It’s absolutely chaotic.  One turn of your reel handle and you begin to feel a thumping sensation.  A thump, a thump, a thump…you feel as the lure speeds through the grass.  You are anticipating a bone crushing strike.  No bass can resist that enticing thump and flash the Potomac Punisher is putting off.  It’s going to surely be Kaotik when that bass tries to destroy it.

It’s not a jig or a spinnerbait, but it has some of the same attributes that a jig or a spinnerbait have.  I guess you would say it’s a hybrid of the lures.  A bladed swim jig has the head of a jig, a blade to create vibration and flash attached to the jig head, and wears a skirt.  Everything needed to create a lure that attracts bass even if they are suspending or lethargic.  A bladed swim jig can be fished on the bottom, around cover, under boat docks, rock piles, brush, or anywhere you would fish any lure.  There is no wrong way to fish it, unless you leave it in your tackle box.  There are a number of bladed swim jigs anglers can buy, but one has the unique ability to be reeled in extremely fast without rolling over or tracking erratically side to side is the Potomac Punisher by Kaotik Lures.  The 3/8-ounce Potomac Punisher has a slender head with an open eye jig that allows it to cut the water when retrieved, a one-of-a-kind Bubbler blade that causes the jig body to undulate back and forth giving it a life-like appearance that produces a micro-bubbling effect, a high quality V-Cut 44-strand silicone skirt, and a razor sharp 5/0 Mustad UltraPoint hook.

Bladed swim baits require only a trail to be attached to it before fishing.  What style, color, and size will depend on where the angler is fishing.  For example, an angler fishing clear water impoundments will catch more fish with a transparent skirt and matching trailer.  An angler should use more bright colors like firertiger on bladed swim baits in stained or muddy water.  Anglers should also try to match the forage in the reservoir they are fishing in.  Does the reservoir have blueback herring, gizzard shad, threadfin shad, or gobies?  Each one of these baitfish has a distinct color pattern that can be replicated with the right skirt and trailer combination.  Another thing to remember is some lakes have color patterns that always catch fish like red bladed swim jig on Lake Sam Rayburn in Texas, natural shad on Table Rock Lake in Missouri, or junebug on Lake Okeechobee in Florida.  As for what retrieve to use it depends on the reservoir.  They can be rigged with a beaver style bait and yo-yoed up and down in clear water situations, burned back over open water, ticked over the top of aquatic vegetation, pitched around cover, or simply reeled in steadily.  Any style trail can be used with a bladed swim jig.  “I like to use a streamline type bait like a curl tail, thin spilt tails, 4-inch Rick Clunn grub trailer, or a Reaction Innovations Sweet Beaver,” Pat Rall, owner of Kaotik Lures (www.shakerbait.com) continued, “the Potomac Punisher  is less likely to hang up than the standard spinnerbait and more versatile.  No other bladed swim jig has more vibration with its unique blade design that has holes in it; these holes also produce the trail of micro-bubbles that attract fish.”   Rall likes to fish a bladed swim jig with a 7-foot rod in either a medium heavy action or medium action on 12-pound monofilament although it’s not uncommon for other anglers to use either fluorocarbon or braided line depending on the cover they are fishing, and a 6:3.1 high speed reel.

Do you want your next fishing trip to be Kaotik?  Start casting a bladed swim jig around cover or near structure.  That thump, thump, thump vibration is sure to be interrupted by an explosive strike.