I had one of those rare..."epic days" using the new swing jig and a baby berry on the backwaters of the Mississippi River today. It was a balmy 46 degrees...and not windy for a change. I headed over to a couple deep (14 - 20 ft) basins that hold a lot of bluegills and crappies during the winter. I've done well in these spots a few times in late fall and I was pretty confident that the swing jig and baby berry combo would produce and it sure did! 22 largemouth in 3 hours... 3 measured at 5 to 5.25 lbs which are big bass for up here. Probably got 10 over 4lbs and the rest where all over 14". I was retrieving the bait at a constant slow crawl and did best if I set the hook immediately after the hit. A couple times I didn't feel any bite..I just notice the line swimming off to the side.
I wasn't all that pleased with the suggested hooks for this rig because they weren't holding the nose of the bait very well after a fish or two so I tried some Mustad Grip-Pin KVD soft plastics hooks and they really worked we'll. Highly recommended. I was using the 3/0 for the Baby Berry's. The hooks have a nice big eye which I like (more swing?)
This might cause some gnashing of teeth...but I cast and powder paint the Swing jigs by themselves and after curing I add the hooks by opening up the eye of the hook using my split ring pliers, adding the hook to the wire and then closing the eye using my leader crimping pliers. I'm not too worried about the eye opening again because the force of the wire on the jig is on the front of the hook...not the side that I bent open.
This slow, bottom bouncing crank bait method (as Biffle describes it) has been super effective for me so far.