But Honey, I only new a few new lures!

There are more tackle boxes in my basement storeroom that any sane angler needs. Every one of them is almost overflowing with fishing lures, so why should I need more?

It's a bit like fishing and hunting books. A man can never have too many good books, and I'm as guilty of buying more than I will probably ever have time to read.

Big, Heavy tackle boxes

There are four huge tackle boxes filled just with muskie plugs, and a smaller one that holds some smaller muskie lures. I've got some 10-inch muskie plugs and great huge spinnerbaits in the big boxes. However, every year I see someone with a Bobbie or Eddie bait or a Suick of a color I haven’t seen before.

It doesn't mean that the other guy's’ oddly colored Suick hasn't worked for him. It could, and there I'd be without one of that strange colors that everyone needs to own but seldom do. On the water, and needing something specific, is a bad spot to be in.

There are two more beastly huge tackle boxes filled with nothing but salmon spoons and big plugs. I own most colors of J-Plugs, Dardevle, Silver Streaks and other fishing spoons, but I keep bumping into newer sizes with different paint and  tape patterns that seem to beckon to me with eyes that look deep into mine and seem to whisper "Buy me!"

The eyes have it. I've been adding stick-on eyes to my lures for many years, and now more and more lures are being made with prominent and well-colored eyes. I think eyes make lures more appealing to fish.

Herring Dodgers are heavy as well

OK, how about Herring Dodgers? I have two smaller boxes filled with them. There are red ones, white and yellow ones, chrome plated, some home-painted a dull black color (don't laugh because they work ... sometimes), half silver-half bronze, chartreuse models, and some with dazzling tape and some without. There are small ones, large ones, those of normal size, and Hoochies, got me some of them too.

If we're going after lake trout I tote 50-60 different sizes, shapes and colors of cowbells and perhaps half that many different colors of P-nuts. Another tackle box is filled with various trolling weights for inland trout lakes, and some stainless steel needles to sew shiners onto my hook.

Dardevles are my lure of choice for pike

One tackle box is loaded with more Dardevles in a variety of colors although my best pike fishing comes with two color combinations -- red with a white stripe and silver back or yellow with five red diamonds and a brass back. There are other pike spoons and plugs in the box, and although most of my largest pike come on the two colors noted above, there are another two dozen other patterns for when the pike get picky.

Oh my, I almost forgot. One box is filled with body baits like Rapalas, Rebels, FasTracs, Long A Bombers and other similar lures. They too are in an infinite variety of colors, and some have never been in the water but boy, do they look pretty.

Still another box is filled with wood FlatFish and Tadpollys from my guiding days when I used the dropback method on the Manistee River below Tippy Dam or when trolling Manistee, Pentwater or Pere Marquette lakes for late-fall steelhead. The FlatFish come in two varieties: those with the tiny treble gang hooks or with two larger hooks. In that box are the hook hangers for the small trebles that I prefer.

I'm a big fan of vertical jigging on the Detroit, Saginaw and Tittabawassee rivers, and there are two heavy tackle boxes filled with jigs from 1/8 to 1 ounce depending on the depth of water and current speed at each location. Half of one box is filled with oodles of grub bodies and twister-tail bodies.

And as nice as freshly painted jigs look in their trays, I often scrape the paint off and use just the bare lead and a lip-hooked minnow. It works!

Wanigas Fly Shop

One small box holds nothing but Mepps spinners, and another holds nothing but weight-forward spinners like Erie Dearies for Lake Erie walleyes. Another small box is nothing special except it contains lures purchased when I was 15-17 years old at the Wanigas Fly Shop near Saginaw, Michigan. The shop was owned by Art Neumann, a co-founder of Trout Unlimited, and it holds a bunch of small trout-size spoons that are never seen these days exception in a lure collection.

Then there are some collectible Heddon lures that I normally leave home, and other scarce Creek Chub Pikie minnows, etc. And did I mention two small boxes of ice fishing lures?

So, do I really need several more lures? Probably not, but once one or two new lures catch my eye, I go into a feeding frenzy until I have them. Many times, after such a cabin-fever purchase, I try the lure and take a dislike to its action, color or lack of fishing-catching ability.

Someone once told me that fishing lures catch more anglers than fish, and I suspect that is true. However, gazing upon tray after tray of various colors and sizes of lures makes me feel good.

So, why not, honey? All I need is two or three more muskie plugs at 20 bucks a pop.

TITLE: But Honey, I only need a few new lures! ((tags: Art Neumann, Bobbie Bait, books, Creek Chub Pikie Minnow, Dardevle,  Dave Richey, Detroit River, Eddie Bait, Erie Dearies, FasTrac, feeding frenzy, fishing lures, FlatFish, Heddon, Herring Dodgers, J-Plugs, Lake Erie, Long-A Bomber, Mepps spinners, Michigan, muskie, northern pike, Pentwater River, Pere Marquette River, Saginaw, Saginaw River, steelhead, Silver Streak, suick, tackle boxes, Tadpollys, Tittabawassee River, Tippy Dam, Trout Unlimited, Wanigas Fly Shop, walleyes))

Posted via email from Dave Richey Outdoors