Those that have been following along on the blog for the last few months, you are aware of some contests and product reviews in the works with Evolve Baits. 
Of the samples sent, I was immediately attracted to the Kompak craw. While I consider myself a pretty versatile angler, when permitted I will always look to power fish with jigs and soft plastics. At first glance, the Kompak craw can seem pretty simple and unassuming as a craw bait. Upon further inspection, there definitely was plenty of thought that went into this craw design.
My first inclination was to put it behind a hefty tungsten weight and flip it around heavy vegetation. The bait has a long body for it’s small stature, allowing you to put a large 4/0 flipping hook into the bait and it puts the point right in the back of the bait, where it should hook a large percentage of fish. Also, there is a slight bias to the bait front to back where the hook point goes, allowing a little extra meat for you to hide a big hook point. The subtle appendages also move enough water to get noticed in the thick cover.
A comparable bait that I like to use for similar presentation would be the old Yum Big Show Craw. Although the soft yet durable plastic of the Kompak craw holds up much better then the Big Show craw. So the introduction of the Kompak craw is welcomed in my boat, as it appears to be a better bait and Yum appears to have stopped producing the Big Show for the time being. If you love to punch milfoil or other vegetation with a craw, this is a must try bait!
The setup I used to fish the Kompak craw was Punch rigged with a 4/0 Trokar flipping hook, 20-25lbs fluorocarbon, 1/2-1oz Tungsten flipping weights, and predominantly rigged on my Dobyns Champion 805 Flip/Punch rod, when I would fish it on the 1/2oz weight, I would drop down to my Champion 734C.
In practice for the Madison Chain event, the Kompak craw produced several bites and fish worked in milfoil and docks. Our flipping bite fell apart during tournament, but I am excited to try them this weekend down on the Mississippi River! I also hope to give the DarkStar swimmer as a go as well this weekend, check back in the future to learn more about the Swimmer and VibraGrub.
As for our contest winner……
Merideth Gifford is our big winner, so here is the selection of Vibra Grubs, DarkStar Swimmers & Kompak craws she will get a chance to tempt Oklahoma Bass with!
Hopefully Merideth will be posting some pics to my Facebook wall with here results soon!
Thanks again to Evolve Baits for their support of this blog, you can find most of their baits online for purchase here.
