Story by Corey Casey | Photos by Tanner & Travis Lyons
Summer is approaching, the water is warming, and the topwater bite is heating up! Over the next five weeks I will be highlighting a different topwater lure each time—what it does, when to throw it, and how to fish it correctly. I will cover the five main styles of topwater lures: buzzbaits, poppers, walking baits, hollow-body frogs, and prop baits.
Let’s start with one of my all-time favorites, the buzzbait!
I was introduced to the buzzbait completely by accident at the age of 14. It was a spring break morning on the Cooper River. My dad dropped me and my 14-foot johnboat at Cypress Gardens boat ramp just at daylight on his way to work. I had a bucket of minnows, a tackle box, and a few rods and reels. He would pick me up on his way home from work at 5:20 p.m., we would clean my catch and do it all over again the next day.
I remember it was around 9:00 a.m. with bright sunny skies and no wind at all. I had already caught a few small crappie and bass on minnows. Until this day, I had never thrown an artificial lure for bass before. As I was anchored and watching my minnow rods for a bite, I started to notice lots of surface action. I was smart enough to know that they weren’t all bass but also was intrigued enough to start digging around in my dad’s tackle box to look for a topwater lure. I had plenty of experience fishing topwater lures for stripers growing up.
Laying in the top row of the tackle box was a chartreuse and white buzz bait with a silver blade. Although I had never fished with a buzzbait, I had seen it on TV and knew what I was supposed to do, so I tied it on and began casting it to the shoreline. Within 10 minutes there was a massive explosion on the lure. It startled me and I ripped it away too quickly. Without hesitation I cast to the same exact spot, and BOOM! another massive explosion.
This time she was hooked, and the fight was on! Eventually I landed this monster bass, tossed her in the cooler, and couldn’t wait to show my dad. He was just as excited as I was! We got to the house and immediately weighed it — 7 pounds, 10 ounces!
It was my biggest bass for several years.
Today—a couple of decades later—I’m a full-time fishing guide and tournament angler, and it seems I always have a buzz bait tied on and ready to cast at any moment, no matter where I am. I’ve caught countless big bass on a buzzbait and many very important tournament fish. I feel very confident when throwing one.
A buzzbait triggers the most aggressive reaction strikes of any bait on the market and it consistently catches big, aggressive bass.
The buzzbait is a simple cast-and-wind-style bait. Make your cast near cover such as grass edges, laydowns, riprap banks, or docks. Keep a steady retrieve and maintain a constant speed so the blade keeps buzzing on the surface. Once the bite happens, just keep reeling until you feel the weight of the fish and then set the hook and hold on! It’s basically that easy.
I use just two colors in my buzzbait fishing—white and black. Sometimes I use skirted models, and sometimes I replace the skirt with a toad-style soft plastic bait like the Zoom Horny Toad. Both work, but the Horny Toad version can be skipped under docks and overhangs while the skirted buzzbait cannot, so I tend to prefer putting a toad on my buzzbaits.
When you make your cast—past where you think the fish is, when possible—start cranking immediately and get the lure sputtering on the surface. A lot of my strikes come within the first few cranks on my reel handle.
I like to fish a buzzbait on a medium-heavy rod—about 7 feet long—a high-speed baitcasting reel (7:1 gear ratio), and 30- to 40-pound test braided line. The line doesn’t even touch the water during the retrieve, so you can get away with heavy line.
I go into much more detail about my buzzbait fishing in this video, so give it a watch.
And, as always, if you’re interested in learning more about fishing, follow my social media or give me a call and let’s get on the water!
Corey Casey – Angler Profile
