Dress Your Baits For Success with the Punch Skirt by Paycheck Baits

Total Score: 8.42 - INNOVATION AWARD!

Introduction: As the days grow longer and hotter and summer approaches, mat fishermen across the country are getting ready for the tried and true technique of punching. Last summer, we gave you an on the water introduction to a new product by a new company, Paycheck Baits, that was sure to change the way all of us thought about and rigged for this heavy cover technique. Thanks to the Punch Skirt, we now had a way to present a weedless, jig-like profile to those hawgs comfortably hiding underneath mats of dense vegetation.

Re-introducing the Paycheck Baits Punch Skirt.

How effective is this product? Normally when a new, effective product bursts onto the scene it immediately becomes impossible to find paving the way for similar product to hit the store shelves. The Punch Skirt never got that chance. Even before supplies of the original became scarce on store shelves, similar products were being turned out by larger manufacturers at more aggressive price points. But with ten different companies debuting their product within two months of the original, could they have gone through the same field tests Paycheck Baits put their product through? We may never find out because since our introduction to this product last Summer, we’ve been busy learning the ins and outs of these inline skirts and all the different ways you can rig it. Introducing our review of Paycheck Baits popular Punch Skirt.

Impressions: The Punch Skirt by Paycheck Baits is more than just an inline skirt product, but rather it’s an entire system. From the hook to the skirt to the stopper, everything has its place in this system. All that’s required to complete the system is your fishing line and your weight of choice.

The first step in rigging your punch rig is to slide on one or two bobber stoppers.

Starting with the stopper, just about any standard bobber stopper will do, but if you’re rigging to punch through the vegetation, the Punch Stop (which as of this writing is still pending availability) has an actual cone shaped taper to it to aid, just that little bit, in getting your bait offering into and back out of the muck without hanging up.

Paycheck Baits was still working on their version of the bobber stopper at the time of this writing, but realistically, almost any stopper will do.

Next in line is the skirt which is what’s up for actual review here, so we’ll save the details on that for later.

Step Two: slide on your weight of choice - here, we're rigging for a standard Texas Rig, not punching.

Last but not least is the hook. This is a reincarnated heavy duty flipping hook formerly produced by Gamakatsu for Reaction Innovations, but now licensed by Paycheck Baits from Gamakatsu as the Punch Hook. It is a heavy gauged, straight shank hook, with the trademark needles sharp point of Gamakatsu. Each package of Punch Hooks is supplied with pre-cut heat shrink tubing so that you may fashion your own Punch Keeper onto each hook – simply thread the heat shrink tubing onto the hook shank, apply heat via a lighter, let the tube melt, then shape the point of the heat shrink tube with your fingers out to the back end of the hook just under the eyelet until it appears as pictured here.

Step Three is to slide on the Punch Skirt and then tie on your hook. Pictured here is the Punch Hook with the supplied section of heat shrink tubing melted onto the shank of the hook and shaped out to form a hook keeper - a very simple process.

Field Tests: We’ve been fishing this bait off and on since the Fall of 2009, past the traditional punching season out on the California Delta (where the Punch Skirt was really designed to thrive). Fishing a product out of season is common place here at TackleTour and that certainly didn’t stop us from fishing the Punch Skirt because in the final analysis, as with any good product, the Punch Skirt is so much more than just a product to liven up your punch rig. If you look past its original intent, what you come to realize is this is really an inline skirt product versatile enough to help you dress up any variety of rigs for a bulkier, jig-like profile. Which is just what we did when fishing this product at other locations like Clear Lake, California and Falcon Lake, Texas.

A finesse version of the punch rig set up and ready to go at the end a Daiwa Zillion swimbait stick paired with a Daiwa Megabass Bespoke reel and Daiwa Samurai Braid... Oh, don't forget the Daiwa baseball cap!

Texas Rigging: The Punch Rig is really just a heavy duty Texas Rig tipped with a one to one and a half ounce tungsten weight instead of something smaller. Substitute that heavy duty tungsten weight to something more traditional, keep the Punch Skirt in place and you have the makings of a bit more versatile jig for the weeds taking advantage of the bullet weight to work through vegetation instead of a traditional jig head affording you the flexibility to use a larger hook and adding the benefits of a more effective weedless presentation tipped by your favorite plastic bait or trailer.

Stopper, weight, Punch Skirt ... just about ready to go.