I have often said that a table spoon with a hook attached and thrown into the blitz might be as effective as any other lure under those conditions. What I really want to know is what the “pros” are using. Am I guilty of curiosity? You bet! More specifically, what I wanted to know is what three lures excluding bucktails and rubber shads they would not dream of hitting a beach without during the fall run.

In search of answers, I turned to three anglers who are very well respected in the surfcasting community. Lou DeRicco spends a lot of time on the beaches of the western South Shore and Jamaica Bay . Over the years, he has consistently placed among the top 5 anglers in the NY Surf Fishing contest. Al Bentsen has probably forgotten more that most of us will ever learn. He is considered one of the premier surfcasters on the east coast and a rigged eel fisherman extraordinaire, Al spends a lot of time these days plugging the marshes of the back bays. Bill “Bucktail” Wetzel is respected as much for his knowledge as he is for his passion when it comes to his pursuit of stripers. If you don’t get an itch to go fishing after listening to him speak at one of his seminars, there might be a boat in your future. Here is a peek into their surf bags: their three favorite lures they “don’t leave home without it”

Bill Wetzel

“This is a tough question indeed, as there are endless conditions to fish in the Fall. Back bays, North Shore , South Shore , changing bait patterns, big winds, big water, calm water…..you get the point. In an effort to break it down a little, I will describe plugs I would use during the Fall run in Montauk. Before I get into them, the reader needs to realize that there are basically three fall runs in Montauk: September to Mid October, Mid October to the end of November, and the end of November into December.  With water temps cooling, and winds predominately out of the North or North West , the arrival and departure of several different kinds of baitfish takes place during this period.

My first choice would be the ultimate Montauk plug: the Super Strike 2 3/8 yellow darter. This is a plug that imitates many of the larger baits that move in and out of the suds in the Fall. There is always current to be found in Montauk, which makes the darter especially deadly as it is fished most effectively by swimming it against a current. However, I will let you in on a little secret. You do not need current to fish this plug. Sharp rod tip jerks combined with a slightly faster retrieve will produce some amazing results in slack water as well. This plug digs into the water really well, which makes it a good choice for moderate to rough surf. For more dig, I change hook sizes by placing a larger 4/0 treble in the front and a smaller (3/0) in the rear. The zig-zag swim action of the darter allows me to cover more water per cast than most other plugs. All Super Strike plugs are plastic and are the most consistent surf plugs on the market. When you throw one out there you know it is going to swim. For all these reasons the Super Strike darter is my first choice.

It took a little time to think about my second choice, because I love throwing metal lips, but perhaps there is no better big water plug than the yellow 2 oz Gibbs bottle plug. Many of you hard-core surf rats reading this may disagree, but consider this: the 2oz bottle plug will out-cast a darter, a metal lip, or a 3oz bottle plug. When you are fishing 30-40 knot winds with huge current this is one of the few plugs with a big profile that will get you out where you need to be and hold the water long enough for something to see it. This is not to say that you need big nasty water to fish this plug, but if you get into “big and nasty,” you will be able to fish it. Why yellow again? I am not a big color guy, but yellow is perhaps the most versatile color there is, and I have caught stripers under almost all conditions with this color.

My third choice, Super Strike 1 ¾ oz green needlefish, is the most versatile plug in my bag, and you will rarely if ever catch me without one while fishing the suds at Montauk. You can drag it along a sandy bottom, make a nice V wake on the surface in rocky areas, use it as a pencil popper when you need a thinner profile, and you can load up the rear chamber with additional weight of your choosing. I use 12 gauge lead shot to load them. Believe me it will cut through the wind like a knife, or get you down deep. So there you have it. Two big profile baits and one thinner bait that will enable me to fish all water columns. That was tough!  But don’t forget…….I still love my bucktails!”

Al Bentsen

“Three plugs that I count on the most in the Fall? Well that’s easy for me because I only carry three different plugs when I fish. You see, unlike Bill, I don't fish all over Long Island . Over the course of a season, I like to fish no further than 30 minutes from my home. I live in Freeport and that puts me geographically between Fire Island and Rockaway beach and of course all the bays in between. I prefer fishing in the back bays because there is never a night I can't fish. In any wind, any tide, any high water condition, I can always find a comfortable, productive spot to fish. I only fish at night between dusk and dawn. Let’s get down to the wood! I only fish Beachmaster plugs. They are made by two expert surf fishermen who have specifically designed them for action, castability and durability.  The first plug and the one I fish the most is their Atom Junior swimmer. It carries two hooks, one in the belly and one in the tail. I use a 5/0 treble in the belly and a 7/0 Siwash in the tail with some bucktail tied on it. It's an underwater swimmer and depending on the speed of your retrieve, it goes from one to three feet down. Since all my plugs have a split ring with a swivel up front to tie to I don't change plugs too often. I haven't used a color on this plug that didn't work. The first one I bought years ago was yellow and on that plug I must have taken a couple of hundred bass. Then one night a boat crossed my line and cut it off! I also like to use brown. This is a very hard color to find because fishermen don't buy dull looking plugs. The color isn't attractive enough for them. I find that brown prolongs the catching ability of the plug into daylight hours when bass usually turn off other colors at first light. The action on this plug is serpentine.  It swims like a snake rigged with the size hooks the way I described.  I use a slow retrieve on this plug.

The second plug is the Beachmaster Eely, a jointed plug that's a smaller version of the giant Cheek Chub Jointed Pikie. Several years ago, I had to send away to a tackle shop in Connecticut to get several of these plugs. I do not know when they are planning to manufacture this plug again. The Eely Plug has a lot of action although it doesn't swim like an eel or anything in the ocean but the bass love it. It does a jitter bug when you reel it in. It's a surface swimmer and like all surface swimmers it extends your fishing time from before dark into daylight hours. Of course it works well at night. The big plus is that because it is a surface swimmer, it isn't prone to gather a lot of weed on the retrieve. I always use this plug or the Danny plug described below when a lot of weed is around. My most memorable catch on this plug was a big blue I estimated at about 23 pounds. He was an easy release so back he went. The color I use is black with 3/0 treble hooks and I use a slow retrieve.

The third plug is the Beachmaster Danny plug. I don't know why but the color I prefer is white. This plug is almost weed-less because it swims on or near the surface. It also has the ability to extend your fishing time into day light hours. When there is a lot of weed, I will use this or the Eely during the night time hours. Again I use a slow retrieve on this plug. I use two 4/0 hooks in the belly and a 7/0 Siwash with buck tail on the tail. All of these plugs weigh between 2 and 2 1/2 ounces and I fish them all with conventional tackle”

Lou DeRicco

“What are my three favorite artificial lures to use during the fall run? That should be pretty easy. Anyone who has fished with me knows that my all-around favorite has long been a white bucktail and more recently a paddle tail shad body. But those two are excluded from this discussion which focuses on plugs. Well, on Cape Cod , the black and purple needlefish is without question the most deadly single lure that I fish.  In Montauk you would never see me carry a bag that did not have at least one or two yellow darters in it. But these two plugs must also be excluded because this discussion concerns the plugs I fish in my home waters of western Long Island ’s South Shore . All hardcore surfcasters know that there are a tremendous number of variables that influence the choice of what lure to use. The most important of these is bait. In the western part of Long Island , the surfcaster’s two key bait migrations are mullet and peanut bunker. Don’t get me wrong!  Adult bunker, herring, bay anchovies and a host of other baits are also terribly important. Heck, the most memorable experience of my life as a surfcaster centered around giant schools of anchovies. All things being equal, mullet in September and peanut bunker in October, November and December are the baits that normally migrate tight to the beach and are often within casting distance: a surfcasters dream! During the mullet run, the western part of the South Shore is the place to be. All the mullet, from all Long Island inlets head west along the beach, so we see a lot of bait and a lot of fish. When mullet are in the wash I always carry two 1 ½ ounce Super Strike, blue-over-white, floating Little Neck poppers. I have had days when other lures or other colors were more productive but for consistency, castability and general effectiveness, this lure can’t be beat.

When peanut bunker are around, there are a myriad of lures that can be successful but a yellow Gibbs pencil popper is one plug that has always been a reliable producer for me. Again, I have had many days when other plugs were more effective but the yellow pencil popper, whether cast by me or other surfcasters, has often out-produced other plugs. I believe that the ”walk the dog” action of the small pencil is close to the action of an injured peanut bunker yet different enough to attract the attention of the predator away from a massive school of baitfish.

My final favorite has to be a Kastmaster. Although it is not really a plug, it is still a lure that every plugger must have in their arsenal. In fact, I carry three in every surf bag I own. It is an excellent casting lure and can be worked fast or slow. It can be fished in the entire water column or even dragged on the bottom. In addition, it can be used to imitate several different types of baits. This lure is also durable, easy to dislodge from a hooked fish and generally does not injure the fish when hooked. I will use a Kastmaster both when no fish are visible and when they are blitzing all over the place. In my experience, it’s the best of all tins and I consider it one of the best lures I own, period. “