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CL8Bait Baby Possum


FishDr
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There was a nice member review on the CL8Bait Water Vole done about a year ago (thanks Wnighswonger) but even though I’ve seen/read a decent number of reports about people catching fish on the CL8Bait Possum and Baby Possum, I’ve not seen a review on them, so I thought I’d give it a go. I’ll admit that I’ve been trying to get some good video footage to go along with the review for some time, but the floods and my work schedule have prevented me from getting anything spectacular, so I’ll just go with my only video with an amusing (but profane) soundtrack. Definitely do not play this loud, and definitely not at work – profane is a mild way to describe it.

 

First off, am I qualified to write a review? Only somewhat – I’ve thrown the Baby Possum for a season now (like many of my baits, it arrived after the lakes got a lid on them last year) and have caught enough fish on it that I think I can at least scratch the surface in the review. There are others who’ve fished the bait more and stuck some serious hawgs on it, and I’m counting on them to add pictures and knowledge as they see fit.

 

Now, while this review is about the Baby Possum, if you believe that bigger is better, as many swimbait junkies do, then take a look at the Possum. This gets you a full 8†body, 8†tail, and 7.5 ounces of fish catching marsupial. But I digress – I don’t have a full-sized Possum, yet, so I can’t speak to their effectiveness.

 

Specifications and General Description

Here is the bait, as you receive it from the dealer - you can buy it directly from Clayton Bryant at the CL8Baits website, or you can buy it from various online dealers (or loiter around the Black Market and hope that someone has a moment of weakness and sells you one). As with lots of the independent bait makers, Clayton will, if you contact him directly, custom-paint the bait for you – the top bait in the picture is one he painted for me in what I call “muskratâ€, while the bottom bait is the standard possum color. You can also get an all-black model from the online stores. Expect to pay around $60 for the bait, not counting shipping - if you hit one of the 20% off sales, you can get this bait for, well, 20% less.

 

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Weight: about 4.5 ounces for the standard waking possum. I throw mine on a heavy rod (but only when I forget to bring the XH rod) – I’m much happier throwing it on the XH rod. As you would expect for a lure that weighs 4.5 ounces, it casts a long, long way!

 

Length: 6" body, 6†tail, 12†overall. Even though this is the baby possum, it is not a small bait. It is wide, deep, and will get your attention.

 

So, what is the Baby Possum? I think the best way to describe it is as a rodent or rat-type lure, but one that has been modeled after a possum. Of course, a possum looks like an upsized rat, or perhaps a rat looks like a downsized possum. If you want to get academic about it, then technically there were possums on the planet before there were rats, so all rat baits are really possum baits, but hey, who cares. What matters is this – it looks like a long-nosed mammal with a long tail and when it falls in the water and swims along, it might just attract the attention of an angry bass or musky that decides that this more evolved vertebrate really needs to die!

 

One thing about the Baby Possum is that it looks, well, kind of cute, at least in the possum color. Yes, I just called a big bait cute, but if you look at the head-on picture of my two Baby Possums, you might just agree. There’s something about those big, wide whiskers and the black beady eyes that makes them visually appealing. My 7-year old daughter thinks that the Baby Possum is way cuter than my other rat-type baits, so if she says it’s cute, I’m sticking with it.

 

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Hardware and Durability

The hardware on the bait is interesting. It comes with a heavy duty screw eye for the line tie, solid joint hardware, and sticky-sharp 1/0 Owner ST-36 trebles that rotate, kind of like the BasStar Spintech treble hooks, except that the hooks here are solid, and the hook hangers, which are swivels that are largely embedded on the bait, are what rotates.

 

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The soft-plastic tail is surprisingly durable, and if you do manage to lose one, you can get more from the manufacturer or you can buy plastic worms of similar size, shape and color (or go with different colors) and fit them into the coil spring mount for the tail. I am still fishing the original tails on both my Baby Possums, even though they have puncture wounds from the hooks and bite marks from fish that missed.

 

The stock hooks on the Baby Possum, as I mentioned above, are sticky sharp Owners ST-36s, and while they are not as heavy-duty as ST-41s, I’ve not yet bent them out. I did have one eyeball come off the Baby Possum (actually a black bead) and when I contacted CL8Baits about it, a replacement was on the way immediately. You’ve got to love the customer service you get from the independent bait makers. Now that I’ve fished the bait for a while, I’m looking around bead stores (ostensibly to help my daughter with her arts and crafts projects) for reflective beads that I can use as replacements for the standard black beads. Why? Because I think it’d be neat to have a Baby Possum whose eyes reflect light at night, like the real deal does. Then I could set a headlamp on low and watch the eyes come wobbling across the water!

 

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The Baby Possum’s bill is made out of carbon fiber, and so far I’ve noticed no damage to them, even though I’ve thrown and cranked them into some unyielding objects. Everything has a breaking point (except maybe Chuck Norris), but if you’re halfway careful, I think you could wear out multiple sets of hooks before you destroy a lip.

 

As for durability, my Baby Possums have had a busy year, especially the possum-colored one. As you can see from the first picture, the paint jobs are showing some wear and tear. What has caused the damage? A couple of dozen fish per Possum, collisions with hard objects, including the odd rock landing at night (I hate when that happens), and hook rash.

 

Interestingly, the most damage the standard Baby Possum has gathered has been caused by the rear treble. I contacted Clayton about it and he said that he’s seen this on a few Possums, but never quite so bad – maybe my bait has a slightly different balance or sashay than the typical lure? Anyway, he had two suggestions. First, I could switch out the Owner ST-36s for ST-46s, which have point that bend in a bit more and are less like to scrape along the bait, but he cautioned that he felt the ST-36s had a better hook-up ratio (which settles it in my mind – changing hooks isn’t an option). The other option would be to protect the damaged area with a thinly applied coat of 2-part epoxy, which is harder than the bait material, and should resist the hooks a bit better. That’s the route I’ll likely take, especially now that we’re getting hit with sub-zero weather here in Colorado and the swimbait gear is getting a rest. Again, getting a quick reply and helpful support from the manufacturer is pretty cool.

 

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One thing I should point out is that despite the hook rash, I’ve seen no drop in fish catching ability, which is key. Perhaps the bass see the white portion of the Baby Possum and think – possum, it’s the other white meat, and hammer it! :)

 

Fish Catching Ability

I bought a Baby Possum for a variety of reasons. First, it just looked wicked and was so outlandish that I knew I could turn people’s heads by walking around with one tied on. If you already have people making snide remarks and doing double-takes when you walk around with a big trout-imitating bait on your rod, wait until you do the same thing with a Baby Possum. It gets their attention and often convinces them that yes, you are indeed a candidate for being fitted with a nice straitjacket.

 

Shock value aside, the main reason I bought the Baby Possum was that I was interested in getting a bigger rat-type bait, something that would move much more water than a 6 – 8†rat. I would have loved to get a Nezuuma Rat, but the price point for those was high enough that bringing one into the house could have led to some serious domestic strife. The Baby Possum looked like a good alternative, and after seeing some of the reports of its effectiveness posted on SU by the likes of Dsouth, I figured it was worth a shot.

 

Does it catch fish? Yes, but it didn’t catch fish for me immediately, which was a source of some frustration. I started off throwing it at night, in concert with my standby 9†Slammer, in ponds and lakes where I knew the fish would pound a slowly-waking surface bait. And you know, pound the slowly-waking Baby Possum they did, but for whatever reason, they would not stay hooked up ! I began to suspect that the rotating trebles had something to do with it ‘cause clearly it couldn’t be my fault ;-). I think that the first night I really put the Baby Possum to work I had 4 consecutive strikes and each and every fish came unbuttoned somewhere between hook-up and the ‘toon. I finally did land a fish that night, and was pretty pleased with myself.

 

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I was fishing it on the XH rod and 65-lb braid and perhaps that was the problem. I later switched the line to 30-lb P-line CXX (sometimes 30-lb Big Game) and the hooking rate has gone way up – but I still don’t know if it’s the trebles interacting with the stretch in the line or not.

 

Once I’d gained confidence that I could actually stick fish on the bait, I starter to put the Baby Possum through its paces. It turns out that the bait is surprisingly versatile, and catches fish in multiple situations. Here are a few that I’ve used with good effect to date.

 

Situations and Retrieves that work include:

- The classic slow grind on the surface. My number-one retrieve at night and not to be sneezed at by day either. The standard Baby Possum throws a wide wake, and even at a slow speed pushes a lot of water. If you speed up the retrieve to a speed just below the point where the lure wants to dive, it really kicks from side to side and moves enough water to wake the dead.

- A stop-and-go retrieve, especially around cover. Deadly by day, and, if your vampire-shift casting skills are up to par, deadly in the dark if you can drop it into weed pockets and around cover at night (when lots of rodents are afoot).

- Cranking below the surface. This is the sleeper, and this is where the standard Baby Possum is perhaps at its deadliest. Now I’ve never seen a real possum swimming underwater, but I’ve seen plenty of muskrats doing it, so maybe that is what the bass think they are seeing. On a slightly faster retrieve, the Baby Possum will run subsurface. If you channel Paul Elias, and kneel and reel, with your rod sticking down into the water, you can get it about 3/4 of a rod-length underwater or more. Reel steadily and hang on – the bass sometimes crush the Baby Possum with seething malice. If you’ve read any of the posts by DSouth, you know this works – and he’s got a special rod that makes it even deadlier, as well as one other refinement I’ll mention shortly.

- Deadsticking. Drop the Baby Possum by a likely looking piece of cover (like a steep riprap bank, laydown, or pocket in a weedbed) and just let it sit. When you can’t stand it anymore, twitch it just enough to make the tail kick once or twice and then let it sit again, but be ready, because fish will come up to blast the seemingly stunned or almost-drowned rodent at the surface.

 

When is a Baby Possum not a Possum?

When is a Baby Possum not a Baby Possum? When it is one of the custom-made cranking Baby Possums. I’ve got to thank Dsouth for letting me know that that CL8Baits makes more models of Baby Possum than are advertised on the website. If you want a Baby Possum that has a different lip angle than the standard one and that runs 4 – 6 feet deep on a standard retrieve, then you need to contact CL8Baits and ask for one. The price is about the same, but you might wait a little longer for delivery because they’re not an off-the-shelf item. Here’s my cranking Baby Possum next to the regular Baby Possum – note the slightly different lip angle.

 

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It also attracts the attention of the odd smallmouth bass…

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And can even attract the attention of the odd tiger muskellunge (even if my lame picture-taking cut off the muskies’ head)! :(

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So there you have it – the CL8Bait Baby Possum. Those of you who frequent this forum know that I have lived and died by the 9†Slammer for years, and I still do. However, I know bring a 2nd swimbait rod with me on almost all of my trips because having a Baby Possum tied on and ready to rock is now part two of my one-two punch. It’s a well-made bait that fits nicely in the rodent/terrestrial niche, it looks wicked, and it flat catches fish. There are other rat-type baits out there and I know they also catch fish, but there’s something about catching fish on the Baby Possum that just makes me smile. :D

 

Here’s the parting video…

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I've fixed a couple of the links - I couldn't edit my original post, for some reason. I apologize for the rookie mistakes.

 

This pic shows the difference between the two Baby Possum models.

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And here’s the parting video…I guess even a space matters

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  • 2 weeks later...

Great review and excellent pictures! I'm a big fan of this bait and am actually on my third one. For some reason I sold the first and kicked myself for doing so. Ended up buying another one then losing it. Lastly, a couple months ago Clayton did a custom gray one for me to replace the lost bait. Unfortunately I didn't get the new one until prime rat season was over with but it will be a mainstay for me in 2014. Also getting a crank down version custom done

 

Unfortunately, I have never caught a monster on the Baby Possum but several fish in the 3-5# range, which gives me confidence in the bait. Many were while cranking the bait down in the 2' range

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