3:16 Freestyle Herring

[mx4life14]

Last year I was lucky enough to get a Freestyle herring when they were released. I remember sitting in front of the computer for like 2 hours clicking refresh because I wanted a shot at the sissy color so bad. Well I just happened to be at the right place at the right time and scored a Sissy Floater freestyle herring. I was so stoked! It came in the mail like 2 days later and had that "new bait smell still on her". I remember going that night to get it wet and see how it swims. And that night I had a new favorite bait.

 

Appearance: The freestyle herring is one sick looking bait! The gill plates are really defined like on most 3:16's. Right after the gill plates you have a really nice scale pattern all the way to the back tail. Color's and paint on 3:16's are the best! The pink almost has a pearl in it which makes it really pop! I have seen and fished the green back also which was awesome and realistic too! I’ve used the sissy color and got bit in day and night hours but the sissy seems to shine for me on those really (cant see the bow of your boat from the drivers seat) dark nights. The eyes are big on the herring which gives it this bug eye look that I like, almost like its always staring back at yah. After about a year and a half now of constant use its getting the normal hook rash and scratches from being thrown into trees off rocks and bounced off the shore many times. But its not to bad! The paints kind of flaking off the tail but again, this bait gets used constantly so in my opinion its holding up really good! Teeth marks and scratches.. it still catches fish!

 

Action: The second the herring hit the water you can see how fluid the joint's are. The herring is in my opinion one of the most fluid freestyles. It sits higher in the water which allows it to have one of the most aggressive blow ups of all the freestyles too! It has a ton of noise and water movement when machine gunned also, slightly more so then even a shad. As a twitch bait its pretty cool because you can let it sit for a while and just the slightest wind or waves will start to blow it around and if you give it the slightest twitch it will come alive. The slow roll is the bread and butter for me with this bait though. Most of the fish I catch with this bait are after giving it a long pause then ever so slowly reeling it about 2-7 feet then pause it again. Also what’s cool is if you reel it just at the right speed you can get it to clack which has also gotten me bit before.

 

When and where: So far this has proven to be a night killer for me! Like fishing a wake jr or baby wake it makes noise which is important for me at night. I am always listening to my surroundings and on long cast ill try to hone in and listen for my bait to make a cretin noise, I do the same with this bait. I also like casting this around trees and giving it one good wack to get a short blow up then dead stick it, it seems to draw them out at night. This bait is always on me when I go night fishing, and if im in my boat ive always got it tied on. Nights in between moon phases when you get that black dark where you cant see your feet when you look down and every cast is on the bank cause you cant see it is when the sissy color shines for me. I’ve caught fish when there was a chop on the water and it was dead calm. I’ve also thrown this bait when its been really bad weather with white caps on the lake and raining and got bit, so for me it works almost all the time. Id like to get my own natural colored one someday and try it in bluebird situations. I have a couple lakes back east I fish I know id slay and will have to get one to try by next summer

 

Hard wear: Im fishing mine stock with the round bends still. The split rings are not rusty, neither are the hooks. I have had decent luck with the round bends so I never change them out. 3:16 baits come with the good stuff stock so there isn’t much to worry about.

 

Run down: The freestyle herring is a bad a$$ bait! Like I said its one of my go to's. Ive caught fish in bad weather and dead calm nights, there is no special condition for me to throw this bait. The gear im using is 20 pound big game on either a curado or quantum cabo, rod-LDC XH or okuma H. The LDC has a faster tip I feel that allows you to really huck it where the okuma xh I have is more parabolic and doesn’t have the whip needed, however the H dose. In the end id highly recommend trying one if your thinking about it! Its a definite fish catcher!

 

 

More pics to come..Thanks

 

Bryson

[mx4life14]

Couple more pics,

 

[Darth Baiter]

Nice review!! Makes me wanna spend money i dont have.....

[jolley]

Now that was a review. Nicely done!

[Danny C.]

Great review! When I saw him nail a fish on his sissy herring I went out and got the next best thing, a sissy shad.

[Thebig1]

Killer review!!!!! Ummmmm can anyone say other then my that my next gotta have bait is a herring.

[mx4life14]

Thanks guys!

 

And for you Muskie guys. I've also thrown this bait on steel leader and not had a issue with performance. Floater tends to dip nose down witch can be a good thing in certin situations. Slow sink wasnt hurt at all by it.

[DBirdtn]

Probably my new dream bait sissy floater, man great review. good luck

[Luke V.]

The pink is the stink! I love my sissy baby wake, and my sissy rising sons, now I just need a shad or herring. Thanks for the review.

[SPEEDBEAD]

Shoulda never got rid of mine. Live and learn I guess.

 

Nice review.

[bigbaittoon]

I purchased a pair in early 2010 off the waiting list (floater/sinker).

Construction/Quality: You know what to expect from 316 no exception with the herring.

 

Retrieves: The bait was very fluid in the water and could be burned or creeped. When burned all of the joints moved, where on the creep only the back joints really moved. The herring is easier to "machine gun"? on top of the water, not sure how useful that is but when your bored it was kinda fun to do. When ripped it doesnt do a true 180 and instead flashes at a 90 degree turn showing the profile of the bait. When reeling in at a medium speed if you stop then the bait will pause to one side and give a little half turn.

 

Durability: The paint on the slow sink was as durable as other 316's, had the typical hook rash/ teeth mark rings around it with some scratches on the top of the head from teeth. I casted one up on a pipe on some delta riprap(accidentally) and automatically said theres no way it survived(Ive broken my share of 316's). Much to my surprise it came back fine minus some discoloration on the joint, so I was very impressed that it held up.

 

Catchability: I fished the floater for about 4 months and the sinker for maybe 8? Apart from a 13" bass on the floater I never got a bite or follower on it at a time when I was cracking topwater/wakebait fish, so I sold it because it clearly did not produce what I was looking for.

The sinker I fished a little longer, not really throwing it for a while. I caught a couple bed fish off it around 4lbs(ya i bedfished with it) and threw it during the postspawn to spots and largemouth. I never could get a spot to follow this bait which was disappointing. The largemouth I caught on this were all less than 4.5lbs, most came on a slow roll, one doing a directional change. Slowly this bait worked its way out of my box and I sold it this fall after not throwing it for more half a year.

 

[DBirdtn]

Had this bait now for 4 or 5 weeks.Haven't really got to fish it like i want to yet due to weather down here.But the one thing i have noticed about action is if you want the tightest fastest zerp of the tail this is the one. I have sisy ss and man when i retrieve t in and i'm talking about i have 401 te calcutta so its not a fast reel boy does the tail kick.I have trout shad, and nothing competes to the action and speed of the tail to me anyways than this. Can't wait until weather really breaks and i can fish it without line and guides freezing every other cast lol.

[Swimbaitbassin987]

Is that a good saltwater swimbait as well?