I've been making the Quakin Shads for our swim bait fishing on weighted hooks and have noticed something regarding the toughness of the baits. I'm using Essential plastic which has a lot of elasticity in the first place but I'm also loading these baits up with .015 and .040 glitter. We are fishing bass and pike primarily but run into a dogfish occasionally too. What we're seeing is that the baits last for several fish, as in maybe 15-18 fish unless a pike happens to shorten one up. The bass are running along the 4 pound range and the pike maybe up to 34". Both sides of the baits that are glitter colors last a whole lot longer than baits of like, say, pro blue where the tops and bottoms are hi lite colored and no flake. Colors like watermelon with a silver flake bottom seem tougher too, but this blue/purple over silver glitter is really a durable one, but then there's a ton of flake in them with the silver about 50/50 .015 and.040 flake sizes. Lots of flake in both colors. One with blue, purple and green in equal amounts over the silver belly is another durable one.
I wonder if the flake is acting sort of like aggregate in cement and makes the plastic harder to tear?
The bait on the right is the blue/purple, blue/purple/ green on the left. Bellies the same. No other components added, just glitter and plastic.
