Zoom’s Trick Worm still going strong, catching bass after bass
In late October, an out-of-state bass angler visiting Keith’s Toledo Bend Tackle near Hemphill, Texas, asked the owner if there was a new artificial lure worth a try before fishing a bass club tournament at nearby Lake Sam Rayburn.
Keith Nabours thought about it a few minutes, then said he tells customers who really want to catch bass to fish an oldie but goldie — a Zoom Trick Worm in redbug color. Hundreds and hundreds of anglers have been sold on the soft-plastic worm over the years, hooked on it, you might say, just like the bass they target.
Charlie King of Coushatta, La., a town 45 miles south of Shreveport on US 71, knows first-hand what Nabours was talking about. He has been catching bass consistently on a redbug Trick Worm.
King, who runs Charlie King Professional Fishing, started guiding part-time in 1991 and went full-time after he retired as a registered nurse in 2014. He has fished FLW and BASS tournaments circuits off and on for 30 years, and he’s been relying on redbug Trick Worms since 2008.
Zoom Bait Co. introduced the Trick Worm in 1981. It was the first straight-tail, high-floating, super-soft plastic worm for fishing shallow water.
Why is it so effective?
King, 69, laughed and said, “Ha ha. Lord, I don’t know. It doesn’t resemble anything. It’s a straight-tail worm with a skinny profile.”
A pro talked it up
King said he got a heads up on it about 15 years ago when he was fishing the same bass tournaments as pro Harold Allen from Shelbyville, Texas. Allen was doing well — “On a roll,” King said — and he’d talk about the reason behind his success on stage: fishing a Trick Worm.
“Nobody ever picked up on it,” King said. “One day, about 10, 12 years ago, I was struggling. I said, ‘Hell, I might need to try one.’ I picked one up and started throwing it, and it’s worked for me ever since. It was all because Harold Allen talked about it years ago.
“That bait’s been a killer for me in eastern Texas and northwest Louisiana. I throw it 90% of the time. I go to a Senko most of the time in the spring, but I still throw a redbug Trick Worm.”
Keeping it locked in his hand has been rewarding in more ways than monetary.
“I’ve caught a lot of big fish on that,” he said.
The biggest? He caught a hawg that weighed almost 11 pounds in August 2013 at Toledo Bend and another 8.49-pound fish in June 2017 at Lake Bisteneau.
Quality and quantity
During the Bob Sealy Big Bass Splash in October on Lake Sam Rayburn, King’s redbug Trick Worm accounted for 61 bass, the biggest being 2.81 pounds.
“I fished them until I ran out of a couple bags,” he said.
Of course, it’s a staple whenever he has a guide trip. King has found different ways to catch bass on it: Texas-rigged, Carolina-rigged, wacky rigged, punching grass and even probing deep or shallow brush at Lake Sam Rayburn and Toledo Bend.
“It gets through brush easier and faster,” he said.
Much of the time, King fishes a Trick Worm Texas-rigged under a ¼-ounce worm weight that he pegs. When he wants to fish it in brush tops, he’ll use a ½-ounce worm weight, also pegged in Texas-rigged fashion.
King, has found that a Trick Worm triggers more strikes than a larger, flashier curlytail plastic worm, which sometimes hangs up when the tail wraps around a limb.
“It’s more of a finesse worm. It’s a real versatile bait. Like I say, it has year-round appeal. It’ll fish shallow, it’ll fish deep and it’ll fish in-between,” he said.
Nabours, Allen and King, among many, many others, know what it can do.
Be the first to comment