When I first got heavily into bass fishing I bought several of these lifelike lures. They are beautiful lures but I never caught a whole lot on them and retired them. I think I'll give them another shot.For those of you who have used them, what are your impression? They are made of a hard foam , silent, sort of like a flat sided bait.

They have a great side-to-side action and are terrific trolling lures.

Bear with me as I have a story to tell. I was born and raised in Fort Dodge, Iowa where Lazy Ike had a plant. I don't remember the year but it must have been in the late 1970's I went to a small lake north of town to fish. As I was getting ready to put my boat in a man carrying a big tackle box and a long spinning rod approached and we started talking fishing. It was Tom Seward. I had no clue who he was but I invited him to go in my boat. It was early in the spring and I was fishing a grub and he was throwing his newly designed bait, the Natural Ike. We each caught several bass and he told me he worked with Lazy Ike and designed this crankbait. I was clueless as to the influence this man had on bass fishing until many years later.

Of course, I bought some of those Natural Ike's but never caught much with them. I was ignorant of crankbait fishing back then and was not sharp enough to learn from Tom Seward when I had him in my boat!

I think they would catch bass now that I've learned how to fish a crankbait....if I only still had them!

I used them as a kid, farm.pond fishing. They were old wooden and plastic Lazy Ikes from my dad's tackle. Ours were all red/ white color. They ran pretty shallow, and the action was sort of like a spoon. A slow wobble. We caught some fish on them back then. I haven't used one for a long time. I retired my dad's old wooden ones years ago.

1 hour ago, Lottabass said:

I had no clue who he was but I invited him to go in my boat.

Of course you did, you good man.

Cool story! You had a fishing rock star in the boat.

49 minutes ago, Lottabass said:

Of course, I bought some of those Natural Ike's but never caught much with them. I was ignorant of crankbait fishing back then and was not sharp enough to learn from Tom Seward when I had him in my boat!

I think they would catch bass now that I've learned how to fish a crankbait....if I only still had them!

Thats a cool story. I'm thinking the same thing. I bought these baits when I was fairly new to bass fishing. They never quite caught on with me but I feel it may have been more my fault than the baits fault.I still have six of them. I also have another foam bait. I dont know who made the lure at the bottom of this pic.

1 hour ago, Lottabass said:

It was Tom Seward.

I have some Tom Seward balsa baits new in box.

CORRECTION. not Tom Seward, Lee Sisson. My bad.

47 minutes ago, scaleface said:

Thats a cool story. I'm thinking the same thing. I bought these baits when I was fairly new to bass fishing. They never quite caught on with me but I feel it may have been more my fault than the baits fault.I still have six of them. I also have another foam bait. I dont know who made the lure at the bottom of this pic.

I had a lot to learn about fishing back then (I still do!) but I was catching much more on bright baits rather than the natural colored ones so I attributed that to the fact that the lakes I fished were dirty water lakes. I put the natural colored ones away and eventually they disappeared.

BUT last year I caught way more bass on subtle colored cranks than I did on bright ones even in the dirty water.

The lazy ike was in the classification called banana baits very similar to the old Helin Flatfish. That side to side wobble definitely caught fish including walleye & crappie as well as bass. I think they produced best by changing speed especially with a slow wobble speed.

1 hour ago, scaleface said:

I also have another foam bait. I dont know who made the lure at the bottom of this pic.

Crankbait Corp. “Fingerling,” also a Tom Seward venture after the Natural Ike stint.

5 hours ago, Mobasser said:

They were old wooden and plastic Lazy Ikes from my dad's tackle. Ours were all red/ white color. They ran pretty shallow, and the action was sort of like a spoon. A slow wobble.

3 hours ago, Dwight Hottle said:

The lazy ike was in the classification called banana baits very similar to the old Helin Flatfish.

I had a Lazy Ike and a Flatfish as a kid. I think I caught some farm pond bass with them. Dont think I threw one since.

I have an older wood, weird looking antique one.Its called a Top Ike.

I believe I have mentioned this before, but an original Lazy Ike (banana shape) about 3 to 4 inch size in perch color will catch northern pike like crazy, especially trolling, if you are in to toothy critters. 😉 I think small perch is their favorite snack.