When I first started bass fishing I went kind of nuts and bought every type of lure under the sun. I had too many lures and didn’t give each one enough time until I decided to slow down and really find out which lures were the easiest lures for catching fish. Below you’ll find my list of easy bass fishing lures for beginners.
1. Inline Spinners
What is an Inline Spinner
The first bass fishing lure is actually a multi species lure, but it also catches bass and is easy to fish and it’s the Inline Spinner. It has treble hooks on the bottom and a blade at the top that spins when you reel it in. You can use this to catch a variety of different fish. You can fish this on ultralight rod, you can fish this on a light powered rod, even a medium powered rod. You can also fish it on almost any type of line. Monofilament, Fluorocarbon, and even braid depending on your waters. I like to fish it with mono because out of the three different types of line it has the most stretch and you’re less likely to yank the lure out of a fish’s mouth.
Yakima Bait Original Rooster Tail Inline Spinner
Buy Now Disclaimer – I use affiliate links so I can keep buying fishing and hunting gear. I get a small commission at no additional cost to you.How to fish an Inline Spinner
Fishing this is pretty easy. You just want to cast it out and reel it in. When you’re fishing it, you want to have your rod tip pointed down a little bit and start with a straight retrieve. If you struggle to get bites start varying your retrieve just make sure it’s constantly moving so the blade spins and causes a flash and causes vibrations in the water. If you do get grass on it, make sure you’re taking it off. Just like with any other bait, you want to take off any grass that you snag so that it doesn’t affect the action or presentation of your lure. It’s that easy and it’s a super fun way to cover a ton of water and to find fish. This is usually one of the first lures I throw out to find fish if I’m at a new body of water. Usually I’ll start getting hits or bites on it if the fish are there and if the conditions are right, I can start throwing other things once I land a few fish.
See also: How to start ultralight fishing
2. Square Bill Crankbaits
What is a Square Bill Crankbait
A square bill crankbait is a small fish shaped lure with two treble hooks on the bottom. At the front of the bait there is a bill that has square like edges that give it the name “square bill crankbait” These are really fun to fish because just like the inline spinner they are super easy to fish and are a great search bait. They come in a variety of sizes from really tiny ultralight square bill crankbaits to huge ones the size of a lime. Most of them stick to shallow depths, but I’ve seen some be able to go as deep as 8-10 feet. They can also be silent or loud and come in a huge assortment of colors. I recommend you start out with a shad or bluegill pattern as most places around you have baitfish that look like shad or bluegill.
Just like with the inline spinner, you want to make sure you’re using some line with some stretch so that when you do go set the hook, you’re not yanking it out of the fish’s mouth. Same kind of rod set up as before, but depending on the weight of your crankbait you might need to stick to a light powered or medium powered rod unless you’re throwing something extremely light.
Strike King KVD Square Bill 2.5 Pro-Model Crankbait
Buy Now Disclaimer – I use affiliate links so I can keep buying fishing and hunting gear. I get a small commission at no additional cost to you.How to fish a Square Bill Crankbait
Fishing a square bill is super simple, you cast it out and retrieve it. The lure is going to dive, wobble, and shake as you reel it in so let the crankbait do all the work for you. You’ll know the lure is working properly because you will feel the vibrations as it wobbles. If the vibrations stop it usually means your lure has something snagged on it like grass, sometimes you can give it a few hard twitches and shake the grass off. I like to vary my retrieves by cranking the reel a few times and then stopping so the lure floats to the top of the water for a bit or give twitch my rod lightly as I retrieve it. Essentially you want to mimic a dying baitfish.
You can reel down faster to get the bait to its maximum depth faster and then slow it down or start reeling slow to keep the lure higher in the water column. Also don’t be afraid to knock it off rocks on the bottom, the noise will attract fish. Grass will get hung up on the treble hooks, but don’t be afraid to run it right over the grass line, you might get a bass to come up from the grass and try and eat your lure.
When you set the hook, you’re going to want to lean instead of setting the hook hard like you would with a single stout hook. If you rip into the hook set you might lose the fish because the treble hooks are so small.
3. Spinnerbaits
What is a Spinnerbait
A spinnerbait is a big and shiny odd looking thing, but essentially it’s a jig with a skirt and wire and some blades. It’s an aggressive large profile lure with the purpose of attracting aggressive feeding bass. Most spinnerbaits have at least two blades on them and there are two types of blades. One kind is a Colorado Blade which is a rounded blade and spins slower. The other is a Willow Blade which spins faster. Sometimes a spinnerbait has both types of blades, but usually they come with two of the same kind.
Unlike the first two types of lures this bait has a stout hook so you’re going to want to use at least a medium power rod. I prefer a medium heavy rod, but a medium rod will work just fine as long as set the hook a little harder.
Booyah Blade SpinnerBait
Buy Now Disclaimer – I use affiliate links so I can keep buying fishing and hunting gear. I get a small commission at no additional cost to you.How to fish a Spinnerbait
Fishing a spinnerbait is super easy. All you need to do is reel it in. Same as a crankbait you can do a steady retrieve or vary your retrieve. The key is to retrieve it fast enough so that the blades spin and cause a lot of flash, vibrations, and displaces a lot of water as it swims. This is a great way to find bass especially if they are aggressively feeding because a bass will feel the vibrations and search it out even if they cannot immediately see it. If water conditions are a little bit murky or dirtier than usual this is a great bait to throw around just remember to really set the hook if you have a bit.
You can run a trailer on the end or a trailer hook. Lately I’ve been running a trailer hook lately, but you can use a curly tail grub or small swimbait or fluke.
4. Wacky Rig
What is a Wacky Rig
The last technique that I wanted to cover is super easy to fish, it’s the wacky rig. A wacky rig is a way to fish a stickbait or worm style bait on a small hook. Wacky rigs can be weightless or weighted, I personally like to use a weedless weighted wacky rig hook so I can fish the lure a little bit faster. Wacky rig rings are not necessary, but help keep your bait on the hook and makes them last longer.
VMC 1/16 oz Wacky Weedless Jig
Buy Now Disclaimer – I use affiliate links so I can keep buying fishing and hunting gear. I get a small commission at no additional cost to you.You can use any kind of stick weight that you like, any color you like, but the two colors you’re going to want to start with is green pumpkin for clear water conditions and black and blue for dark or murky water conditions.
Berkley Powerbait The General Soft Bait, 5 1/4″ Green Pumpkin, 8 Pack
Buy Now Disclaimer – I use affiliate links so I can keep buying fishing and hunting gear. I get a small commission at no additional cost to you.When it comes to rod type you can use anything from a light to a medium heavy. I throw my weighted wacky rigs on a medium heavy and have no problem at all. If I am using a weightless wacky I might throw it on a medium or even go down to a light powered rod.
How to Fish the Wacky Rig
Fishing a wacky rig work is very simple, you want to cast your lure out and let it sink to the bottom. As the lure is sinking the worm is fluttering down mimicking a dying baitfish falling to the bottom of the water column. You’ll know you’re at the bottom of your pond or lake if you pay attention to your line. As the lure falls your line will sink, once it hits the bottom the line will slow down or stop sinking all together. Once it’s at the bottom let it sit there for five to ten seconds. After five to ten seconds reel in your slack and slowly pop it back up and let it sink back down again. You’ll repeat this until you catch a fish or you have retrieved your lure.
For this lure, you’ll want to set the hook a little softer. Not a soft lean like a crankbait, but not a hard hookset like the spinnerbait. The fish will most likely hook itself if you just lift your rod tip up and reel.
4 Easy Bass Fishing Lures for Beginners
So those four techniques that you can try out as a beginner. You get a lot of good feedback from these techniques and there’s really no wrong way to fish these types of bass lures. If you end up catching a donkey tag me on instagram so I can see what you hook into!
