Top Lure Reveal - Strike King KVD Square Bill Crankbait
Clint Taylor
There's a wide variety of crankbaits out on the market today, but few actually make it into my arsenal of divers. For the water that I typically fish, I tend to be in less than 8 ft. of water, so the idea of having a large profile crankbait that dives to 16 ft. is pretty ridiculous. On the other hand, you can still have a large profile crankbait that goes shallow. The Strike King KVD Square Bill crankbait is just that.
Before I knew much about fishing, I would just buy a crankbait and fish it. It didn't matter if I was in weeds, rock bottom, mud bottom, shallow water or deep water. Now, I understand a lot more about the tactics of fishing. I really like crankbaits, but when you stick a square bill on the front of one along with a large 5/8 oz. body, it takes it to a whole new level. This crankbait from Strike King excels in areas with rocks and logs, as the square bill easily deflects its body over the structure with amazing results. With a dive range of 2' - 5', this is no deep diver, but more so a shallow water crankbait. For rivers and creeks, I do not know if there is a better crankbait. Large hooks also allow for a good hook set so that you don't lose many fish...if any. Multiple variations in color also allow for a user friendly preference to tackle any type of water.
As always, I like to go with a white and chartreuse coloration. For this particular lure, I like to go big and heavy with a 5/8 oz. weight paired with a medium heavy baitcasting rod and reel. The type of line varies depending on the situation, but somewhere around 14-20 lb. test usually works best. Due to this crankbaits large body, a stiff rod is a must or you will be struggling on every cast. I like to cast right next to structure, typically the bank of a river, and then work it over and through some timber. Sometimes a pause and go retrieve works good, but I like a nice steady constant retrieval rate with maybe a few twitches of the rod thrown in. Although this is a large crankbait, it is certainly something that can be thrown in shallow water. I use it in real shallow water all the time with great results. The Strike King KVD Square Bill crankbait is somewhat of a finicky lure though at times, as fishing conditions can bring great success or little success. A correlation that I have found is if the crankbait isn't working, try a topwater. It may sound a little odd to some big lake fisherman, but for rivers this seems to do the trick.
Perhaps out of all the great features that this crankbait brings to the table, the one that I like the most is durability. When you are throwing this lure you feel like you’re throwing a big bass lure into the water and that any second a large bass could bite. Although it doesn't have some magical trick to catching all of these big bass, it does do a very good job at reeling in some nice ones. For these reasons, the Strike King KVD Square Bill crankbait has made it into my list of top lures.