Buck Perry

Elwood Lake (Buck) Perry – Widely acclaimed as the “father of structure fishing” – his theories changed the way very serious angler approached the underwater world.

His theories on structure fishing were based on his direct observations of fish behavior. As a lifelong fisherman, he repeatedly observed that fish travel both in schools and along predictable paths between deep and shallow water. These paths are determined by the bottom structure of the lake.

Buck Perry opened up our lakes and rivers to a different style of fishing than anyone before him had ever enjoyed. He was the first to talk about how weather affects the fish, specifically the “cold front”.

In 1946 he invented the Spoonplug lure in his North Carolina garage and the lure has remained on the market for more than five decades. Spoonplugs are lures (tools) specifically designed to find productive structure, locate fish, and make them strike.

Even before the days of sonar, Perry was using his Spoonplugs and trolling tactics to catch deep water and offshore bass that others did not even know existed.

He spent his life educating others about bass migrations, habitat and deep water methods. Perry published Spoonplugging: Your Guide to Lunker Catches in 1973 – considered one of the most influential fishing books ever written. He also published a nine-volume Home Study Series in 1981 and his bi-monthly newsletter, Buck Perry’s The National Spoonplugger, is still published today.

Though he passed away in 2005 at the age of 90, his Spoonplugging school is still a serious educational institution for anglers.