SEBILE Flatt Shad Snagless ~ Lipless Crankbait

The Flatt Shad Snagless is one of SEBILE's most innovate new fishing lure designs. It's destined to go down in history as one of the greatest lipless crankbaits ever!

It is far better at getting into and out of thick cover compared to most any other hardbait. The way the cleverly configured double hook catches fish, it is like using a flipping jig. Often both hook points are embedded deep in the roof of the mouth. It hooks fish solidly and holds them securely like using a jig hook - except it is a lipless crankbait.

With the hookless feather tail, I dare say the Flatt Shad Snagless has a better swimming action than even the regular Flatt Shad with two treble hooks. Try it yourself and see if it isn't true.

Handy size comparison. From L to R: Flatt Shad Snagless 54 SK, 66 SK and 77 SU.

One of the biggest advantages lies in how the Flatt Shad Snagless will benefit shore anglers in fresh or saltwater. Shore fisherman run a higher risk of losing lures compared to boaters. So the Flatt Shad Snagless provides a very effective way to fish from shore, and it permits you to prospect all the underwater terrain from deep to shallow, in search of fish. You may hug or bounce the bottom a little more closely and penetrate tough cover more deeply with less risk of snagging than ever before.

Why the Flatt Shad Snagless works so well has to do with its side-to-side swimming action that causes its body to switch from right to left rapidly even on a slow retrieve. The side-switching body is constantly in a position where it can deflect something like a branch, a stalk of grass or even a rock. So that rapid series of deflective movements shields the whole bait and especially the double hook from snagging against any obstacles that the lure may hit or encounter.

The second design feature that makes the Flatt Shad Snagless possible is that only a double hook with a lot of freedom of movement will work here. If it is a standard double hook that is too stiff or too short and doesn't have enough freedom to lag behind the body, there will be a lot of snags and also, missed strikes. Ample freedom or "play" is needed to really be efficient at hooking fish and also the right dimensions of every hook proportion must be perfect which is why SEBILE custom-designed the exact hook for the job. By having the proper hook, what happens is when the Flatt Shad body switches to the right, both upward-facing points of the double hook will be lagging behind (to the left) because the hook just follows the body, always one beat behind it. On the next beat, when the body switches to the left, the double hook will swing to the right. So the hook will always lag one beat behind the body, thereby always protected from snags by the body. The body always takes the leading step, the double hook always takes the following step, and when the side of the body hits a branch, a stalk of grass or a rock, it deflects away before the hook swings to that side. That's what makes the big difference for snagless fishing.

It is also very important to be very snagless that we only use a hook on the belly of the lure. Having any hook on the tail really increases the number of snags without really increasing the number of fish hooked, plus that flickering hookless feather really adds to the allure.

Also, something that people may be surprised to hear is that when you have a regular lure with two treble hooks, that means the lure has six hook points and at the moment of a strike, when you set the hook, then all the pressure you put on the line to set those hooks has to be divided between those six points so you may have a lower quality or poorer hookset and that is why a jig head for example is very efficient, since all the power goes on that single hook. So having just two hook points on the Flatt Shad Snagless instead of six is really very efficient and hooks fish very well.

About the feather, white is used for every Snagless color. White always makes an easy target for fish to spot as well as for the angler to watch his lure coming back through cover.

Model	Size	Weight	Type	Casting/Trolling	Jigging	Line Test
Flatt Shad Snagless 54 SK	2-1/8" / 54mm	3/8 oz / 10g	Sinking	2 to 4 ft	20 ft	2 to 8 lb
Flatt Shad Snagless 66 SK	2-5/8" / 66mm	1/2 oz / 14g	Sinking	3 to 5 ft	30 ft	4 to 16 lb
Flatt Shad Snagless 77 SU	3" / 77mm	1/2 oz / 15g	Suspending	1 to 1-1/2 ft	n/a	8 to 20 lb

From top down: Flatt Shad Snagless 77 SU, 66 SK and 54 SK.

Flatt Shad Snagless 54 SK. Good things do come in small packages. The Snagless 54 SK is small enough to 'match the hatch' and makes a good imitation of young-of-year shad, sunfish or crappie. Best of all, the 54 SK will cast like a rocket, incredibly far for it's small size, and the double hook on it is fairly stout for a compact lipless lure. Keep in mind, you cannot use the same heavy grade of tackle with the 54 SK as you would use with its bigger brethren (the 66 SK and 77 SU) but the 54 SK does weigh 3/8 oz, so it is no lightweight, and it may be fished just like you would a 3/8 oz swimming or casting jig on say, 12 to 16 lb test in shallow cover with little fear of snagging. One of my favorite tactics with the 54 SK is to just inch it along ever so slowly (about the speed of fishing a Texas-rigged worm) and fish just nail it! All I can say is to give this a try because "worming" the Flatt Shad Snagless 54 (fishing it as if a worm in thick cover) is a winning tactic.
Flatt Shad Snagless 66 SK. At 1/2 oz, this is the most popular size, and the large, custom-designed double hook with its larger split ring can be used with heavy tackle to flip this lipless into the worst snags. The 66 SK has a powerful vibration when reeled forward, but when the retrieve is stopped, the 66 SK simply glides downward, and that's often the strike trigger - the falling action. As the Flatt Shad Snagless drops deeper into thick cover, fish feel compelled to strike it as it falls, before it can reach the relative safety of the bottom or other cover - the same way that bass often strike jigs on the fall.
Flatt Shad Snagless 77 SU. The 77 SU is ideal for fishing shallow water or flats of any kind, over submerged weedbeds, underwater rocks and through the tops of flooded brush. Basically anywhere that sinking Flatt Shad models can't easily be used in shallow water without getting stuck, that's where the suspending model excels. Plus, when fish are hiding in thick, shallow cover where they are holed up waiting to ambush bait, you can work the 77 SU right up to a likely spot, and then just stop it right where you think is best, right in front of the spot where you think a fish is waiting in ambush. That's what the 77 SU is made for. When you let it suspend there, that truly antagonizes them. It's not like something that's swimming by, that's passing through. It stops and stays right in front of their hiding spot. So it's kind of like sitting there in their space, and they're going to attack it for that reason. Just let it sit there, give it a twitch or jerk, and watch out! That's a reaction strike you can really only get with the suspending Flatt Shad model.

Nice bass landed on Flatt Shad Snagless 66 SK.