As a tackle reviewer, the amount of gear that shows up and accumulates on my boat over the course of several months can be overwhelming. While I try my best to go through each and every product and give it time on the water, in many cases, stuff gets discarded, sent back, or given away without ever getting wet.

Sometimes, I receive a product I’d like to test and write up but I find it’s either out of production, too difficult to source, or the details of its availability are just too fuzzy. One such product is this paddletail minnow that I found laying in a forgotten compartment within my boat. Its name? The “One’Up Shad”. That’s right, it bears a similar name to the hardbait from 3:16 Lure Company – a tidbit I found somewhat amusing.

This product showed up on my boat, and stayed there, after sharing time on the water with a very good friend of mine. This friend knows my affinity for JDM tackle AND big baits, so he brought these baits along as a “I betcha never seen these before” kind of challenge. Well, he was right, I hadn’t seen them before and my intial thought was, “oh, not another paddletail bait”, but after seeing its name, I knew I had to at least try them.

Well, before my friend departed, he left me several packages of the product, but of course, they got lost into obscurity amongst the pile of “stuff to check out” on my boat. Just recently, on a tackle testing trip to Lake Pardee with Zander, I remembered to pull them out to have a look.

Pardee is a favorite place for us to go to check out new baits for while the fishing can be very difficult due to the ultra clear water, this clarity affords us the unreal opportunity to really see what a bait is doing in the water on a full length cast. In fact, the only thing stopping us from going there more often is a complimentary VIP pass at the gate!

But back to the One’Up Shad. At first inspection, the bait is somewhat unremarkable. The colors are farily opaque and the shape of the bait is reminscent of an oversized Slug-O – remember those? The difference here, of course, is this bait has a paddletail AND a somewhat distinct joint in the middle of its body.

While distinct, this joint is no where near as thin and fragile as that of the Imakatsu Javallon. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized, this probably affords the bait a very unique swimming action.

Onto the end of the line it went aboard a Dobyns Rods 804CB paired with an Abu Revo Elite Aurora series reel. I spooled the Revo with 12lb test Toray HiClass fluorocarbon. Not necessarily an ideal combination, but amidst the Crankbait Rod wars, you have to make due with the rods you’re dealt.

After a few test pulls alongside the boat and remarking of the bait’s sinuous action, I made a cast to shore alongside some semi-submerged brush (Pardee is currently at full pool). I watched the bait and noticed the same swimming action we saw at the side of the boat, was happening on my medium paced retrieve. This bait has some moxy! Then, about two feet behind the bait, a large, dark shadow emerged and just as soon as I noticed it, it slowly sank back down into the depths.

Whoa! Whatever it was, it was BIG! This experience is typical of Lake Pardee, only this fish was darker than anything had seen previously and so dark, I could not make out any markings. Just it’s overall shape – literally as if it were a shadow.

A few casts later, it was on and I was able to pull up this healty, but significantly smaller largemouth bass.

I’m told these baits were made several years ago. I’m not certain if they are still made, or where in Japan you can or cannot find them, but if you are over there, and come across these baits, AND are into the paddletail style products, I suggest you buy as may packs as you can afford. I know I will now be guarding mine very closely