I was reminded recently that one of the handiest tools an angler can have is a pair of scissors.  

In addition to traditional uses like the cutting of line, scissors make it easy to trim soft plastic baits.  

A cut here, a trim there, and you can alter the profile of a soft bait, often making in more effective, particularly when water temperatures are cold.

A couple days ago — before setting out on a river walleye trip — my longtime fishing partner Dave Keith and I were rigging up at the Brady’s Bend access area along the Allegheny River.  

Looking into his tackle bag Dave discovered that it was loaded with largemouth bass-style plastics, rather than the walleye baits he’d intended.  Among the collection was an assortment of sinking Senko-style worms.  

I mentioned that one of my regular guide clients does very well on both walleyes and smallmouth bass fishing half of a Senko on a leadhead jig.  

With that Dave cut the five-inch worm in half and threaded it onto a quarter-ounce leadhead jig.  

Twenty minutes later we were at the top end of a long, slow pool that’s traditionally a good walleye spot.  

I’d barely had time to drop the trolling motor when Dave set the hook into a nice fish.  

A couple minutes later a 23 inch walleye was in the net.  

The jig-worm combo proved to be the most productive offering of the day, accounting for additional walleyes in the 18 to 20 inch range.

Other cold water plastic bait refinements I’ve come across involve the classic twister-tail grub.

 I was exposed to this one on the Susquehanna River just north of Harrisburg during a wintertime outing.  

River guide Dave Neuman and I took smallmouth bass on a variety of presentations that day including a pared down two-inch grub.  

Neuman cut off all but about a quarter inch of the tail, and then trimmed it into an arrowhead shape, sort of a flapper.  It provided just enough action to appear alive, yet not so much that it turned off the fish in the super-cold water.

Another trimming-of-the-grub involves the head of the bait.  

Typically grubs have a rounded head, like that of the round nose version of a Core Lokt bullet.  You can make a more compact — and potentially more effective cold water presentation — by trimming off the round nose with a nice, straight cut.  

This flat area mates nicely against the backside of mushroom-shaped leadhead jigs like Gopher Tackle’s Mushroom jig, and Northland Tackle’s Lipstick jig.  

Both of these jigs have bullet-shaped heads, but square, flat backs.

I’ve also found the use of scissors to be prudent on skirted bass jigs, the ones that come with a heavy broom of weedguards.  

While the weedguards help you from sinking the jig into a stump or limb, they can also impede the hookset.  

Making a tapered cut on a line from the hook point to the jig eye thins the fibers to a point that ups the hook-up ratio while retaining most of the snag prevention qualities.

Soft swimbaits like Yum’s Money Minnow are effective largemouth bass lures, but the broad body of the bait (likely intended to mimic a shad) is often too much of a mouthful for smallmouth bass.  

They’ll still hit them, but it’s tough to get a decent hook-up rate.  Trimming off a quarter inch or so of the belly of the bait — making it more of a shiner shape — often helps out in this regard.

Jeff Knapp is a fishing columnist for the Butler Eagle.