Over the past few years, my friend, the late Andy Bisson, and I concentrated our fishing efforts on black crappie. A very beautiful freshwater fish that provides excellent tablefare, this fish is plentiful now in New Hampshire waters. It can be caught using bait, lures, jigs and flies. Primarily, however, we use the traditional round jig heads with rubber curl-tails on them. 

The other jig that is commonly used in catching crappies is the Marabou jig. This jig has a rounded head of metal and a body of wound on chenille with a marabou feathered tail. We preferred using the rubber-tailed jigs because their tails squiggle like crazy when you troll or retrieve them. With the marabou jigs, the tail only flutters if you jig it up and down. Their tails are nowhere near as lively.

Round head, rubber-tailed crappie jigs and some of the nail polishes used to paint the heads and eyes.

One day Andy and I were trolling a favorite pond for black crappie. We had been on the water for about an hour and a half without so much as a strike. We were both trolling our rubber-tailed jigs. Andy’s depth-finder was marking lots of fish below, but none would hit our trolled offerings. "I can’t believe this," Andy remarked. "Those crappies have always done well hitting our rubber-tailed jigs, and now this." He decided to change his jig and fish one of his favorite marabou jigs instead.

Andy’s jig hadn’t been trolling five minutes when he was onto a beautiful 15 ½ inch black crappie. He released it and within a few minutes he was onto another big crappie. Finally, after his fourth crappie, he offered me a duplicate of the same marabou jig he was using. "Hey, this isn’t the normal colored head for this yellow marabou jig," I commented. "What did you paint the head with?" Andy replied, "It’s painted with blood red nail polish." Boy, did it work! But, I had a strong feeling that painting the heads of the rubber-tailed jigs with various colors of nail polish would work even better.

Nail polish was used to paint the heads and eyes on the streamer flies above.

The thought of painting jig heads with nail polish intrigued me no end. Over the next few days, I went on a nail polish shopping spree, obtaining a wide variety of various colors. In a short time, my nail polish inventory grew to a size that I am sure would catch the envy of any woman. There are many different brands and some are very expensive and I tried to stay with those that were less expensive. Some of my collection includes Maybelline’s Wet Shine Diamonds, Sally Hansen (in various colors that include Chrome), N.Y.C. Long-Wearing Nail Enamel, Pelites (in various sparkle colors), Sinful Colors, WetnWild (in various colors and sparkle) to name a few. The collection also includes Sally Hansen’s Hard As Nails Strengthening Top Coat and her Super Shine Top Coat.

Store-bought jig heads only come in two or three standard colors and are totally unattractive. I take a few and soak them in paint remover for half an hour. I then retrieve them one at a time, wipe them down to the bear metal. After they are dry, I coat them with Sally Hansen’s Strengthening Top Coat nail polish, giving the heads two coats each and letting them dry for 20 minutes. The next step is to coat the heads with white nail polish. After that has dried, select the main color wanted for the heads. I apply two coats of nail polish and let dry for a couple hours. Next, choose what colors for painting eyes on. Some will go nicely with yellow and then, after they have dried well, paint on a selected color for the eyeball. Some of my eyes are white with the eyeball in sparkle red. That being done, allow it to dry for a couple hours.

The next step, after all is well dried, is to cover all with two coats of Sally Hansen’s Hard As Nails Strengthening Top Coat polish. I let this dry for an hour and then put on a coat of Sally Hansen’s Super Shine Shiny Top Coat polish. The final results? A jig head that is far superior to anything jig manufacturers make and even more attractive to the fish. Your newly painted jig heads are now even tougher and less apt to have the colors deteriorate over time.

I have also been a fly-tier for many years, since 1971, and since I’ve been using nail polish to paint my jigs, I’ve tried nail polish on my steamer and other fly heads. Using it to paint my fly heads, instead of the standard fly-tying varnishes, has proven to be far superior. The fly heads come out much harder and tougher, which preserves them and prevents them from getting battered, when fish strike. So, is nail polish just for women? You decide, but I don’t think so.