by Ralph Walker
Poppers, Choppers & Chuggers
by Ralph
Walker
INTRODUCTION
by Editor Nick Caine
Rippers, choppers, poppers, proppers, chuggers, ploppers …. all super
surface lures especially if the water’s not too weedy. Here, in this very
comprehensive article, (for which, very many thanks),
Ralph “The Rod” Walker, shares some of his secrets
and experiences with this exciting branch of lure-fishing on the surface. I
also must add that because of the large number of photos that accompany the
article, we’ve had to reduce their size a tad to make-sure that the page
loads reasonably quickly.
CRAZY
ALL-TIME CLASSICS
I’ve been fishing lures for a good few decades and it may seem surprising
that quite a few of my favourite surface plugs in my lure-box are pretty much
unchanged because they’re all-time classics that are just as good now
as they ever were. Of course I’ve lost all my originals and have replaced
them as needed, and seem to have ended-up with much the same selection, plus
a few newcomers, naturally.
I
used the Crazy Crawler quite a bit years ago, but in my lure-box these days
it has to take 2nd-place to that magic little plop-plop-plopping surface lure,
the Jitterbug -- I prefer the jointed versions.
PROPBAITS
Equally, when it comes to creating a big pike-attracting disturbance on the
surface, my other big favourites, the propbaits (surface
lures with one or two propellers), are equal front-runners in the
fish-catching stakes. I have to say that I much prefer twin-propbaits and of
those I reckon that the Woodchopper is “The Business” -- it has
a pair of really tough, contra-rotating, stainless-steel propellor blades that
rarely need repairing, bending or adjusting, which is more than can be said
for some of the propbaits with more feeble props.
However,
there are other occasions when I would chose a Devils Horse, or a Dying Flutter
especially if I want to be a tad more subtle, that’s if you can ever be
subtle with a surface lure. Oh, and I mustn’t forget that lovely little
propbait, the Heddon Torpedo which I also use quite a bit on certain venues
especially shallow gravel runs where trout and chub are present – they
go mad for a Torpedo.
HYBRID
SURFACE PLUGS
Heddon’s Meadow Mouse has been around for a long time and more recently
has been joined by a hybrid between it and an unjointed Arbogast Jitterbug,
to make …. the Jitter-mouse!
Another hybrid surface lure that I have fished
quite often and with a good deal of success is
the Jitterstick, or JitterProp as I prefer to call it. I guess the idea of these
hybrids is to combine the best of both styles of the surface plugs on which
they’re based and has all come-
about
with the hybridisation of top lures brands Heddon, Smithwick, Rebel, Bomber,
Arbogast etc., under the PradCo umbrella.
I reckon that it’s very difficult to say whether the theory and the practice come together with these new-fangled hybrid ideas with surface plugs, especially when most surface plugs are seen in silhouette from below, and must simply seem like noisy, shadowy surface objects, maybe imitating mice, frogs, topping bait-fish, insects or whatever – and I’m sure hungry pike or big chub aren’t too fussy about what they grab from the surface.
And that reminds me about not making one of the commonest mistakes in lure-fishing, that of striking much too soon when you’re fishing with surface lures – I usually quickly count “One two” after the initial “take”, before striking.
POPPERS & CHUGGERS
A type of surface lure that’s in a class of its own, is the popper --
worked properly, these 
lovely
lures create spurts of water in front of them during the essential jerky retrieve,
and in doing so, also make exciting popping sounds which attract the attention
of any nearby predators.
There
are many different brands of poppers including Rebel’s very obviously
named Pop-R, a magic lure by any standards. And then there’s the well-known
Hula-Popper that’s been around for ages, for the simple reason that it’s
a very effective lure.
Rapala,
not to be outdone, have also added their SkitterPop and SkitterProp surface
plugs to their range. Other classic poppers in my lure-box are a couple of Bomber
“T” plugs that have been and still are great surface catchers, although
some people might argue that these aren’t technically true surface poppers
because they tend to run back just below the surface. What the heck! Who cares?
I rate them for surface lure-fishing and I’m sure you will or do too.
Chuggers
such as the good old faithful Chug-bug are another type of surface lure that
you should have in your lure-box, ready for suitable conditions on the right
venue.
WALKING THE DOG
I kicked-off by talking about all-time classic lures and if you’re an
exponent of the “Walking the Dog” technique with surface lures,
then you won’t need me to tell you about the Zara-spook because it’s
been around longer than me and that’s saying something. If not, it’s
well 
worth a
crack – it’s a lip-less stick-bait, a bit like a mini-jerk-bait,
that you fish with a side-to-side, twitching, tugging and jerking action, so
the method must be names after a really badly-trained dog!
I have to say though that, unlike their big brothers, the jerk-baits, I’ve never had much luck with this type of surface lures and so I haven’t got much faith in them. That said, I’m sure the problem lies with the way I’m fishing with them so I really must try harder to improve my technique of “walking the dog”… but do try it for yourself, you may have better luck.
OTHER
SURFACE PLUGS
Another surface, or rather, just sub-surface lure, that I must mention because
for me many times it has lived up to its name, the Lucky 13 -- you can fish
this across the surface, or with a steadier, slightly faster retrieve, you can
make it wiggle back just below the surface. At one time, a long time back, a
Lucky 13 held my PB pike record -- enough said!
On
the other hand, many lure-anglers really rate the Bass Oreno, a surface plug
that I personally don’t favour very much -- in fact, it’s been pretty
much a dead-loss for me -- it seems to have hardly any in-built action, is quite
difficult to impart any decent action to, and most importantly has caught me
very few predators … but don’t take my word for it -- try it for
yourself, and you may have better luck.
I should also add that even the ultra-buoyant Big Alphabet plugs such as Shakespeare’s Big S can be very effective when fished slowly and jerkily across the surface: in fact, sometimes I begin to wonder if pike will grab just about anything off the surface if they’re so minded.
SPECIES
Now I wouldn’t want you to run-away with the idea that with surface lures
we’re talking solely about pike, far from it! Of course pike are the major
quarry for many lure-anglers, but when it comes to surface lures, there are
lots of other big predators that will grab your surface ploppers, choppers and
chuggers … chub & trout are also very partial to a nice Jitterbug
or Pop-R and perch even will grab surface lures usually in the summer when the
water’s water and they’re feeding off or close of the surface.
HOOKS
If there are trout in your venues, they too will snatch your little Heddon Torpedo
and similar surface lures, and they can be very hand to hook, especially with
surface lures, because they have very hard mouths -- so make sure all your surface
lures have good sharp strong but not heavyweight hooks because sadly often as
not, the original hooks supplied with many of these otherwise super surface
lures, are only fit for the dustbin -- replace them with a reputable make like
Owner, VMC, Daiichi or Gamakatsu, the latter probably being the easiest to obtain
in the UK – they may not be cheap, but to compromise on your hooks is
to compromise all your fishing.
TACKLE
The Editor has especially asked me to include “a paragraph or two”
about the tackle that I use for surface lure-fishing. Well, the most important
thing is to make-sure that your main line and trace wire are strong but not
too heavy, otherwise they will affect the action of, or even sink, some surface
lures.
My
main line is 20 lb BS braid, usually either TUF-Line or Whiplash, or if I'm
buying stuff from Cabela's I usually get a couple of spools of their Ripcord-Si.
Their shipping costs are extortionate and I get round this by asking friends
of mine in the States to buy it and mail it to me.
As for trace wire I find that just about any standard, uncoated, 7-strand wire will do, the thinner the better of course.
My current fave little lure rod is an bit of an odd-ball one that I got cheaply (£50) on impulse, and with which I've been very pleased; it's a 7ft Maver Tica Carbon Spin with a claimed lure casting weight range of 6-20gm but I reckon that this range must have been guesstimated using mono main line as I reckon that with braid you can fish much lighter lures than that.
I
use a nice little Abu Cardinal reel to balance-up my set-up and they make a
very comfortable combination for casting poppers, choppers & chuggers, but
are still tough enough to handle any predators of the size and weight that I'm
likely to encounter on my venues, and that includes more than one 20+ lb pike,
just in case you were wondering and maybe even doubting.
ARM, ROD-TIP, ACTION !
When you're fishing surface lures you have to put a lot of "action"
into them by using your arm & rod-tip plus an erratic retrieve; I also find
that generally you have to hold your rod up at a much higer angle than normal
to get the best action, especially with lures like the Jitterbug. Also with
surface lures, your retrieve speed is often very critical.
Well, I hope you've found my ramblings across the surface with lures, including walking-the-dog, helpful and that in turn they help you to much more fishing fun and surface success.
If I had to give you only one piece
of advice when fishing with surface lures, it would be "Don't
strike too soon".
Ralph Walker
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