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Jason Moss
Home: Castalian Springs, TN Old Hickory Lake
Occupation: Eterprise Engineer at Corrections Corp of America and Professional Bass Angler
Boat: 2006 Stratos 201 Pro XL / Yamaha VMAX HPDI250
Sponsors: Yamaha Outboards, Secret Weapon Lures, High Roller Lures, Gambler Lures, Gamakatsu, SPRO.
Tournaments: Stren Series, Stratos Owners Tournament Trail, BFL Music City Division, TBF, American Bass Anglers, Bassmaster Weekend Series. Plans to fish as co-anglers in several FLW Series, FLW Tour, and B.A.S.S. Elite series events as a co-angler in 07
Favorite Fishing Style: Flippin/Pitching, Topwater, Spinnerbaits
Family: Wife - Desiree, Kids - Jacob & Julian (The new generation of Bass Anglers)
Service: US Navy from 1997-2000 Norfolk VA Station on USS WASP
Favorite Touring Pro: Gerald Swindle.... Gotta love the G MAN!
 Using the Secret Weapon Buzz-R-Baits — I throw my buzzbaits on a medium heavy 6.6 rod unless I’m fishing around overhanging trees and areas where I need to make short underhanded accurate casts and then I throw it on a 5.6 MH rod (I had this one custom made), but a 6-ft would probably work too. I use the same rods for my spinnerbaits that I use for my buzzbaits.
I use an Abu Garcia 5500 casting reel. I like the Garcia’s for any type of cast and retrieve presentation. I like a medium speed 5:x:1 or 6:1:1 for spinnerbaits and buzzbaits. It gives you speed if you need it but also isn’t’ so fast that it becomes hard to slow your bait down slow enough.
I recommend heavy mono for use with buzzbaits, usually 17-, 20-, or 25-pound test; it all depends on what I’ve got when I’ve got to re-spool. The key is just stout mono. Why mono? You will have a bunch of people tell you they throw theirs on braid and fluorocarbon but I use heavy mono because it floats better then braid and fluorocarbon (braid does sink once it’s gotten wet) and because of the stretch factor. When a fish blows up on my buzzbait, I continue reeling until I feel the fish at which point I bow into the fish EXACTLY like I would if fishing a spinnerbait. A huge, HUGE key to fishing a buzzbait is the trailer hook, ALWAYS use a trailer hook.
As to targeting structure, when fishing a buzzbait my goal is to hit whatever I’m fishing as much as possible. If it is grass then I target the edges and anywhere the grass makes a point, pulling the buzzbait right through the edge of the grass and along the outside. On the points of the grass I want to actually hit the last couple of blades of grass.
For lay-downs, log jams, and standing timber (like your cypress trees) I try to contact the wood as much as possible. For lay-downs I make a cast on each side of the lay-down coming down the main part of the trunk, contacting as much of it as I can and reeling as slow as I can (this is where the Secret Weapon Buzz-R-Bait comes into play but I’ll talk about that later.)
If it’s a lay-down with lots of branches I’ll make a couple of casts across the lay-down contacting any branch with the blade that is sticking out of the water and across the end of the lay-down which is usually in a lot deeper water then the base of the lay-down.
For log jams I make multiple casts, paralleling any log I can parallel in the jam, coming right through the middle of any V’s that the logs make and contacting it as much as I can. One great presentation for lay-downs and log jams both is after you contact the last bit of the lay-down or log jam, pause the buzzbait and let it fall for a second, make sure you are hanging on and ready for a bite. Also when you hit structure, if they aren’t biting it right away, try making it look as if the bait deflected off the structure for a turn or two, so when you bump the side of that log, switch the rod to make the bait come out away from the log a little and then bring it back toward the log to hit it again.
Around cypress trees I make 4–6 key casts per tree and move on. Each cast will go past the tree and smack it as it comes by. You want to make sure you get a cast on each side, one down the front and one down the back. If it’s a big tree then cover other angles/areas of the stump of the tree that maybe the four casts didn’t get. Just remember to contact the tree each time. Again, a slight pause after contact here can generate a bite.
Now for my personal key elements of a buzzbait: I like my buzzbaits to be noisy but not from clackers. I like a good loud squeaky buzzbait. I like a buzzbait that can be reeled super slowly and I like a buzzbait with a stout, fairly wide-gap hook and a trailer hook about the same. I use silver-bladed buzzbaits with light skirts for clearer water and sunny days. On stained water I use a gold blade and dark skirts or skirts with chart in them early in the morning, late in the evening, and on cloudy days.
My recommendation is obviously the Secret Weapon Buzz-R-Bait. I have been fishing this Buzz-R-Bait since it was in the prototype stage and I absolutely love it. I throw the smaller 3/16-oz, which is actually about the size of a normal average buzzbait. The blade may be a little smaller but its not one I’d call a small buzzbait.
The Buzz-R-Bait is different because it has a small spinnerbait blade attached behind the buzz blade. This blade draws the strikes back towards the hook and also causes more drag and lift which will allow you to fish the Buzz-R-Bait slower the most other buzz baits. This blade also causes more turbulence and puts off a different vibration in the water then your traditional buzz bait. I like to bump the spinner blade up one size (from a #1 to a #2).
I ALWAYS use some sort of trailer on my Buzz-R-Bait. This helps the bait get on top quicker, gives the bait a little more action under the water, gives the bait a bigger profile, and helps slow it down even more. My go-to Buzz-R-Bait is the 3/16-ounce in white/chart with a white or chart trailer and a trailer hook. (One comes packaged with each bait.)
Another tip I can give you for any buzzbait is to break it in. The more that blade spins the more squeak it will develop and the louder the squeak the better the buzzbait. I like to take mine and tie them to a short heavy piece of braided line and tie it to the antenna of my truck (make sure you tie it tight so you don’t lose it.) and leave it that way until I’m ready to fish with it. Another thing you can do is position your rod and the bait on your boat so that when towing it to the lake and when running from spot to spot the blade gets broke in even more. You can also take some heavy grit sand paper and sand the areas where the blade spins around the arm, scratching the smooth part of the arm up causes more friction and more squeak.
While fishing the Buzz-R-Bait, from time to time I find that the fish will hit short or roll on the bait but miss it. This happens on buzzbaits, period... not just the Secret Weapon Buzz-R-Bait. Here’s a tip on what you can do to provoke more strikes when using the Secret Weapon Buzz-R-Bait: change your presentation up a little by giving the Buzz-R-Bait light twitches. This causes the bait to spit and sputter and causes a slight pause in the movement. I’m sure many of you have done this with your buzzbaits, BUT the difference is that also when doing this, the trailer blade on the Buzz-R-Bait will flip up and smack the buzz prop causing a clinking or flicking sound, much like the sound a shad makes when it breaks the surface of the water - that little pop you hear when they are skittering across the surface running from bass.
Time and time again I have had bass CRUSH and completely inhale the Buzz-R-Bait when doing this. As a test, I took the trailer blade off to see if the bass were hitting because of the erratic sputtering and splashing of the blade or if the sound the trailer blade was making was actually causing the reaction. The results: I still had fish hit the Buzz-R-Bait on the twitch but NONE of them were crushing it like they had with the trailer blade on. I put the blade back on, and once again I was back to getting my arm broke with huge blowups - the thing we all want and love to see when fishing a buzzbait or Buzz-R-Bait.
This presentation helped me finish 39th in the BFL Regional on Kerr Lake recently, in which the majority of my fish were caught on Secret Weapon products!
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