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i've been ice fishing for about 2 years now and have had some luck with tip ups, but only a little with my jigging rod. i guess my question is how do you know where to set up once you get out on the ice? i usually just set up close to the other people on the ice. sometimes i get lucky and hit a honey hole, but other times i get skunked. i also just bought a fish finder that can also be used for ice fishing. i was wondering if anyone could share their techniques for finding and catching fish under the ice with a fish finder. i was also wondering what jigs and rigs work best and how to work the jigs.
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well, location location location is what it is all about, you either got good real estate or bad. and some times good can go bad and bad can go good, which is the case for perch.
perch are always moving, unlike gills or crappie that will come in and linger for a while before moving on to another location.
the most important tip I can give you for finding them is "use the X Y method" find the drop off "X", drill holes along the drop off every 10 feet. go back and forth untill you catch a perch, if you dont get one in about 15 minutes drill another 4-5 holes along the same axcess and fish them, just go back and forth from hole to hole, this includes fishing the previous holes as well, if nothing shows up repeat the process untill you catch a perch.
from the hole you catch the perch in, "dosnt matter what size" drill holes every 10 feet apart going closer in to shore and away from shore. 6 or seven holes will do nicely, work your way in and out from shore,
the trick with perch is thay move in to the shallow and streight back out again. so once you have found them mark it on a gps unit, I do have to tell ya that when you are catching perch from that hole you wont be catching much of any thing else.
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Dave is got the right stuff there.
Over here on thes side of the pond,
and in the Bay of Green Bay we fish a bit different. The shacks go out when it is safe in deep water. The perch seem to like the deep water, The Pike are in the shallows.
Your fish finder works well, but lots of holes is some times the ticket.
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yepers, pike cruse horizontaly with the top of the drop off, perch move up and down the drop off, gills crappie, rock bass, move around in circles.
you can find the gills with fish finders and under water cameras, but that dose not mean the fish will bite.
that is an entirly different equation.
fish finders are fine, but I never rely on them to put dinner on the table..
the larger perch in my experience I have found are more active in the middle of the day "on avrage". say from 10 am till 2 pm.
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All great advice..
Let me add, lock jaw can be a real problem to solve sometimes but when the bitty bite has been good then suddenly shuts down its always a good ideeeer to gear up for a large pred that might have sent the bitty biters scrambling for cover....
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Awesome info! Thanks for sharing! Now if I could just get this kind of info on all my target species...
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I'm gonna hafta try and fish in your neck of the woods this winter! You can show me all the tricks of the trade.
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Thanks for the tips Profishing. Keep 'em comin'!
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Well I have found that if you have a fish finder and keep moving when you aren't seeing fish helps. If you find fish with sonar but can't get them to bite just keep trying different baits and lure combos. When I was a kid I remember fishing a lake for perch on a deep flat in 30+ feet of water. We drilled a bunch of holes and started catching perch. When we started catching them we drilled more holes around the one we were catching them out of and contiued to do this and kept on the fish. At the end of the day we were fishing the same area we started in the morning. The fish made a huge circle that covered almost a half mile in diameter. The last 2 winters I have had great success with a 1/100 ounce hair jig and maggots as well as small jigs tipped with wax worms or perch eyes. I have also had good success with shrimpos and ratsos on lakes where any bait was not allowed. If you have fish coming in and looking at your bait but not hitting keep trying different colors and presentations until you find something that works. 2 winters ago I was using a shrimpo 6-12 inches off the bottom and I would place my rod across the top of a bucket and hit it where it crossed the bucket in the middle to get it just quivering and the perch would slam it like it was the last meal they would ever get. I think the new buzz stix would have been great for this tactic. Good luck on the ice.
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] Try tying on a swedish pimple without its hook on a line , then tie a 12-16 inch piece of line on the other end with a ice jig attached , it attracts them from aways away ! 