Over the years we played with them, tweaked them and honestly we never finalized a finished design. In fact we are still tweaking them today. Now dont get me wrong this isn't a poorly made or functioning product. We had fun with them just this month and you can see the fish we were catching using it. I ran some that we have in stock thru their motions. John just fell in love with the ones he used. He had one in black silver he has hung up in the shop on a rack still tied the way it was that night. It is a piece of conversation each time he has come in the shop since.
What is a Hayney's Hybrid, well I will Tell you. It is your popping cork. Without the hooks you still rig it the same as you do a regular popping cork. Tie on at the top. Remove the double clip in hooks, and add a leader and weight if necessary. The cork will function as a cork. Add the hooks and then your fishing a top water plug. It was just your popping cork, now it is your top water plug that you can fish alone or add a trailer of your choice to and work two zones with hooks instead of one.
The fish sees the wounded bait. Hears the feeding pop and gets to choose a top water target to strike, a subsurface target to strike or a sinking target to strike or a combination of them from the top down. I am especially fond of the Ratfish trailed behind it. But weighted jigs during midday sun that sends them deeper have always proven themselves in the surf. The first time people see it can raise some eyebrows.
The first time we sold one at a public event was Ernie's Bait Barn down by Freeport last year in 2008 before the storm. Being at the water made for an excellent demonstration area behind the camp for the fishermen that stopped by.
One gentleman bought one after careful consideration and some in depth investigation, and a bit more water demonstration. Two weeks later we were doing the same thing at Boyd's One Stop at the Texas City Dike. That same gentleman was fishing the dike that morning, he stopped at Boyd's and when he came across us outside he walked up politely asked if we had any of the popping cork plugs. After a few quick fish stories he purchased two more. After you use it you will understand how he must have felt about it.
So what is a Hayney's Hybrid-Pop-U-Lure? It is the popping cork that bites back! Does your popping cork have hooks? No. So why are you wasting half your cast each time.? Why are you fishing only one zone each cast? The Hayney's Hybrid can always fish in two zones at once and it can cover three zones depending on you rig it. The fact is your popping a cork to draw fish to the bait you hang underneath or it. The fish doesn't always know that your popping a cork and that it is not bait. That is why it will stike at the cork. Lets face it we throw top waters that are desined to catch the fish by actually drawing them to the surface. The exact same thing your cork is designed to do. So why don't you have hooks in your popping cork?
