Used them way offshore out of Uclulet last year for part of one day. There was tons of bait and many, many cohoes, springs and dogfish around. All lures including, Baitrix worked that day. The one benefit I noticed was that it could be re-used for several fish and the dogfish left it alone while eating all the real anchovy rigs on the other side of the boat. This was a once in a lifetime day for numbers of fish. If the fish are scarce, I'd use real bait.