Corky Suspending Lure Tips & Tutorial (Paul Brown Fat Boy Pro)
- By: Wyatt Parcel
- on
Are you a fan of using Corky or Paul Brown suspending lures?
What are the best ways and times to use this lure for catching big fish?
Corky lures or Paul Brown lures are soft suspending baits that have their own list of advantages in certain situations.
Learn more from Capt. Caleb down below!!
Corky Suspending Lure Tutorial
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Out of the package, Corky’s are typically straight and streamlined.
You want to bend the nose and tail of the lure down as far as you possibly can.
This allows the lure to sit in the water column better and it keeps the head down to improve its presentation.
There are lots of ways to retrieve a Corky and ultimately, there is no wrong way to swim these lures.
Compare throwing a Corky to throwing a small topwater lure.
Throw the lure out and let it sink for a few seconds.
Sink rates depend on the salinity of the water you are fishing in but usually, with this lure, it is a foot for every 1-1.5 seconds.
After allowing it to sink, implement a simple walk-the-dog retrieve technique.
The biggest mistake people make with retrieving Corky’s is they aren’t constantly reeling in the lure.
Your reel should always be moving as you retrieve the lure back to you.
If you don’t reel in as you work the Corky, the line can get wrapped up around the tip of your rod and cause issues.
Moreover, you can mix in slight pauses and twitches here and there as you reel in the lure.
A lot of times on the pause and fall, fish will strike your lure on the fall.
Another method for retrieving this lure is letting it pause and fall, but instead of continuing the retrieve as normal, you crank the reel fast.
Oftentimes, a fish will see the lure falling and then quickly dart off which can trigger a reaction strike.
Corky lures are versatile and in spite of popular opinion, they can be used any time of the day on any day.
There is always an opportunity to mess around with your Corky presentation and change things up every now and then to create many presentations with the same lure.
You can fish this type of lure in a plethora of ways in any scenario.
This further solidifies the Corky as a versatile and unique lure in your arsenal.
Corky Suspending Lure Tutorial [VIDEO]
Conclusion
Corky or Paul Brown Fat Boy Pro lures are extremely versatile suspending soft bait lures that explore different depths of the water column and have countless presentations.
Be sure to note that you can manipulate the body of the lure to swim and perform how you want.
Corky lures are best utilized when you change up presentations to find what works best!
If you have any further questions on Corky lures, please let me know down in the comments!
And if you know someone who wants to learn more about Corky lures, please TAG or SHARE this with them!
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Great info Wyatt and Caleb (a.k.a “Dusty” if you’re a Bite Me Podcast listener LOL) I just received one from SS that I might just try out tomorrow!
Thanks Caleb and Wyatt! I just received my first-ever Corky from SS shop. Tried it today from a dock just to try to get familiar. A few observations:
Fat Boy Pro casts a mile! My first cast went straight to the bank on the other side. I had to walk over and get it!
When working twitch-pause (like I do a Mirrodine), it seemed to have the same
sort of action. So in that case, I basically have another suspending twitch bait, but one that is a little larger and casts further. On that note, I wondered since baitfish are smaller this time of year, if a Soft Dine might be better?
When I tried the walk the dog action, it worked surprisingly well for my time time. (Action-wise. I didn’t catch anything).
Question: like in Caleb’s video, even when I let it sink to the bottom/near bottom after the cast, when I started walking it, it was just below the surface. I mean almost on surface.
That seems great for when I’m getting short strikes on a Topwater. But this time of year, based on what I’m learned from SS staff, I need to be fishing slow retrieves on a suspending twitch bait, letting it sink slowy over a pothole
Or depth change, which is when I will get a strike. This near-surface walk the dog seems out of place in this colder weather. What am I missing?
Also, I noticed Caleb using a bait caster, and his walk the dog rig action appeared to be twitching rod tip upwards. I tend to point my spinning rod rip either parallel or downwards when I’m walking the dog with a surface lure. Is that a baitcaster vs spinning thing or is that a Corky walk vs Topwater walk technique difference?
Thanks y’all !
Correct, it’s another form of suspending twitch bait. Rarely do you see them offered in such large sizes, and even rarer do you see such an eggagerated walk-the-dog action.
I would say that if it’s riding to high, you might not have tuned the nose and tail down enough, but also, you’ll want to let it sink down to the strike zone before you walk it. This takes time to learn how long to wait (often times you’ll learn how close you are to bottom by pulling weeds or mud) and ideally, you’ll want to be a foot or two off bottom. It can also be worked higher in the column, or even on top like a topwater. The versatility of this bait is pretty remarkable!
The fast walk near the surface isn’t out of place for winter. Large trout on the flats are ridiculously aggressive and will hawk one of these down, and they would prefer it to ride just under the surface (like the mullet we see swimming around) in about 2-3 ft of water. The caveat to this is that big trout are few and far between, so this approach is more about quality, rather than quantity. I’ll happily spend 4+ hours in the morning wading for one big trout, but it’s not for everyone. This is a wintertime bait for big trout, but reds will hit it too (not as common) if they’re large enough and feeling aggressive.
As for the direction of the rod twitch, I work mine sideways, Caleb work’s his up. It’s really just a matter of personal preference as long as your lure is staying in the strike zone and walking properly.
Wow, Wyatt. Thanks for the thorough, helpful reply. Y’all are the best.
@Wyatt. Do you switch out trebles for unlines on the Corky?
Inlines
Oops. Just saw your reply below. Thanks
I had also been to Paul Brown’s garage a couple of times. Brings back good memories.
I also never did the walk the dog with the Fat Boy But will give it a try. I use Softdine XLs quite a bit. I may try walking the dog with them too.
Definitely give it a shot! They’re a great lure but they take a little practice to get proficient with!
Thank you Capt. for this tutorial. I just bought my first PB’s heard about them some time ago. Looking forward to using them in the future
Awesome! Can’t wait to see what you catch with them Jose!!
Thanks Capt. Caleb, I love the PB Corky tutorial, The Corky is a killer, but I never thought of Walk-the-Dog.
Yup! A great way to think about it is just working a topwater under the surface!
So glad you guys have Captain Caleb on board now. Follow him on YouTube and always thought he would be an excellent SS addition.
He’s the bomb! We’re so happy to have him as a guest coach!
Thanks for a most informative tutorial Capt. I’ll start throwing it again because of this piece !!!
Can’t wait to see what you catch with it George!!
I grew up in Texas and I can remember going to Paul Browns house and getting lures out of his garage in Pasadena and later in friendswood. My Dad use to test them back in the day and give feedback. Great lures!! I use them here in Florida and still getting the same great results.
That is so cool!! I’ve heard many stories about folks going and picking up lures from his garage!
Capt Caleb
Again, a pleasure to have you on the Salt Strong Team!
Thank you for a brush up on the Corkie techniques!
My question (possibly a repeat):
What is your take on in-line hooks on the Corkies?
Wyatt, your take on this as well?!
Those with any opinion seem to be very polarized on it. Cptn Jay Watkins says “NO”, throws off the action too much., others have said with the correct in-line hooks, the action stays the same. I prefer in-line hooks over trebles on everything, & half my Corkies are converted. But as I am learning to use the Corkies, I can’t tell which is better, since I am still a relative newbie with them & both versions seem to be avoided by the trout at this time! :-).
I have put in-lines on my corkys when the grass is super heavy and it doesn’t seem to affect the bite at all! It’s more for me about the walk, which if you tune the bait (twisting the nose and tail) the hooks don’t affect it much.
Thanks Wyatt!
I will try for a similar weight comparison for the treble replacements. As well as an initial saltwater test for sink rate.
The pronounced front & rear wire bends will be included in my new experiments!