Crankbait

What it is

A crankbait is a hard-bodied lure, balsa or plastic, with a diving lip in front of the line tie and two treble hooks. Reel it and the lip digs, and the bait dives and wobbles. Stop reeling and a floating crankbait rises; Roland Martin's shallow retrieve, below, is built on that pause. The Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation's lure page draws the one line that separates the lipless kind: lipped crankbaits float when they are not being retrieved, and lipless crankbaits are weighted inside and sink.

Rapala's description of its DT series names the parts that matter in any crankbait: a body weighted to rest nose-down so it starts diving at once, a lip that "digs the bait down quickly to desired depth", and a rattle tuned for sound. Every decision on this page is one of those three: how deep, what it does when it hits something, and what it sounds like.

This page covers four kinds:

• Squarebill. A short, square-cornered lip for shallow cover.
• Medium divers. Round or coffin-shaped lips running roughly 5 to 12 feet.
• Deep divers. Long lips, big bodies, 14 feet and past it.
• Lipless. A flat, sinking body with no lip, fished at any depth by how long you let it fall.

Basis: official (Rapala, ODWC); the four-way split is editorial

Running depth: what the makers publish

A maker's depth figure is a starting point, not a promise. Greg Hackney, writing in Bassmaster, says most crankbaits run within 2 feet of what the package claims; line, cast length and speed account for the rest (see the next section). Rapala's DT series page does not say what line its figures assume.

Rapala DT (Dives-To)

The name is the depth: the number is the depth in feet, per the maker's specification table.

Rapala says the balsa DT can be cast 150 feet, and that each one is hand-tuned and tank-tested before it leaves the factory.

Rapala Shad Rap

Bassmaster's four-season piece picks it for winter for its tight wiggle in cold water. Rapala publishes depth ranges rather than a single figure: SR04, 4 to 7 feet; SR05, 4 to 9; SR06, 5 to 10; SR07, 5 to 11; SR08 and SR09, 8 to 15. The SR05 weighs 3/16 oz and the SR07 5/16 oz.

Bomber

From Bomber's own 2023 breakdown of its line, written by Jeff Samsel for the maker:

• Square A 4SL and 5SL (1-5/8 and 2 inches, 1/4 and 3/8 oz): about 3 feet at most. Small-forage and creek-shoal squarebills.
• Shallow A (2 inches, 3/8 oz): about 1 foot at most, made to wake the surface.
• Flat A (2-1/2 inches, 3/8 oz): 3 to 5 feet. Deep Flat A: 5 to 8 feet, which guide Jimmy Mason uses for cranking bluffs, 45-degree rock banks and gravel slopes in winter.
• Fat A 5F (2 inches, 3/8 oz): 6 to 8 feet. Fat A 6F (2-1/4 inches, 5/8 oz): 8 to 10 feet. The round body and wide wobble, Bomber says, help it deflect off rock and shed vegetation.
• Model A: the maker's three-pack of the BO2A, BO4A and BO6A lists cranking depths of 2, 6 and 8 feet. The Model 8A, 3 inches, dives 10 to 13 feet.
• Fat Free Shad (3 inches): to 16 feet, and Bomber says it deflects brush well on ledges.

Strike King

Strike King's own product and instruction pages refused our fetches, so we have not printed the makers' figures for the KVD squarebills or the XD deep divers; see what we don't know, below. What we can give is Kevin VanDam's own description of his squarebill sizes, in a 2018 Bassmaster column: the 1.0, the 1.5 and 1.5 Shallow, the 2.5, a 4.0 that "dives to about 10 feet", and an 8.0 with a bigger body for lakes with big gizzard shad.

Lipless

A lipless bait has no rated depth. Rapala lists the Rippin' Rap's running depth as "variable": 5/16, 1/2 and 7/8 oz, all sinking. The Oklahoma wildlife department's rule of thumb is 1/2 oz and heavier in water deeper than 12 feet and 3/8 oz and lighter in water shallower than that.

Basis: official (Rapala, Bomber, ODWC); KVD's own sizes in Bassmaster for Strike King

Line diameter and depth

Thinner line runs deeper. Hackney puts it in those words in Bassmaster, and every source we read agrees on the direction. The amounts are what anglers want, and the published figures are these:

• Mike Iaconelli on the Rapala DT8, on his own site in 2021: it dives to 8 feet on 12 lb test, to 9 feet on 10 lb, and to 10 feet "or maybe a little more" on 8 lb. He also says the DT number tells you roughly how deep the bait runs depending on line type, diameter and strength.
• Kevin VanDam, in a 2012 Bassmaster column: the depth difference between 17 and 12 lb line is 18 inches, and he says the fluorocarbon he uses dives 18 inches deeper than monofilament of the same size. He spools different reels with line from 10 to 20 lb so the line changes the depth for him.
• Tim Horton, in Bassmaster's "5 mistakes deep crankers make": 10 to 12 lb fluorocarbon, because thinner line lets the bait dive faster and reach full depth, fluorocarbon sinks better than braid or mono, and its reduced stretch gives better hookups.
• Hackney: 10 or 12 lb fluorocarbon for most crankbaits, and 14 lb for the biggest deep divers.

Three other things change depth as much as line does, and they are worth knowing before you blame the bait:

• Cast length. Hackney: the longer the cast, the deeper the bait runs. Horton positions the boat to cast with the wind; VanDam says that in a 5 to 10 mph wind, a 6XD cast 75 yards gains an extra 4 to 5 feet.
• Rod angle. VanDam: rod tip near the water versus up at 11 o'clock can change the depth by as much as four feet, and kneeling and reeling gets the bait at least 3 feet deeper.
• Speed. Hackney: the faster the lure moves, the deeper it runs.

We read these as pros' measurements from the boat, not controlled tests. We did not find a published, independent test of line diameter against crankbait depth that we could read; see what we don't know.

Basis: consensus (Bassmaster, Iaconelli); the published figures are the anglers' own

When it wins

• Fish you can reach by bumping something. VanDam wants the bait on the bottom so it deflects off it and triggers more strikes. Kevin Short, in Bassmaster, says the whole key to a squarebill up shallow is a reaction bite, and that you want as many deflections as possible.
• Covering water. Rapala's pitch for the DT is that it dives fast to a preset depth and stays in the strike zone longer than other crankbaits, and that it casts 150 feet.
• Offshore schools after the spawn. VanDam, writing in June, says this is when a deep crankbait really shines: fish done spawning, schooled offshore and aggressive.
• Shallow wood, rock and grass. Short walks a squarebill down a log and bumps every limb; VanDam says squarebills work around grass, rocks and wood, and in open water too.
• Grass, with a lipless. Rip it free when it catches; see the retrieves below.
• Cold water. A tight wiggle. Ott DeFoe, in Bassmaster's four-season piece, has caught fish on crankbaits in water as cold as 42 to 43 degrees.

Where it loses: the sources describe the cost rather than a place it fails. Heavy cover means hang-ups; Short says you are going to get hung up, and Roland Martin stops reeling and lets the bait float up over the cover before a hook digs in. And a bait that runs too deep for the water is wrong: VanDam says a bait rated to 18 feet belongs in 17 feet of water, not 8, where it is "too overpowering".

Basis: consensus (Bassmaster, Rapala)

Species

Largemouth and smallmouth first; nearly everything published about cranking is written for bass, and the advice on this page is bass advice. KDFWR's summer tips name crankbaits for walleye (trolled or cast), for deeper white bass, and for trolling for hybrid striped bass. For crappie, David Baker, quoted in KDFWR's 2024 column on small crappie lakes, says: "I troll crankbaits in summer in that top 10 feet of the water column."

Basis: official (KDFWR); consensus on bass

Season and environment

• Winter. DeFoe's split, in Bassmaster: on grass lakes, a lipless bait, a 1/4 or 1/2 oz Rat-L-Trap, in small ditches and depressions where a drop of about a foot can hold bass; on rock and wood, a No. 5 or No. 7 Shad Rap on gravel, riprap and chunk rock, especially banks sloping 45 degrees or steeper; the article picks the Shad Rap for its tight wiggle in cold water. VanDam's winter lipless fish came from 2 to 10 feet of water, and Bassmaster's winter lipless piece gives separate advice for extremely cold water, the upper 30s to low 40s.
• Early spring. Alton Jones, same piece: early spring is prime time for squarebills, in 2 to 5 feet around new grass where baitfish gather, then shallow points and sandbars no deeper than about 5 feet.
• After the spawn and summer. Deep divers. VanDam's offshore schools in June; Horton's summer water is steep main-lake drops, often 10 to 14 feet, especially where wind or generation current hits them. Short says that when the water is really hot, bass tuck into cover and the squarebill has to go right in their faces, and you may need eight or ten casts to the same target.
• Fall. Edwin Evers goes against the small-bait habit and throws a big squarebill in shad patterns in the backs of creeks, pockets and flat rocky points, making 10 to 20 casts at a good log. KDFWR puts a deep-running, shad-colored crankbait on Kentucky Lake's sloping fall banks (see In Kentucky).

Basis: consensus (Bassmaster); official on KDFWR's fall note

Structure, cover, clarity and current

Rock, wood and grass. On the bottom, VanDam says he feels the bait vibrating and bumping along through the reel. In wood, a squarebill's lip, as Short puts it, makes the bait stand on its nose so the hooks stay away from the cover. In grass, a lipless bait ripped free, a squarebill over new grass as Jones fishes it, or a wake bait such as Bomber's Shallow A, which the maker says works well over vegetation and gravel bars.

Clarity mostly changes the color; see the color logic below. Current: Horton's summer drops are best where current from power generation hits them. That is the only current note in the sources we read; see what we don't know.

Basis: consensus

Rod, reel and line

KDFWR's 2024 column on rod power and action gives the frame. It says many professional bass anglers use moderate-action rods for crankbait fishing, and that a softer action absorbs the shock of the violent strike that treble-hooked lures provoke. A medium-power baitcasting rod is a good choice for deep-diving crankbaits. Lures of 1/2 oz and up belong on baitcasting gear, and anything that needs 10 lb line or lighter and lures of 3/8 oz or lighter belongs on spinning gear.

Beginner

A 7 foot medium-power, moderate-action casting rod, a casting reel around 6:1, and 12 lb fluorocarbon. That outfit is ours, assembled from the sources: KDFWR's moderate action and medium power, Horton's 5.4:1 to 6:1 reel range, and Horton's and Hackney's 10 to 12 lb fluorocarbon. It throws a squarebill, a medium diver and a 1/2 oz lipless. For the small Shad Raps and other light baits fished on 10 lb line or lighter, KDFWR's rule sends you to a spinning setup. Our baitcasting setup guide covers spooling and brakes, and rods and reels explains power and action.

Intermediate

Split the outfits by the job.

• Deep divers. Horton: a rod at least 7 feet and 7'6" better, medium or medium-heavy with a slower tip and good backbone, and a 5.4:1 to 6:1 reel; he calls 7:1 and faster a poor choice because fast reels create a lot of torque under the load of a big crankbait. VanDam uses a 7'10" cranking rod with a soft tip for distance and a 5.3:1 reel, which he says is less fatiguing. Hackney: big deep divers need a heavy rod and a big reel, and a 300-size spool picks up more line per turn than a 200 or a 100.
• Squarebills. Horton's summer cranking line is 10 lb fluorocarbon, or 12 lb around heavy cover; Evers throws his big fall squarebill on a 7 foot medium-heavy rod and 20 lb fluorocarbon. Martin goes a different way in shallow cover: 30 to 50 lb braid on a 7 foot medium rod and a 6.3:1 reel, with a 2 foot leader of 10 lb fluorocarbon in clear water and straight braid in stained water. He notes that the light-wire hooks will straighten before the line breaks.
• Lipless. The sources disagree, and the difference is the season. The winter outfit in Don Wirth's Bassmaster piece with VanDam is a 7 foot medium-action cranking rod with a fairly soft tip, a 5.3:1 reel VanDam calls critical in cold water, and fluorocarbon from 10 to 20 lb; the article goes to 17 to 20 lb in water in the upper 30s to low 40s so the bait sinks more slowly. Andrew Upshaw, ripping grass on Toledo Bend and Sam Rayburn from fall to March, uses a 7 to 7'6" heavy rod, a 7:1 reel and 15 to 20 lb copolymer, and says he does not use braid or fluorocarbon for it.

Advanced

Use line as a depth control. Keep the same bait and change the line rather than the bait, as VanDam does with reels spooled from 10 to 20 lb: heavier to keep a bait off the bottom, lighter to reach it. Mono, in VanDam's figures, runs shallower than fluorocarbon of the same size. Then the weighting tricks: VanDam puts heavier, larger-wire trebles on a 6XD so it suspends or sinks slightly, adds lead strips to the throat or the bill ahead of the front hook hanger, or clips a 1/8 oz drop-shot weight to the front hook hanger to make it dive steeper, trimming the weight until it suspends. See mono, fluoro and braid for what each material does and line systems for the leader recipes.

Basis: official on KDFWR's rod guidance; consensus (Bassmaster); editorial on the beginner outfit

Knots

None of the crankbait sources we read names a knot. We tie a Palomar for a snug connection, or a non-slip loop when we want the bait to swing freely on the eye; both are our choices, not a source's. For braid to a fluorocarbon leader, as in Martin's shallow outfit, see line systems.

Basis: editorial

Lure choices and color logic

• Clear water, sun — shad and natural patterns. VanDam's lipless choice for sun and fairly clear water is gold sexy shad.
• Clear water, cold — natural, subtle crawdad colors, the four-season piece's choice for DeFoe's winter Shad Rap and lipless baits.
• Stained — Horton's default is citrus shad, with more chartreuse as the water dirties.
• Muddy or after runoff — VanDam's chili craw for cloudy days; the article adds it for when heavy winter rains send cold, muddy runoff into the lake. The Oklahoma department calls red and black crawfish patterns tried and true in clay-stained water, especially for largemouth.
• Shad water in fall — Evers' shad-pattern squarebill; KDFWR's shad-colored deep runner on Kentucky Lake.
• White bass and hybrids — the Oklahoma department lists white, pearl, silver, gold and chartreuse.

Basis: consensus; official on the ODWC and KDFWR colors

How to rig it

1. Pick the bait for the depth: a model rated a little deeper than the water. Iaconelli likes whatever model runs just a little deeper than the water, because it gives the best feel, and VanDam's 17-feet-not-8 rule is the limit on the other side.
2. Pick the line for the fine adjustment: lighter to go deeper, heavier to run shallower (see Line diameter and depth).
3. Check the hooks. Horton touches up the points every few hours and replaces any treble with a slightly bent shank; the front hook dulls fastest on rock, riprap and shell.
4. Tie on (see Knots).
5. Check that it runs straight before you fish it (see Tuning).

Basis: consensus (Iaconelli, Bassmaster)

Tuning

Rapala's own advice, from its newsletter: test the bait by ripping it through the water beside the boat, or by retrieving it straight back fast. If it veers to one side instead of running true, it needs tuning. Grip the eyelet with the tuning tool on the pliers and tweak it "ever so slightly, the opposite way the lure veered." If you feel the eyelet move, you may have turned it too far. Keep testing until it runs straight.

Rapala says its baits are tuned to run right out of the box, and that even the toughest crankbait can be knocked off true after hitting structure. So re-check after a fish or a hard hang-up, not only out of the package.

Basis: official (Rapala)

How to fish it

Lipped crankbaits

• Wind it into something. VanDam's rule for deep divers is to get the bait to the bottom so it deflects off it. Iaconelli says the same about the DT8: he always tries to make sure the bait is hitting something and bouncing off it.
• Bump and pause. Martin's shallow retrieve: cast past the target, crank until the bait bumps it, pause so it rises, and continue if nothing hits. Jones fishes squarebills stop-and-go early in spring, pausing to let a snagged bait float free.
• Burn and kill. Short: some days you have to burn the bait through the cover and kill it the moment it hits something. He says the right speed changes by the day and even by the hour.
• Point the rod at the bait. Horton points the rod straight at the lure and follows it back, which puts the strain on the grip instead of the forearms; turning the rod to the side bends it more and tires you out.
• Long-lining. VanDam's way to add depth: cast, then idle away with the reel disengaged so line pays out, and retrieve once you reach the back of the target area. He says it gets a 6XD to about 35 feet or more, and notes that it is like trolling, which is not allowed in tournaments. Check your event's rules before you use it in one.

Lipless

• Steady. The Oklahoma department says a steady retrieve is usually the most effective way to work it, and that it bounces off logs and rocks to draw reaction bites.
• Yo-yo. Bassmaster's winter lipless piece with VanDam: cast, let it fall to bottom on a tight line, sweep the rod, reel up the slack and let it fall again. Most strikes come as it sinks back.
• Rip. When it catches grass, rip it free with a sharp stroke of the rod; the same piece says that often triggers a reaction strike. Upshaw's grass retrieves are a slow wind in January and February, the yo-yo in fall, and a very fast retrieve most of the year.

A snagged lipped crankbait usually comes free if you stop: Martin lets it float up over the cover before a hook digs in.

Basis: consensus; official on ODWC's steady retrieve; the retrieve names are the sources' own

Common mistakes

Horton's five, from Bassmaster, cover deep cranking; the last two are from the shallow-water sources.

• Line too heavy. It keeps the bait from reaching its depth. Horton fishes 10 to 12 lb fluorocarbon.
• Short casts. The bait spends the first part of the retrieve diving. Keep the spool full, set the spool tension properly, and cast with the wind.
• The wrong reel. A 7:1 or faster reel fights a big crankbait; Horton fishes 5.4:1 to 6:1.
• Rod held to the side. Point it at the bait.
• Dull hooks. The front treble dulls on hard bottom. Sharpen through the day and replace bent hooks.
• Not touching anything. Short and VanDam both want deflection, and Iaconelli tries to make sure his bait is hitting something.
• Too few casts at a good target. Short's eight or ten, Evers' ten to twenty.

Basis: consensus (Bassmaster)

Kayak notes

These are our suggestions, not the sources'.

• A squarebill and a medium diver cover most kayak water. Deep cranking wants long casts, a long rod and a lot of winding, which is harder from a seat.
• Cast with the wind. Horton does it from a boat for depth and distance; in a kayak, drifting with the wind lets you cast ahead of the drift as well.
• Point the rod at the bait. Horton's rod angle is easier on the arms from a seat, too.
• Mind the trebles. A crankbait has two, and the fish comes to hand close to your lap. Lip it or use a grip, and keep the bait away from your legs.

See kayak boat control.

Basis: editorial, with Horton on the cast and rod angle

Where it came from

Two dates from the sources mark where today's baits came from. Bomber's own history says the Fat Free Shad was one of two lures Mark Davis used to win the 1995 Bassmaster Classic, the 16-foot deep diver still in the line. VanDam writes that squarebills were first thought of as baits for dirty, shallow water and heavy cover, and that Strike King introduced the original KVD 1.5 squarebill, with more sizes added since.

Basis: official (Bomber); VanDam in Bassmaster

In Kentucky

KDFWR's crankbait advice is scattered through its columns rather than collected in one place, and what we found is this:

• Kentucky Lake in fall. Lee McClellan's 2020 column on state resort park fishing sends bass anglers to the sloping banks of Barnett Bay, Vickers Bay and Rhodes Bay with a 1/2 oz football jig, and adds that "a deep-running shad colored crankbait" worked along the same banks produces strikes.
• Summer. KDFWR's undated summer tips say to use jigs, soft plastics and crankbaits for deeper-water bass, deeper-running crankbaits for deeper white bass, and trolled or cast crankbaits for walleye.
• Rods. The 2024 Power vs Action column, quoted under Rod, reel and line, is the agency's own tackle advice for crankbaits.
• Crappie. David Baker's summer trolling, quoted under Species, from the 2024 column on small central Kentucky crappie lakes.

For the reservoir smallmouth lakes, KDFWR's 2019 column, which names Lake Cumberland and Laurel River Lake and quotes an angler who fishes Dale Hollow from late fall through spring, calls mid-October through late spring the best time for big smallmouth, but the lures it names are topwaters, jigs, spoons, blade baits and the Ned rig, not crankbaits. DeFoe's rock-bank Shad Rap in winter and Mason's Deep Flat A on 45-degree rock and bluffs describe that kind of water, but neither source is about these lakes; that application is ours.

Basis: official (KDFWR columns); editorial on the smallmouth-lake application

Skill level

Beginner to fish, intermediate to fish well. Cast and wind, and a crankbait catches fish. What takes time is choosing the depth before the cast, feeling the difference between rock, wood and a fish, and knowing when to stop winding.

Basis: editorial

What we don't know yet

• Strike King's own figures. Strike King's product and tip pages for the KVD squarebills and the XD deep divers refused our fetches. Retailer listings exist; we have not used them in place of the maker. Status pending.
• Berkley's figures. Berkley's Dredger and Frittside pages loaded without their specifications. The Dredger is sold in sizes numbered 8.5 to 25.5, but the page we read does not say what the numbers measure. Status pending.
• The line behind the makers' ratings. Rapala's DT page does not say what line test its depth figures assume. Status pending.
• An independent line-diameter test. The depth figures for line size on this page are pros' own numbers. We did not find a published controlled test we could read. Status pending.
• KDFWR's 2026 Fishing Forecast. The agency's current forecast PDF did not give us readable text, so any lake-by-lake crankbait notes it carries are not on this page. Status pending.
• Current. Beyond Horton's note on generation current, none of the sources we read covers cranking in river current or a tailwater. A KDFWR magazine piece on Buck Creek appears to discuss Shad Raps in current, but its PDF did not give us readable text. Status pending.
• Wired2Fish. Its crankbait and tuning pieces refused our fetches. Status pending.

Sources and how confident we are

Claim	Source	Confidence
Running depths, sizes, weights	Rapala, Bomber	Official (makers)
Line size and depth	Bassmaster, Iaconelli	Consensus (pros' figures)
Rods, reels, line	KDFWR, Bassmaster	Official and consensus
Retrieves, deflection, seasons	Bassmaster, ODWC	Consensus
Tuning	Rapala	Official
Kentucky	KDFWR	Official
Beginner outfit, knots, kayak	Ours	Editorial

Sources

• DT (Dives-To) Series — Rapala — the description, the nose-down quick-dive rest, the 150 ft cast, hand tuning, and the DT04 to DT16 specification table.
• Shad Rap — Rapala — SR04 to SR09 running depths, lengths and weights.
• Rippin' Rap — Rapala — lipless, sinking, variable depth; 5/16, 1/2 and 7/8 oz; grass, timber and rock.
• Anglers Start Your Engines... And Tidy Up The Tackle — Rapala newsletter — testing and tuning the eyelet.
• Breaking Down Bomber Lures Crankbaits — Lurenet (Jeff Samsel, 2023) — the Square A, Shallow A, Flat A, Fat A, Model A and Fat Free Shad depths and sizes; Mason's Deep Flat A; Davis's 1995 Classic.
• Bomber Model A 3 Pack — Lurenet — cranking depths of 2, 6 and 8 feet.
• The Rapala DT8 — Mike Iaconelli (2021) — 8, 9 and 10 feet on 12, 10 and 8 lb line; a model a little deeper than the water; hitting cover.
• How deep will my crankbait really run? — Bassmaster (Greg Hackney, 2016) — thinner line, longer casts and more speed run deeper; within 2 feet of the package; 10 to 14 lb fluorocarbon; reel spool size.
• Deep cranking tips — Bassmaster (Kevin VanDam, 2012) — 17 versus 12 lb, fluorocarbon versus mono, rod angle, kneel and reel, wind, long-lining, weighting a 6XD, the 7'10" rod and 5.3:1 reel, the 18-feet-in-17 rule.
• 5 mistakes deep crankers make — Bassmaster (Louie Stout, with Tim Horton, 2012) — line, casts, reels and rods, rod angle, hooks.
• Kevin Short: The art of deflection — Bassmaster (Brent Conway, 2010) — the squarebill's bill and hooks, deflection, burn and kill, hot water, repeated casts.
• Roland Martin on shallow cranking — Bassmaster (2011) — bump and pause, floating free of snags, braid with a fluorocarbon leader, 6.3:1 reel, cover to 5 feet.
• The versatile square bill crankbait — Bassmaster (Kevin VanDam, 2018) — the KVD squarebill sizes, the 4.0 at about 10 feet, cover, history.
• Crankbait tips for the four seasons — Bassmaster (David Hunter Jones) — Jones in spring, Horton in summer, Evers in fall, DeFoe in winter.
• Lipless crankbaits for winter bass — Bassmaster (Don Wirth, with Kevin VanDam) — the yo-yo, ripping from grass, 5.3:1 reel, 10 to 20 lb fluorocarbon, colors, cold water.
• Ripping traps in grass — Bassmaster (Andrew Upshaw, 2011) — three retrieves, 1/2 and 3/4 oz, heavy rod, 7:1 reel, copolymer line.
• Lipless Crankbaits — Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation — sinking versus floating, the steady retrieve, weights by depth, colors.
• Kentucky Afield Outdoors: Power vs Action — KDFWR (Lee McClellan, 2024) — moderate action for crankbaits, medium-power baitcasting for deep divers, spinning versus baitcasting by line and lure weight.
• Three State Resort Parks For Great Fall Fishing — KDFWR (Lee McClellan, 2020) — the deep-running shad crankbait on Kentucky Lake's fall banks.
• Summer Fishing Tips — KDFWR — crankbaits for deeper bass, white bass, walleye and hybrids.
• Remember small lakes this crappie season — KDFWR (Lee McClellan, 2024) — Baker's summer crankbait trolling for crappie.
• Reservoir Smallmouth Bass Season Around the Corner — KDFWR (Lee McClellan, 2019) — the mid-October to late-spring smallmouth season and the lures it names.

Related

Species

• Largemouth bass
• Smallmouth bass
• Crappie

Techniques

• Spinnerbait
• Jig

Knots

• Palomar knot
• Non-slip loop

Line

• Line systems
• Monofilament, fluorocarbon and braid

Gear

• baitcasting-setup
• Rods and reels

Waters

• Kentucky Lake
• Lake Cumberland
• Dale Hollow Lake