Not sure whether to use a popper or a minnow? Why not use a lure that can perform the job of both types and get a bit of pop and wiggle, as Dave Magner explains.

There is no doubt that the most enjoyable way to catch our native freshwater sportsfish is with surface lures. When conditions are right, anglers all over the country have the opportunity to throw poppers, fizzers, sliders and walkers at their quarry and watch the fish blast them right off the surface. When fish are switched on enough to hit a popper, they usually mean business and those explosive surface takes can almost have us thinking we have died and gone to fishing heaven.
Of course the trouble is that conditions don’t always suit the use of surface lures. Sometimes the fish will come up and look at a lure bouncing around on top but they are just not committed enough to break through the surface to grab it. Whether it’s because they are afraid to reveal their presence to potential predators, a temperature related thing or something to do with barometric pressure… who can really tell? I guess as anglers, about the only thing we can be sure of is that there are plenty of times when they are fired up enough to look but not enough to touch.
Seeing as we are nowhere near as attuned to our surroundings as the fish are, the method most anglers use to establish if the fish will take a surface lure is to tie one on and give it a try. It’s a pretty reliable way to go and if the fish don’t cooperate then you can always go back to a sub-surface presentation. However, there is another option to keep up your sleeve and that’s to tie on a lure which effectively combines the role of both a surface lure and a diver into the one retrieve. That way you don’t have to commit to a full surface presentation and you give yourself an each-way chance of fooling the fish, regardless of how switched on they are.

Barra are prime candidates for the pop and wiggle technique. This 75 cm fish had no hesitation in pouncing on a little 60 mm Killalure 2Deadly.

THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS
Lately I’ve been doing a lot of fishing with lures like this which blur the boundary between traditional surface lures and diving minnows and plugs. Depending on exactly how you fish with them, I guess you could classify them as being either surface lures that dive or as minnows that bloop. Seeing as they don’t really fall into any of the established lure categories, I’ll simply refer to them here as ‘swoppers’ (swimming poppers). At the end of the day, what they are called really doesn’t matter too much, because these things are simply a lot of fun to fish with and are very effective in those in-between activity levels we’ve already mentioned.
The sort of lures I’m talking about here can probably best be illustrated by the Killalure 2Deadly. This amazingly versatile minnow is the brainchild of Lance Butler and like all really good ideas, it’s delightfully simple in design and function. The body and bib of the lure look much like any other shallow running minnow but at the very front of the lure, its nose has been sliced off, to produce a flat slanted face which makes it work like a popper. I’ve mainly used the smallest 60 mm model so far and it has accounted for some nice bass, as well as barra to around 80 cm in length. If you have bigger target species in mind, there are two larger sizes in the range but I’ve not had the need to try them so far.
While there aren’t that many lures which fit into this particular category, there are a couple of other smaller models that I’ve also used with quite a bit of success. The first is the Viva Mazzy Pop. Like the 2Deadly, at first glance you’d think it was just a shallow running minnow but the front of the lure has been designed so that its nose overhangs the bib. When worked with downward stabs of the rod tip, air is trapped between the lure’s nose and the surface of the water as it dives and creates a beautiful blooping sound which predators like bass home right in on.
The other lure I’ve only just started using is the Bassday Bubble Crank 45. It combines not only the ability to be splashed on the surface, but also the whirr of a fizzer blade. Additionally, the bib has been drilled full of holes to let water flow through it when retrieved. It makes quite a bit of commotion for such a small lure and while it’s more of a wake bait (only just getting under the surface) than a minnow, it can still do the same sort of job.
FISHING WITH SWOPPERS
As you’d probably expect with a lure that combines the best attributes of two lure styles, the best way to fish with swoppers is to combine a number of retrieves. As I’m a hopeless surface lure junky, I pretty much always go with a traditional surface lure retrieve first up in the hopes that the fish will come to the top. If that doesn’t work, I concentrate more on trying to get the lure down a little and swim it back to me to see if that’s what the fish prefer.
Working swoppers on the surface varies a bit depending on what you are fishing out of and which lure you’ve got tied on. A lot of my fishing is done from my Hobie Pro Angler kayak for bass and freshwater barra. From my seated position, I find that the 2Deadly responds best to downwards stabs of the rod tip that rip it under the surface. A fairly short but hard rip seems to do the trick and when you get it right, the lure will make a lovely blooping sound, that’s not unlike the noise made by a bass feeding on the surface.
One of the mistakes I often see people make when fishing with surface lures is working them too hard and too fast. For ambush predators like bass and barra, slower is nearly always better than too fast. The same goes for the action you are trying to create. When the 2Deadly is making the right noise for example, there is not much splash at all. Instead, it enters the water a bit like an Olympic high diver and only leaves behind a bubble trail to show where it’s been. It’s the sound signature rather than the amount of splash which seems to be a real strike trigger.

From left to right; Bubble Crank, Mazy Pop and 2Deadly.

That’s not to say that fish won’t respond positively to a loud and fast retrieve at times. When they are switched on, that’s exactly what might work best. It’s just that when they are not in such an aggressive mood that you generally need to tone things down a little. In a lot of cases, the hit will come while the lure is stopped and just floating on the surface anyway, so give the fish enough chance to decide whether they want to eat it or not.
Chances are, even if you can’t see them, any nearby fish will have heard your lure crash down and come over to investigate the disturbance. If you rip it too violently while the poor fish is hanging just underneath it, they will be frightened off by the sudden commotion. A little wiggle or slow enticing ‘bloooop’ however will likely draw a more positive response on most occasions.
As I’ve already mentioned, sometimes the fish are reluctant to actually take a topwater lure and it’s at this point you’ll be glad you’ve tied on a swopper. Simply give the lure a couple more bloops (with suitable pauses) and then begin a sub-surface retrieve. Once the lure dives down, any fish which were attracted by the noise will hopefully feel much safer about taking a lure without having to show themselves by breaking the surface.
In terms of the actual retrieve, I find that there’s not usually any need to get fancy here and a simple slow roll is all it takes. Occasionally, I’ll work in some pauses but it’s not often necessary and sometimes, speeding up the retrieve slightly once your lure is out in open water can be what is required to make the fish take a swipe at it before it escapes. It’s generally not advisable to pause for too long anyway, as these lures are fairly buoyant and if you stop winding, it won’t take too long for them to float back up to the surface.
On really long casts, it’s often possible to go through the pop, pop, swim retrieve a number of times. Generally speaking, I haven’t found that to be necessary all that often, as the first couple of pops right up close to cover are usually the most important ones. Still, if you are swimming your lure out alongside cover (like a fallen log laying horizontally in the water), it can be worth letting it float back to the surface halfway back and giving it some more twitches just to see if you can excite the fish into having a swipe at it.
WHEN AND WHERE
As you can probably guess, the combination of a shallow running minnow and surface popper works really well around your classic bankside timber snag. That’s not the only place to give it a try though. In particular, shallow lakes with lots of weedbeds present another really good location to prospect with this sort of technique.
Actually, fishing right over the top of any submerged weedbeds is where this approach really shines. Of an evening, when bass (or barra) start to feel a little more comfortable due to the lower light levels, they will often leave cover and start roaming around and over the weedbeds in search of a feed. Using a swopper, you can cast it out, bloop it a few times to get the fish’s attention and then swim it back right over the top of the weeds. This can be an absolutely deadly technique and has saved the day for me on a number of occasions now.

Of course, you shouldn’t restrict yourself to only fishing with swoppers once it starts to get dark. Rainy, drizzly days with lots of cloud cover and little wind are good. Any time there is a bit of shade from overhanging branches can also be worth a go. Even during the day when the sun is full on the water, cover like waterlilys with their spreading leaves can provide enough shelter from direct sunlight to keep the fish up near the surface. So as you can see, this approach can be worth a shot almost anytime, given the right conditions.

Bass find the combined noise and action of the Mazzy Pop most attractive.

The shade provided by lily beds can keep bass high in the water column where you can fool them with this technique.

TRY IT OUT
Swimming poppers really do combine the best of two great lure types. You get the noise and commotion of a surface lure, plus the enticing wiggle of a shallow diving plug or minnow. They can give you a double shot at the fish by providing two different types of presentations in the one retrieve. On those times when the fish are almost but not quite ready to take a surface lure, employing a bit of pop and wiggle can often still get you attached to fish you would otherwise miss out on if you used only a standard topwater presentation. If you haven’t got any swoppers in your tacklebox, I suggest you get a couple and give them a go.
Dave Magner is a keen angler who relishes the freedom and flexibility that fishing from canoes and kayaks brings. While he’ll chase anything with fins, he has a real passion for our native and imported freshwater species