Anglers that follow the FLW Tour will already know Bryan Thrift well. Bryan has established himself as a major force on tour with credentials including career earnings over 1.4 million dollars, 37 top ten finishes, 2007 FLW Tour Rookie of the Year, 2013 FLW Tour Angler of the Year and the 2012 Texas Bass Classic Champion title! His choice baits on tour are those of his lure and rod sponsor, Damiki Fishing Tackle.

We meet with the team from Damiki and Pro Angler Bryan Thrift at 6:00am at Clear Lake

Yesterday we had the opportunity to head up to Clear Lake, CA to meet up with Bryan Thrift and Daniel Kim, Director of Sales and Marketing at Damiki USA, to check out the company’s newest baits and get Bryan’s take on how to most effectively fish these offerings. We met the team up at Konacti Vista at 6am and Daniel outlined the agenda which was pretty simple, get on Bryan’s boat and go wet a line.

Time to go fishing

We head out from Konacti Vista and powered straight for some rock piles where Bryan wanted to try a combination of jigs and frogs. Bryan tossed the Damiki Air Frog for the first 30 minutes with a single blowup but unfortunately it didn’t stick. This was the first time that we have seen the Air Frog up close and personal.

Bryan's first boated fish comes on a Damiki Mamba Jig

This frog is not a traditional hollow bodied frog, instead it is somewhat of a combination between a traditional plastic toad and a reusable hollow body frog. Designed by Damiki and Thrift himself, this frog features air chambers on each side of the bait so that it will stay on the surface of the water.

Bryan adds a Damiki Knock Out as a trailer on the Mamba Jig

The air pockets are hidden in each of the arms so the frog acts like a pontoon boat, and is even able to right itself when it lands upside down. A hook hiding belly keeps the lure from hanging up as it is worked over structure and as the frog is pulled the legs churn up plenty of splash in the water.

Another nice Clear Lake jig fish

With the fish not seeming to be very committal on the surface Bryan decided to switch to a Damiki Mamba jig and proceeded to work the rocky bottom. Bryan uses either Damiki Knock Out creatures or the company’s Air Craw as his trailers of choice when fishing jigs. It didn’t take long for Bryan to start pulling fish off the rocks so I also switched over to the same jig and was rewarded with a healthy four pounder.

The sun finally comes out

Next Section: The sun heats up and so does the fishing