Gary Yamamoto Ika

Gary Yamamoto’s IKA combines a grub-style body with a tube-bait-like frill skirt, allowing anglers to produce different actions depending on the rig and orientation.

When the 4-inch Fat Ika is rigged backward and fished weightless with the frill skirt toward the head, it slowly glides backward as it falls after entering the water, provided the line is not kept overly tight. Its design makes it easy to pitch into and along cover, making it well suited to pitching and flipping. When rigged in the standard orientation with the frill skirt toward the rear and fished weightless, it can also produce a side-to-side darting action as it sinks. On a Texas rig, it can be worked like a tube bait and is capable of slipping through cover.

The 4.5-inch Light Ika features a relatively firm, one-piece-molded body with only a very small amount of salt, resulting in improved resistance to tearing. It responds to rod movements all the way to the tips of the frill skirt and slowly falls over after the sinker reaches the bottom. It is easy to fish on a jig head rig, neko rig, or drop shot rig with a Maruseigo-style hook, and a 1/0 hook is recommended for the Light Ika.