Tackle store wisdom with Terry Scroggins 

Nearly every good fishing trip includes a visit to the local tackle shop. As a kid, stopping at the bait shop to pick up a box of nightcrawlers or a dozen wax worms on the way to the pond was as much a part of fishing as stringing up your pole and tying on a hook. The smell of minnow tanks, stink bait and soft plastics brings along a boat load of good memories for most fishermen. 

MLF pro Terry Scroggins is well-known for being a tackle tinkerer and making a lot of the baits in his garage that he fishes with on the Bass Pro Tour, but “Big Show” loves stopping in to old-school tackle stores just the same. Even if that means hopping in his Toyota Tundra and driving 90 minutes each way like he did during his off-day for Minn Kota Stage Seven Presented by Humminbird on the St. Lawrence River. 

“I always find one reason or another to go spend money at a tackle store,” Scroggins said with a laugh. “Like most people these days, I order 95% of what I need online on Bass Pro Shops website or other online retailers, but there’s no replacing a trip to a local bait and tackle store.

“Especially when we come north. Anglers love New York because we get a lot of bites and catch a lot of fish, which means we go through a lot of baits, and weights in my case this week.”

Scroggins made the three-hour roundtrip drive from his Air BnB outside of Massena to the 1000 Island Bait Store for a basket full of drop-shot weights, a few bags of soft plastics and a couple bonus lures that caught his eye. In the process, he shot the bull with a dozen locals and put a smile on every one of their faces before taking his treasures to his truck.

What may sound like a waste of time to some was a chance to support a local store, make a few new friends and learn a thing or two for the Team Toyota pro. Bass Pro Tour competitors cannot accept information from anyone outside the tournament, but that doesn’t mean they can’t take notice of local tackle trends. 

“Make no mistake, pro anglers are paying close attention when they walk into a tackle store,” Scroggins said. “When you look at a wall of baits and you see a peg that’s almost empty, you can bet fish have been biting that bait. On the flipside, I get excited if I’m catching them on a certain lure or technique in practice and I notice no one else is buying it (that lure). It gives me a little confidence that I may have something all to myself.” 

Big Show recalled one such summertime tournament where he was using deep-diving crankbaits to catch offshore bass. In practice, he found he was getting the most bites on a plug with a purple back and white underside, not exactly a staple color in the world of deep crankbaits. 

“I went to a popular tackle store the night before the tournament and they had like 20 of the exact color I was looking for,” he said. “I’m talking two pegs fully stocked, not even one missing. I figured I was either onto something or I was an idiot, so I bought every one they had. I got a Top 10 in that event and used those crankbaits to catch every fish. 

Scroggins’ practice has him feeling optimistic, as he hopes for a similar payoff from his tackle store trek this week on the St. Lawrence River.