Best Bluegill Swimbait

As a fish that plays a major role in the food chain, there is no more familiar prey to a largemouth bass than a bluegill. Lakes that hold the species are typically populated with a large abundance of these panfish, giving inhabiting bass a large supply of food to eat. What better way to mimic a familiar meal for a bass than with with a bluegill swimbait?

Most lure manufacturers that make swimbaits produce a model that resembles a bluegill sunfish. No other company has done this better than Jackall Lures with their Gantarel Swimbait in the RT Bluegill color.

They also make a smaller version called the Gantarel Jr. The attention to detail on these baits is incredibly realistic, that goes for it’s swimming action as well as you can see in this video.



The Gantarel floats, but will dive down to about three feet deep as its retrieved. It swims in a wide S-shape like a glide bait, in fact some consider this a more of a glide bait rather than just a hard body swimbait.

At just over six inches long and weighing 2.5oz, this is a pretty big swimbait and should be fished with a good swimbait rod rated for that big of a bait. The line tie at the nose is on a swivel to prevent line twists, since this bait will dart in many directions if you give it some jerking action.

Swimbaits are the most expensive bass lures as a category, so in that 35 to 40 dollar range the Gantarel is middle of the road in the high quality swimbait market. Of course there are cheaper bluegill swimbaits as well as there are more expensive ones, and we’ll take a look at a couple, but as far as quality for the price you can’t go wrong with the Gantarel.