Z-Man DoormatadorZ Saltwater Grub Soft Bait???

[BoatGuy]

Competition for GULP? It has a Super Gel scent. I just can't keep up with all the new stuff.

Besides, I still like spearing best for fluke.

 

[BennyV]

Competition for GULP? It has a Super Gel scent. I just can't keep up with all the new stuff.

Besides, I still like spearing best for fluke.

I’ll try it. I am a bait guy at heart though. A few spearing is all I need. If I get crazy maybe a piece of fluke belly.

 

[BoatGuy]

A few spearing is all I need. If I get crazy maybe a piece of fluke belly.

I agree. I tried GULP again this year. I seems to tear too easy. And the Sea Robins are shredding it. The spearing are more durable than the GULP. Maybe is sales drop, they will make it more durable.

 

[pequa1]

Haven't bought bait since I started kayaking in 2005. Perhaps most of my Gulp is the older and tougher stuff ? I do notice that soaking Bass Assassins and other "plain" plastics in the "juice" seem to get less hits than regular Gulp.

 

[Leprechaun]

So if you haven't already seen the On The Water video, here it is:



And here are my thoughts, bearing in mind I have not tried this specific bait.

I'm not a fan of any closed-cell plastic-bodied bait being used with a scent. Not in the deep ocean water I fish, anyway. I don't even care for those Berkeley plastic baits - what are they called? Power Baits with built-in scent? Yeah, that's it. "Fish hold onto them 400% longer," that's Berkeley's marketing claim. Yeah, right. Not the deep fluke. They avoid them like the plague.

Smearing some scented jelly on a plastic bait might work for a few minutes of a fast drift, but its actually a poor substitute for what Berkeley has developed with their permeable-bodied GULP! baits. I guess there must be a patent on the GULP! bait's body formation, because no one has ever brought anything like to market. Always a plastic, never an organic body.

Plastic will not normally absorb scent. Not to an effective degree anyway. Again, though I have not seen these Z-man baits, watching that video gave a great indication of what's up with them. They look (and stretch) exactly like the Z-man baits that have been around forever. Except now they’re repackaging them with Pro Cure gel, and have given them an impressive re-name. DoormatadorZ indeed. Quick, someone warn the fluke! O’le!

Let me relate a quick story, so you can better judge my, umm, judgement. About five Springs ago I stopped by "The Worm Lady's" table at the Freeport show. She had these GORGEOUS soft plastic Gulp-imitating baits, that perfectly mimicked Berkeley's big 6" jigging grubs - and in all the proper colors too, including glow-in-the-dark. Very vivid - beautiful baits they were. I was quite impressed.

So I thought that perhaps, in the interest of pure science (of course), I should make a small investment in a few dozen of her baits, soak them in GULP! juice and give them a whirl. So, that's what I did. I let them stew in that juice for many months prior to taking them offshore with me.

Based on my earlier paragraphs can you guess the results? Miserable! Used side-by-side against my GULP!-using fishin' buddies (All are really good fluke jiggers), my "home-made GULP!" couldn't catch a cold. Hardly a half-hearted hit, while my "buddies" were whaling on the fish, all the while ribbing me for my stubborn refusal to switch back to the Gulparinos.

This testing went on for another three trips - on and off, and I even waited 'til the fish were at that point in the tide when they were really wacking our lines - still, horrible results. Enough was enough. I ended up giving the whole bottle of home-treated Worm Lady baits to a buddy who's building a cabin upstate, very near a good FW bass lake. Perhaps he'll have better luck with them there than I did in the salt. I hope so, anyway.

My conclusion is that though we all love to hate the delicate GULP! body formulation, what with their ridiculously easy to tear tails, they do catch like hell. I'm pretty dense, but not THAT dense. I am still capable of learning!

Now if Z-man has developed a body chemistry formulation that will absorb scent, then they might have something. But if its just another version of their "plastic fantastics," no thanks. I've already been down that road, before they even though of it.

 

[Leprechaun]

Whelp, here's some data to digest, concerning GULP! substitutes - it ends up as I thought it would. . .

 

[BoatGuy]

Thanks for posting that. The Z-man seemed to work well for Snook. Wonder why it didn't work as well for fluke. Smell?

I like the tip to dunk the fluke rig in Gulp juice when starting a new drift.

 

[NoFlukenName]

Thanks for posting that. The Z-man seemed to work well for Snook. Wonder why it did work as well for fluke. Smell?

I like the tip to dunk the fluke rig in Gulp juice when starting a new drift.

Has to be the scent. Skinner even commented that the action on the Z-Man was insanely good. I think the Snook may be more focused on the movement and “sound” - I know many of his Snook immediately snatched the presentation tight to the mangroves as soon as the presentation hit the water. My guess is they scavenge anything that falls of those mangroves....