3 Tips for Trout on Popping Corks

There’s no denying the effectiveness of using popping corks for speckled trout in a number of situations, especially when they’re oriented to grass beds. But how you rig and fish that cork does have an impact on just how many fish you’ll catch. Want to up your popping cork game? These three tips will help make it happen.

How you rig and fish a popping cork will determine just how many fish you can fool into biting.

1. Choose an offering that has some scent. Unlike a straight cast-and-retrieve, the pause used with a popping cork gives the fish a fraction of a second more time than usual to eyeball a bait. Except that they don’t just eyeball it, they can also smell and taste it – often before you have the chance to react. When popping with a livie on the hook this aspect of things is taken care of, but when using a paddletail or plastic shrimp you’ll catch more fish if you use something that’s scented, like a Fishbites shrimp or a Gulp!. Another option is using an add-on scent like Pro-Cure. Either way, just be sure to use an offering that the fish will hold onto for a second or two after snapping.
2. Don’t fall into a rut with your retrieve style. It shouldn’t always be pop-pop-pause, nor should it always be pop-pause-pop. On different days and different tides different retrieve styles will work better or worse. So, you should always be varying your style. When you get a bite, stick with that cadence for a few casts and see if you get another. If not, start changing things up again.
3.  Don’t hesitate to trim or lengthen the leader. Sometimes two feet will be best, other times three feet does the trick. It’s a pain in the butt to constantly trim and re-tie, so we naturally tend to do it as little as possible. But on some days, that little change in leader length will make all the difference in the world.