Today we’re going to look at another frog bait. I know that we have done a couple of these lately but that is because this is the time of year when this genre of lures is at it’s most effective. From now until late summer, there is a good chance that you will have some great days on the water throwing some kind of frog bait.
We have reviewed a couple of very good choices the past few weeks and I am going to throw a different design into the mix.
Several years ago the first of many soft plastic buzzin frogs was introduced. Tonight I am going to get down and dirty with the Attrax Mystic Frog.
Action And Construction
The overall length of this little frog is 4 inches and is designed a bit differently than most of the competition. It has the buzzin legs similar to other baits in this class that are thin and turned in which gives it the slapping, burbling, bubbling action on top of the water on your retrieve. From the side, the body of the bait is on the thick side which gives it some extra weight over most of the competition. The hook slot on the top of the bait is very generous in width and deep enough to hide any hook point that I carry.
The bottom of the Mystic Frog is designed like a catamaran that merges into one piece at the nose of the bait and spreads to almost 1/4 inch at the butt of the bait. This design characteristic seems to be responsible for the fact that this lure gets up to plane faster than most of the competition. It also makes a deep bottom groove that in turn translates to less plastic in the way when it comes time to set the hook. Keep in mind that this is not a floating bait but one that can be used to fish pads or slop and can drop into open water pockets if you choose to slow down your retrieve enough to allow the frog to sink.
Scent
The Attrax comes infused with what the company calls, “Sci-X feeding stimulant” which is supposed to hyper-stimulate the nose and taste buds in fish. The Mystic Frog comes in four colors that are all fairly basic, one color patterns and one size. So let’s get this thing on the water and see what it’s like to throw!
Testing Conditions
The conditions have been unusually cool around here with air temps well below normal which have kept water temps 4 – 8 degrees lower than normal for this time of year. There are still balls of fry in the water so I decided to use the Mystic Frog over and through them to see if I could get a strike. We’ll get back to that later but for now, let’s look at the action that you can expect from this lure.
We rigged the Attrax weightless on a 5/0 Gamakatsu EWG hook which seems to be the perfect size for this bait. As usual with this type of bait, you want to thread it on the hook as straight as possible so that it doesn’t roll over or spin on you. The Mystic Frog is excellent in this area. Even if it lands upside down, just starting your retrieve rolls it right side up and it stays there, all the way back to you! No issues with rolling or having to fight to keep it running true.
The Mystic Frog does get up to plane quickly and in our testing we found that it will stay on the surface the entire time with a medium retrieve. You don’t have to burn it to keep it buzzing along. Furthermore, due to it’s weight, you can cast this bait considerably further than you might be used to if you’re using something like a Sizmic toad or Stanley Ribbit.
The action is a subtle buzzing that creates a nice bubble trail that will call fish from below it and get their attention. Even in less than ideal conditions, we managed to hook the majority of the strikes that all came when the Mystic Frog was on top. All of the strikes came in the last hour of light before the sun went down and were very aggressive. We did not get any strikes from bass that were under their fry even when we allowed the Mystic Frog to sink about a foot under the water.
The Attrax Mystic Frog has earned a place in my tackle box for the coming warm weather season because of it’s ease of use and solid performance when measured against other lures of the same type.
The Mystic Frog earns 3 stars on the MVF rating system.
See ya on the water …