BOBBY GARLAND HATCHES ITTY BIT MAYFLY

This NEW 1.25-inch soft plastic jig features incredible detail with the proven action crappie anglers rely on to match the hatch during tough conditions. 

With the popularity of forward-facing sonar in crappie fishing today, it’s only fitting that Bobby Garland’s latest soft plastic jig has taken on a video game moniker during testing this summer – the cheat code.

Serious crappie anglers understand the difficulty of summer jig fishing, which is why Bobby Garland tests new products during the dog days.

“We’re fortunate enough to work with some of the best crappie anglers on the planet,” said Bobby Garland brand manager Skylar St.Yves. “When it comes time to test new jigs and jigheads, we have our fishing staff take them into the toughest bite environments possible to ensure their effectiveness for all crappie anglers.”

The NEW 1.25-inch Itty Bit Mayfly accomplished that and then some this summer. Battle tested and Bobby Garland fishing staff approved, the bite-sized Mayfly is now available for your upcoming crappie fishing adventures.

Mayfly Added to Itty Bit Series

Bobby Garland’s highly popular Itty Bit Series brings an extra measure of finesse for fussy crappie and for matching small forage. The new Itty Bit Mayfly, like the Itty Bit Slab Hunt’R, Itty Bit Swim’R and Itty Bit Slab Slay’R, delivers a proven Bobby Garland shape in “Itty Bit” proportions.

The 1.25-inch Itty Bit Mayfly has a natural insect profile with realistic features, including a forked-tail, ribbed abdomen, and accurate wings and legs. The Itty Bit Mayfly was designed to pair perfectly with Bobby Garland’s Itty Bits jigheads as well as a wide range of jigheads that utilize a size 6 or smaller hook.

This bait adds a new level of versatility to the Itty Bit Series with features that mimic a wide-range of natural food sources for crappie including winged-insects, shrimp, nymphs, tadpoles and baitfish.

The Itty Bit Mayfly is available in 20-count bags, MSRP $3.99.

Colors to Match

Bobby Garland staff meticulously selected the 18 color patterns available in the new Itty Bit Mayfly, including two new exclusive colors.

“The secret’s probably out of the bag at this point, but some of the most reliable crappie colors day-in and day-out are dark natural tones, especially brown, black, purple and green pumpkin,” St.Yves said. “Bright traditional colors are still very much effective for active techniques and searching, but we’ve become much more methodical since the introduction of forward-facing sonar.”

Crappie are incredible sight feeders with large eyes set high on their head for optimal upward ambushing. Shad and other silver, shiny baitfish appear chartreuse and iridescent, making colors like Monkey Milk, Blue Ice, Cajun Cricket and Bluegrass extremely popular and effective for crappie anglers.

However, it can be easily overlooked that insects, crustaceans, nymphs and tadpoles make up a healthy portion of a crappie’s diet. These types of prey sources are typically dark colored in nature.

Bobby Garland has made sure that crappie anglers are well equipped to match these food sources with colors like Pecan Cream, Black Night, Sandfly, Hummingbird, Smoke Silver and a new color, Outbreak.

Other available colors for the Itty Bit Mayfly include Shimmer Shad, MoGlo Glow Worm, Mayfly and a new exclusive color, Wonder Bread.

Bobby Garland also created a special limited run (900 bags only) of the Itty Bit Mayfly in the colors Neon Nymph, Spring Fling, Electric Chicken and MoGlo Green Lantern.

Effective Techniques

The Itty Bit Mayfly is a great jig option in any environment, but getting the tiny bait into the strike zone is most important.

Itty Bit Series jigs were designed to be ideally paired with 1/32-ounce jigheads and smaller that utilize size 6 or smaller hooks.

That’s light enough to really zing on a fly rod but can leave spinning equipment easily bird-nested if not paired with light line and light action.

If you like to cast, pendulum and retrieve, 4-pound test fluorocarbon or copolymer is the optimal sized line when used on a medium-light to light action spinning rod. In water deeper than 10 feet, a medium-sized piece of split shot placed on the line a foot above the jig will help with casting distance and fall rate.

Keeping the jig on the lightest jighead possible allows for incredible life-like movement when casting, slip-corking or dock shooting. Using a jighead 1/16 or larger is most effective when presented vertically or dead-sticked from a boat or dock.

For those dipping with a long jigging rod, pegging a 1/4- to 1/2-ounce egg weight to the line a foot above the jig works great. This allows accurate placement when using a 1/32-ounce or smaller jighead.

Whatever your preferred style of crappie fishing is, pair a new Itty Bit Mayfly with an Itty Bits Jighead and have yourself a blast this fall!