Hey Tom,
My cousin told me of a bait he uses from the James River in Central Va called a butter minnow. Have you ever heard of this? He gave me the specs on this little guy and I took a couple of 2 1/2" Glass Rapala Minnows and custom painted them to look like the real thing for him. Do you have them in the rivers and streams in NC? He tells me that they often catch them in minnow traps and that they are great smallmouth bait.

I did a little fishing down in NC last year and a buddy gave me something called a Butter Belly to use, its a soft bait, in a mustard top/yellow belly with a long narrow tail used like a Sluggo or similar bait.

How long was it and how did you do?

They were two inches long tops, he had better luck than me but I did manage to hook a couple of crappie and one small catfish with one. It sort of reminded me of a tadpole shape, with the top being caramel colored, the bottom being bright yellow. He had an assortment in a box, but stuck to the yellow ones. I suppose just about anything would hit on it.