No.  The more choices the better.  Somewhere out there is a magic lure that will catch big bass all of the time, in any lake, under any kind of conditions, and I am going to find that lure or go broke.  The Bait Monkey told me this lure exists, and I have to trust my best friend even if he is a monkey.

edit...midread the thread.  

 

No there are not too many options.......how dare you question the monkey ?

Tom Mann was asked why he made so many lures in so many different colors. He answered catch the angler, a bass has never put a penny in my pocket.

Many options for sure.

How many Bass would hit a Speed craw and ignore a brush hog. Idk

 

I don't believe we have to many different techniques but we likely have a surplus of baits immitatating the same thing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I feel I am someone who really likes to play around with my local fish, especially when they seem to be active.

 

But if you told me I was gonna be limited to a jig/chatterbait/senko/crankbait for the rest of my life and no more tackle, I'm confident my catch rates would improve substantially! ?

 

Look at Seth Feider!  

 

Fish a few things you KNOW will work and you tend to fish them more confidently and present them better.

 

But dang it I gotta know what a big girl in a tree thinks of a dark sleeper anyway!  ?

I stick to brands I know and love. But I want all their baits. I love Strike king rage and coffee tubes. So I’ll only use those for plastics and tubes. Real prey swimbaits are the only soft swimbaits I’ll use. 
 

 

I'm of the opinion that the lure rarely matters.  Especially with soft plastics, where it's all about the presentation.  

 

I'm the type of guy that if it ain't working, I'm gonna take the blame for it myself.  I'm not gonna say "they weren't biting Junebug Rage Craws this morning".  Instead, I'm gonna say "I spent way too much time on that point that wasn't producing when I probably should have hit that bank earlier".  

 

So I'm not effected by options.  Besides, I like to stick to what I've had success with in the past.  A new bait is a new learning curve. 

I have a ridiculous amount of gear. Narrowed myself down to only carrying 5 boxes going forward at one time.

 

You gotta love a guy who spends thousands on lithium batteries to save weight but carries a full tacklewarehouse inventory in the boat.

Nearly every bass angler starts out as a minimalist using 1 or 2 lures. 

That is how I started using 1 lure a Hawaiian Wiggler #3 that caught bass for me where and how I fished walking the shore line.

Then met another neighbor angler who caught bigger and more bass trolling a 300 series Bomber lure in frog color.

My brother was catching bass on a Heddon Injured Minnow.

My lure collection stared to grow.

50 years latter my lure collection was several hundred in dozens of colors. Lures I had to have that were catching bass that I didn’t have and had to buy.

Yes you can catch bass on 1 or 2 lures as long as those are what the lures and colors bass want at that time.

Tom

If you go to a really expensive restaurant, they usually only have 3-4 dinner options. They know that when there's too many choices people freeze up. 

 When Boris Yeltsin visited the US in the early 90's ('90 or '91, I can't remember), he thought the grocery store he went to was a fake and built for propaganda, so he demanded to go to another one unscheduled. He was overwhelmed by the sheer amount of choices we have for toothpaste.

 

 Now let me bring this back to us. How many times have you thrown a lure, didn't get a bite, then look in one of your many tackleboxes and think, what in the world do I throw now? Whereas if you only throw baits you have confidence in -say 3-4 of them- then it's just a matter of elimination. 

On 1/28/2023 at 3:05 PM, garroyo130 said:

I don't have an issue with original choices. I do have an issue with the billions of chinese knock offs of everything that you have to sift through when looking for stuff on amazon. I mean really how many D lures does one need???? 

I had no idea that Amazon was a decent source.  Many years ago, I found prices excessive and pedigree questionable.  I haven't looked for anything rod, reel, lure or line related on Amazon in many years.

Bill Lewis lures has 275 colors of Rat-L-Traps on their web site and six different sizes.  Not every color is made in every size.  I didn't count exactly how many they make but I estimate that it's around 350 different model you can buy.  The price ranges from $7.19 to $14.99.   

 

What happens if the next time you go fishing, they're hitting  Black Cherry Tiger Craw-630  (1/2 oz) and you don't have one? 

 

 

1 hour ago, WRB said:

Nearly every bass angler starts out as a minimalist using 1 or 2 lures. 

 

Tom you're like me, we're so dang old all they had back then was one or two lures.

On 1/28/2023 at 1:47 PM, Deleted account said:

 

Yes, there are way to many choices, but it's up to everyone to decide what to buy or not buy or what to use or not use. Tackle companies are in the business of selling tackle.

 

Are you saying I don't have to buy everything?? I thought that was part of fishing!!!

 

 

I'm not one to run out and buy a new bait as soon as it comes out.  I wait to see how it is working for other anglers before I spend. 

I've also cut back on the colors I fish with.  There is only a handful of different colors in my bag right now. 

I'll go against the grain.  I like to buy new stuff and have some before everybody else finds out about it.  I don't want to discover a fantastic bait a year or two after everybody else.  Fish have gotten use to it and it's not fantastic any more.  But I don't spend a bunch of money.  When I learn about a new bait that seems to work well, I buy one bag or one lure (hard lures ) in a color that I trust (greenpumkin, black/blue ou shad ) and spend a couple of hour testing it when the fish are biting.  This is my success rate: out of ten new baits 5 are duds, 3 are as good as classics and 2 are fantastic.  I buy ten bags or ten units of these last two and I'm set for a couple of years.  In general, that's how long it takes for others to catch up.

The real test is throwing a lure in clear water 3 or 4 feet from a weedbed and, regularly, having the bass rush out to get it. 

No such thing as too many options. You don't have to buy all of them, although I recommend you do so. ?