By Captain Mike Fisher
Posted Wednesday, April 6, 2005
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 Teasing the fish to the surface is what spreader bars do, and they do it well. Spreader bars have been around for some time. They have proven themselves to be great fish attractors, when used as teaser without a hook, or when rigged with a sharp hook under the stinger/chase-bait's skirt to put it into the fish catching mode. In the fish catching mode the removable chase bait or stinger is attached to the last skirt on the centerline of the spreader bar by a ball bearing swivel and snap that's concealed under the last skirt.
Leader material between 18 and 24 inches in length is used for rigging the hook under the chase/stinger bait. This longer leader length sets the stinger/chase bait distinctively apart from the skirts on the bar. It's the straggler, the odd-man-out, or the inferior baitfish that can't keep up. This is the only bait on the spreader bar that is rigged or loaded with a hook.
Today, the majority of spreader bars pull varying numbers of plastic baits, hollow squids, squirting squids, and squid skirts in a multitude of colors. In the teaser mode they'll raise fish for bait-and-switch and fly presentation.
Several skirts skipping across the water imitate schools of baitfish or squid splashing along the surface. This illusion is what stimulates the predators to rise to this school of imposters. Following mere instinct, the rising predators target the straggler following behind the escaping school. Anything outside of the safe confines of the school or bait ball is targeted as an easy meal.
Single lures pulled behind the boat are not that conspicuous. They represent one baitfish each, and one baitfish doesn't make a meal for a school of predators. To raise a school of predator fish, whether they be albacore, yellowfin, blue fin, big eye, yellowtail, Dorado, marlin or other fish eating predators there has to be enough of a meal to offset the effort expended to catch it. Your boat's wake passing over the predators draws their attention first; they have to see enough available food in your wake to change their course.
Fish Magician Tackle's Bait Ball Spreader Bars™ and Bait Ball Daisy Chains™ are placed in the spread to develop the illusion of a school of 20 to 70 or more fleeing baitfish moving across the surface behind your boat. The daisy chains represent other baitfish that have been separated from the school; stragglers silhouetted against the sky and the prop wash, their stinger/chase-baits become easy targets for the feeding school of predators.
This tip courtesy of Captain Mike Fisher of Fish Magician Tackle
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