It is a debate as old as crappie fishing itself – hair or plastic,
which is best? (Photo: Richard Simms, CrappieNOW Editor)
Hair or Plastic? How to Choose Your Weapons
by Brent Frazee
Kim Burnett will tell you that hair jigs are all you need to catch crappies year-round.
Gary Dollahon says you have to go with plastics; that they have much more action and versatility.
Ask other avid crappie anglers, and you’ll probably get a split vote. So, who’s right?
Let’s hear the arguments.
HAIR JIGS
Burnett has no trouble remembering the moment he switched from plastic to hair jigs.
“I was fishing the docks in the winter and I was getting tired of my plastic jigs getting torn up,” he said. “I was having to replace them ever three fish I would catch because they tore up so easily.”
“I thought back to the hair jigs my dad and granddad used years ago, and I decided I would learn to tie my own.”
Burnett, who lives in Olathe, Kansas, got some help from an employee at a Cabela’s store, and began creating his own lures.
He got excited when the first batch he tied, black and chartreuse hair jigs, immediately enticed big crappies.
He continued using them and routinely found success, and it wasn’t long before he lured attention from other anglers.
“I would be catching fish on my jigs when no one else was doing very well, and they would come up to me and say, ‘What in the world are you using?” he said. “I began giving them a few of the jigs I tied and the word got around. I was planting the seed.”
That seed grew into a part time job when Burnett developed his Crappie Stopper Jigs company in 1998. His marabou jigs, which he ties in endless color combinations, have a national following. He ties 500 jigs a week and sells them to customers in every state east of the Midwest.
Burnett believes in his own product. He uses his hand-tied jigs to catch big crappies throughout the year. He enjoys using a flyrod to cast 1/80th-ounce hair flies under a bobber to catch crappies when they are spawning, and will go to spinning tackle and jigs from 1/32nd-to 1/8th-ounce to entice them when they retreat to deeper brush.
He credits the durability and subtle motion of the hair jigs in playing an important part in his success.
“In the winter, when the crappies aren’t chasing, you can drop a hair jig down there and hardly move it, but it will still be undulating,” he said. “I think it looks natural to the fish.”
PLASTIC JIGS
When Dollahon goes crappie fishing, he never has to worry about running out of plastic baits.
He was the longtime brand manager for Bobby Garland Crappie Baits, one of the nation’s top brands of crappie lures. That means his tackle boxes are well-stocked with plastic baits of every size, color and profile.
He not only promotes the plastic baits he helped create, he uses them when he is fishing.
“Plastic baits can imitate or duplicate any species that crappies prey on,” Dollahon said. “Whether it’s a slender glass minnow, a bulkier shad, a mayfly or a crawdad, there are baits that imitate them.”
And there are many variations of those baits to give anglers plenty of options. Bobby Garland Crappie Baits offers 90 colors in just its popular Baby Shad bait alone.
Add the variety of sizes and profiles, and anglers have plenty of choices when the fish get picky.
“I remember being out on a 100-degree day at Lake Spavinaw (in Oklahoma) and I went to six different brush piles and kept getting hits, but didn’t land a single fish,” said Dollahon, who lives in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. “Finally, I decided to drop down to a 1/64th-ounce jig head and an Itty Bit (1.25-inch) jig and I caught fish on six consecutive drops.
“It showed me more than anything that you have to match the size of what the crappies are feeding on. There were a lot of young-of-the-year shad roaming around, and that’s the size the crappies were keying on.”
Similarly, manufacturers can incorporate features into plastic baits to meet every activity level of the crappies’ prey.
Bobby Garland’s best seller is its Baby Shad, a bait with a straight tail that imitates a young-of-the-year baitfish. But it also manufactures plastic baits with swim tails and paddle tails to imitate more-active baitfish and others with appendages to replicate insects.
Colors also play a big part. Monkey Milk (pearl with blue highlights and black flakes) is Bobby Garland’s best seller and one of Dollahon’s favorite colors when fishing Oklahoma reservoirs. But Electric Chicken, Blue Ice, black and hot pink, and Cajun Cricket are also popular.
“Plastic baits have come a long way,” Dollahon said. “There is a color, size and profile to meet most situations.”
YOU DECIDE
Long-time Tennessee River crappie guide Brad Whitehead said, “There’s a 100 percent difference in the movement of hair jigs and plastic body jigs. Plastic just doesn’t move as much. The hair jig can be moved a lot slower and still have much more movement (action) than plastic.
“I use hair jigs in colder water than I use plastic,” Whitehead said. “Hair jigs work better in winter months when I slow-troll open water. The hair moves more on a slow troll, and with scent added and holding in the hair, it’s a great combination.”
Sometimes, however, Whitehead will cut both ways.
“Yes, sir! I will put a plastic jig body on a hair jig,” he said. “This gives a bigger profile for use in dingy water. Or I often double up, using two jigs about 18 inches apart on my line – one will be a hair jig while the other is rigged with a plastic body. I seem to catch bigger crappie on this double rig. I can cover a lot of water with this technique, and by using two jigs, I can sometimes determine what the crappie prefer on particular days.”
So let the fish decide, and if they’re being finicky either way, most experts say use the one that gives YOU the most confidence. If you’re confident in your bait, you’ll fish harder and longer, ultimately catching more crappie.
Brent Frazee is an award-winning writer and photographer from Kansas City, Mo. He worked as outdoors editor for The Kansas City Star for 36 years before retiring in 2016. He continues to freelance for magazines, websites, newspapers and other outlets.
