Five Artificial Baits that Catch Big Speckled Trout

If you are a serious speckled trout fisherman then you’ve been in this situation. You are fishing a promising looking spot. You know the trout are there because you are catching one small one after another. The soft plastic under a popping cork is doing its job. But you’re tired of catching the little ones.

What’s your next move? Well…it isn’t doing more of the same. Do you keep casting the popping cork and catching the undersized trout?

I’ve been saltwater fishing my entire life and have been fortunate to be able to fish a lot in the last ten years. Here are the top five artificial baits I use to catch large speckled trout.

Spotted seatrout are resourceful carnivores who start off life eating mostly small crustaceans. When they grow to a medium size their diet is a mix of crustaceans and small fish. Large fish feed primarily on other fish including mullet, pinfish, and menhaden.

Trout are amazing eaters, they don’t hesitate to attack and eat something half their own size.

With that in mind, I don’t hesitate to throw a larger artificial bait.

The Heddon Spook is my number one topwater artificial for speckled trout

The Heddon Spook is an elongated football shaped lure that  has been around for many years for a very good reason-it catches fish! Using the traditional “walk the dog” retrieve it can be irresistible to big trout. When an aggressive trout blows up your topwater lure it is an experience that you don’t forget.

The Heddon Spook is available in several sizes and colors, I prefer the Super Spook Jr when conditions are calm. The Super Spook Jr is 3 1/2 inches long and weighs 1/2 ounce. When the wind picks up and the water surface  gets rougher,  I cast the larger traditional 4 ½ inch Zara Spook.

Sea trout feed on mullet throughout most of their range and the Heddon Spook top water lure mimics a wounded mullet struggling on the surface. These lures are available in many colors, I prefer a lure with a dark back and silver belly color pattern that closely resembles mullet coloration.

The Mirrorlure 19MR-S MirrOminnow twitchbait

The MirrOlure 19MR-S MirrOminnow Twitchbait is a relatively long and thin hard bait.  It is 3 ¼” inches long, weighs 3/8 ounces and resembles a finger mullet or glass minnow.

The lure runs just below the surface of the water and requires patience to work correctly. Using an alternating jerk, retrieve, jerk, retrieve pattern with pauses after each jerk, strikes often occur when the bait is suspending or slowly sinking.

The MirrOlure 19MR-S has saved more than one trip for me. A couple of years ago I was throwing a 19MR-S and catching some very nice trout. No else on the boat was catching anything of legal size. I didn’t have another  19MR-S in my tackle box so I eventually handled my rod over to my son who immediately hooked and landed a fat twenty-two incher.

The MirrOlure MirrOdine MR17 suspending twitch bait

The MirrOlure MR17 suspending hard bait resembles a small menhaden. Weighing in at 3/8 ounces and 2-5/8 inches in length these baits have along history of catching trout. The MR17 sinks slowly with a wobbling action that large trout can’t resist snatching up.

It takes patience to work the MirrOlure MR17. The retrieve pattern should be a twitch, pause, retrieve sequence. I prefer odd number twitches, usually one, three, or five followed by a pause of up to five seconds, then a short retrieve. Cold water situations require a slower retrieve with longer pauses and less aggressive twitches.

Its not uncommon in clear water to see a fish attack and miss the lure. If that happens let the lure sink-there is a good chance of another strike on the fall. On some days the strikes will come almost exclusively on the pause, on other days the trout will strike it on the twitch.

The MR17 is available in a multitude of colors. Top colors I use include a dark back silver belly combination, a red or pink color pattern, an all silver pattern and something containing chartreuse. There are days when speckled trout will only hit a specific color lure, so if one color isn’t working, keep changing lure colors until you find a color and pattern that is working for that particular day.

The Paul Brown Fat Boy is one of the most underutilized lures for catching large sea trout

The Paul Brown Fat Boy is a 3 ½ inch, 7/8 ounce through-wire soft plastic twitch bait. This fish catcher was originated in Texas by a legendary sea trout angler and entrepreneur who developed a soft plastic twitch bait lure that yields some of the largest spotted sea trout.

The Fat Boy has a larger profile than the MirrOlure MR17, but is fished in a similar way, using the twitch, pause, retrieve method. It takes some time to get used to fishing this lure, the twitches have a longer and more pronounced dart action than the MR17, and the sinking action is more subdued. It contains an internal rattle that adds another attractive component.

The size, weight and overall configuration of the Fat Boy lure cuts through the air and allows you to cast long distances. This comes in handy when the wind kicks up. It is available in wide variety of colors, my personal favorite is the pearl with orange throat. One downside of this bait that even though it is a durable soft plastic, they wear out more quickly than traditional hard lures, especially if bluefish are around.

The Zman Jerk Shadz five inch soft plastic jerk bait

The Zman Jerk Shadz five inch soft plastic jerk bait is a long slender soft plastic with a split tail that can be fished in combination with a variety of jig heads and hooks. My preferred way to fish it is rigged on a weighted swimbait hook. This combination has produced large fish with on days when other baits were not getting strikes.

The Zman Jerk Shadz can be retrieved in a variety of ways. It can be fished with a traditional lead head jig with a lift, drop, lift, drop retrieve pattern. It can be fished slow and deep which is an effective technique in cold water, or it can be fished as a true jerk bait with a series of violent twitches followed by a pause. This is my favorite way to fish it, there is something about this retrieve that it can induce strikes even on slow days.

Installing the Zman Jerk Shadz on a weighted hook takes a little practice to get the bait  to swim the way you want it to. Take your time to get the soft plastic on straight on the hook and tune it occasionally so it will track through the water without spinning or twisting.

The Zman jerk bait is available in a slew of colors. I fish darker colors in clear water or bright sunshine and lighter colors in dirty water or overcast  conditions. The dark body with the chartreuse tail pattern is also productive.

Speckled sea trout are found in near-shore and inland estuarine waters on the Atlantic coast from Maryland south to Florida and on the Gulf coast from Florida west to Texas. Cynoscion nebulosus is the scientific name for the speckled trout and they are also known throughout their range as spotted sea trout or just specks. The big females are referred to as gators. Although they are relatively easy to catch as a species, the big ones tend to be elusive but using these five lures you will be able to land your share.

Additional information and buying resources on these artificial baits are available at the manufacturers’ websites linked below.

Heddon Zara Spook  https://www.lurenet.com/brands/heddon

Mirrolure 19MR-S, Mirrolure 17MR, Paul Brown Fat Boy  https://www.shopmirrolure.com/

Zman Jerk Shadz  https://zmanfishing.com/

I have no affiliation with any of these companies and don’t receive compensation for mentioning them. I use their products and recommend them.

Gator sea trout caught on a Paul Brown Fat Boy by the author