I get in a pattern, personally, and use soft plastics when dock shooting and hand ties when fishing bridges or brush.

When is the right time to use each style or does it matter? What are y'alls thoughts?

It honestly doesn't matter and is all personal preference. I tend to use hand ties more in the summer heat or in the dead of winter. I do think you need to have both. I have seen times when one or the other makes the difference.

Both will catch fish. I prefer hand tied most of the time simply because I don't have to mess with weaving the plastic body onto the jig head. On the other hand, the hand tied are going to be more expensive so a hang up can be more expensive if you break off.

Bob Young taught me a lot about crappie fishing and he tied jigs. That’s probably why I’m such a hand tie guy. That said shooting docks I love thump chubbies! I hope somebody keeps Laners baits going. Either will work. I just never liked when the plastic slid down or got kinked up and I was too lazy to superglue and didn’t like the way baits looked on screw lock heads. Never could get them straight enough to please me!

Sometimes it comes down to scent.... And color of course. Nothing against plastic, but since I started spinning my own, I have purdy much stopped the other.

I pour plastic and tie jigs. I think it is just a personal preference but I am 50/50 on my use of them.

It's funny how we can get stuck in a pattern. I probably went through 15 soft plastics yesterday shooting docks and having to adjust them on the jighead every other time. Lot of time wasted changing bodies or adjusting them. Never once thought about put a hand tie on! I need to try some hand ties on docks as I really like them and like that you don't have to keep messing with them.

Hand ties won’t skip as well while dock shooting and that’s a big reason I don’t use them for that. A jig head with a wire keeper will go a long ways for helping the plastic moving around

Golfers have different clubs,Pitchers have different pitches to accomplish the task so shouldn`t it make sense for a Crappie Angler to have as many different types of baits for the type of Task he or she wishes to accomplish? It`s better to have & not need then to need & not have .Except when it comes to minners

minners? what's that Fishbonz?!

Seems I used to use plastics more, trending more toward handties lately!

Glue is messy and ruins soft plastics for reuse. No one to my knowledge has ever used the following method to hold plastics on jigs no matter how many fish caught, though I've posted it many times on many forums over many years. Here goes:

1. 24g floral arrangement wire (sold everywhere)
2. line up the piece of cut wire as shown
3. wrap once around post under line tie
4. clip one side close
5. bend wire as shown into an L shape which swings into and out of the lure
6. rig the soft plastic and swing the wire into it. Zero damage when lure is removed. Plus the lure stays straight at all times.

Also works when using trailers on skirted bass jigs except differently.
Steps:

Grub Grip in use:


Note: For the least damage to plastics,I order collarless jigs on Ebay. When I can't get jigs without a collar, I squash the collar with pliers and use a box cutter to remove it.

When it comes to soft plastics, there are too many to count that catch fish of any species and size. The huge number of combinations of size, shape, action and color keep me from getting bored especially - after using hair and/or feathers.

Do a search on my user name for all the examples I've posted on TFF.com - most of which I've designed myself that anyone can copy using only a blade and a candle.