jigs

[JB]

Probably going to "bait" pnj on this on, so here goes....Bass jigs come in all sizes, but most range from 1/4 ounce up to 3/4 ounce. They can be dressed with hair, feathers, silicone rubber or other materials.
When I was an enthusiastic young bass fisherman, there was only one thing to put on the end of your jig, and that was the Uncle Josh pork rind. The pork rind - cut into frogs, eels, twin-tails, lizards or other such shapes - gave the jig a flowing, life-like look and feel as it moved through the water. The pork, stored in little jars of brine, tended to make big messes in a tackle box, but no serious bass fisherman would go out without his favorite varieties of pork bait, especially in the winter.
When soft plastics came along, many anglers switched to putting plastic frogs or crawfish or twin-tails on their jigs. The debate raged for several years as to which was better, pork or plastic. I've caught a lot of bass on both, so I won't take sides. But I would recommend keeping both on hand, because there are times when switching from plastic to pork, or vice versa, has seemed to make all the difference in fishing success.
Jig-and-pork or jig-and-plastic baits are good at any time of the year, but they really shine in midwinter, when lots of other techniques aren't working. If you can find bass on deep-water points or humps, around submerged creek channel edges, or around brushpiles anchored in deep water, then a bass jig is usually the best tool for catching them.
The basic jig-fishing technique is pretty much like fishing a Texas-rigged plastic worm. It's a slow raise and drop of the rod tip, done while maintaining just enough line tension to feel what the bait is doing, but trying to avoid interfering with the bait's natural falling action.
But there are variations. I once had a bassin' buddy (coulda been pnj, but who the hell knows lol) tell me the secret to his wintertime jigging success. According to him. The idea was to try to move his jigs as many times as he could without actually moving them more than a foot in distance. He wanted the jig to quiver, shake and jump - making it appear alive - while letting it stay in the same place as long as possible.
I tried to emulate his technique, and I'll vouch for it: It works. I especially like it when fishing around deep-water brushpiles, or along the tops of submerged points or ridges.
Most fishermen tend to use heavier line and stiffer rods for jig-fishing. My advice is still to use as light a line as you can, but use a rod with a stiff spine that gives you some hook-setting power. Your line, of course, will need to be strong enough to withstand a good hookset, so you can't use the same kind of line that you'd pick for fishing finesse baits on spinning tackle.