5 tips to ice more pan fish.

Looking to put more panfish on the ice this winter? Hear are a few ideas that work for me. Feel free to add more.

#1. Light line. 2 pound test is perfect for panfish and will help greatly with detecting light bites.

#2. Soft tip rods with a good back bone. Soft tips will allow you to detect the light bites and allow the fish to inhale the lures in better with less resistance from the rod. A good back bone to the rod will take care of the hook set. If it is panfish you want get a panfish rod.

#3. Loose the floats. You can not effectively make the constant needed depth adjustments with a float on the line. Panfish move threw at to many different levels to just sit at one. Many effective jigging approaches require constant depth adjustments also that is just slowed down or impossible with a float on the line. I would bet my depth adjustments are made 1 to 5 times a minute or more. This is just not going to happen with a float on the line.

#4. Do not sit still for panfish. Drill more holes and keep on the move. Many times you will get the most active fish out of a hole with in the first few minutes you fish it. The longer you sit on a spot the more the fish get conditioned to a lure hanging over them. If I dont see a fish on my Marcum in short order after dropping a lure down it is off to the next hole. If I get a hand full of fish out of one hole and they slow down its off to the next spot. For me keeping moving also means no portable fish house if possible. It just slows a person down.

#5. Fish higher. Lots of times we seem to find large schools of pan fish grouped together towards the bottom or deeper in the water column. These fish are very tempting to drop a lure down to but many times they are slow to respond. Try looking above these for more actively feeding fish. Some time these active feeders will run 5, 10, 20 feet above the inactive schools. This year I have all ready caught many a crappie just a few feet under the ice in 20′ of water. These fish are up there for a reason. They are feeding. Another bonus of this is many times they are larger fish to.

Hope these tips help. There could be many many more added but I need to get back to work. Good luck fishing.

Good tips sir! You’ll have to demonstrate them for me sunday. So what did you buy at Thorne Bros?

dd

Great read Mike

I would add to the tips…..
If the bite is tough down size.
And if the fish are coming in high, do not ignore the first couple feet under the ice of which you may not be able to see if you are using a flasher.

I hear you Bret. Sometimes those little quick blimps you see on the flasher rite under the ice are minnows or fish chasing minnows. It doesnt hurt to check them out. This leads to watch out setting the hook on these fish rite under the ice. Have had plenty get knocked off hitting the ice and even broke a few lines. Had one a few weeks back that i set the hook and my jig came flying out of the water.

Picked up a few ice plastics last night and a new panfish rod. A 27″ thorne brothers light bite rod. Ill be giving this thing a work out this weekend. Its not near there high end custom rods but I think it will be much better than what Im using now.

I can add another I swear by, and usually don’t tell my friends till a I’m tired of outfishing them

Check you knot on your lure, especially on lures that are fished horizontal like a shrimpo or a Genz worm, the postion of your knot effects how the bait sits and hangs and effects the action of the bait. Pretty much if you set the hook, the knot moved and your bait is no longer sitting right.

I’ll be working a fish on the flasher, get him to bite, miss the fish, and then can’t get him to hit it again (assuming he’s still there looking at it) 8 out 10 times, quick reel up, adjust knot and drop back down and catch him, setting the hook the first time moved your knot.

I fish a lot of baits that hang horizontal like that, so I pay attention to that. You may think BS, but try it, time and time again it makes a huge difference for me.

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I fish a lot of baits that hang horizontal like that, so I pay attention to that. You may think BS, but try it, time and time again it makes a huge difference for me.

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I’m a believer. There’s no BS to be found in this tip.

Nick…that is the most critical thing to make sure your jig is presented properly. Fishing mostly with gill pills, its very critical to keep that lure on a horizontal level vs vertical…I often retie after the knot comes loose.. Great tip.

With horizontal baits I use the double surgens knot. this allows the bait to sit the way it was weighted to sit. That way I don’t have to retie or even worry about how my bait is being presented to the fish. All good tips. I use nothing bigger than a size 10 jig and often times find myself using a size 12. Put a slight bend in the hook shank so the hook tip is at a 45 degree angle from the jig head. I also bend the hook slightly to one side so the hook tip and the head of the jig do not line directly up.

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Great read Mike

I would add to the tips…..

If the bite is tough down size.

And if the fish are coming in high, do not ignore the first couple feet under the ice of which you may not be able to see if you are using a flasher.

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Adding a little more to the high swimmers, 90% of our iceing on pools 10 and 11 is relatively shallow. Heck, anything over 6ft. is like a mini abyss

For the last few seasons I have been running the puck on the LX5 just under the surface. Mainly did this to avoid the line wrapping up in the ducer cable but it also gives you an edge in reading higher in the column.

This does not work when the unit is on wide beam however, the echos bounce off the side of the hole making a big mess. Narrow beam is what works with the puck dead center over the hole.

Not a method that I search with of course but when you know fish are present(especially slabs) it can give you a distinct advantage. Be ready when setting on Narrow beam in the shallows, they can be on your bait in the blink of an eye!

Baits? Anyone use the little cadis canes? Just a tiny piece of spring threaded and glued over a wire hook, usually painted with dots……slide the knot where it runs horizontal with a small waxie or spike, it has its days

Thanks for the tips Mike, this could end up being a pretty valuable thread!

the post mortem is good intelligence. You might find the 11 inch perch are feeding on nothing but one inch minnows as I discovered yesterday and will be putting into operation this weekend.

Thanks Mike

One thing I am trying this year is using the smallest No-Knot Fast Snaps…

These things are REALLY tiny…

And after trying to snap them on the lure(especially with old,fat fingers,combined with bad eyes)

I decided to attach them to the lure using my forceps and just tie the line to the snap….Everything hangs and moves naturally

Just started using them this last week so the experiment has just started but it looks good

Here,s a fovorite tip of mine. When everybody around me is using tiny jigs and not doing so well i upsize to small spoons tipped with waxies or plastic. I,ve had many people just stare at me while im pulling up crappie as fast as i can get my bait down to them. I see it as the same concept of downsizing.If the fish are tired of staring at tiny offerings sometime going bigger is the ticket.

Also i,ve been using the fas snaps for a couple years and love,em.

Ajs

#1 in my book is get the coil out of your line. Fish don’t hit a spinning jig. The little spinning reels coil line after 1 trip if you are reeling against the drag, or fishing much deeper than 10 feet. Went to fly reels this winter, coiling is almost a non-factor now. If a you aren’t interested in a fly reel, periodically let your jig go to the bottom, then starting at your reel tip slip the line through your fingers by hand to straighten it out.

Totaly agree with this Iv’e had alot of days on the ice that the pan fish either stop hitting small jigs or are very slow to react to them. Switch to a 1/16th buck shot rattle spoon or a slenderspoon and they just hammer it. Even bluegills hit these with authority. Even if the fish are agressive I will still use this just because its fast and why wait for a small jig to get down when the fish will eat something that fishes faster.

A guy schooled me on the buckshot rattle spoons last year. I still cant figure out shy a sunfish would hit a spoon that looks to big for it to even swallow. Then again how many times have you seen a sunfish come up and nip at the camera or nip you on the leg while swimming in the summer. Some times I think they are just testing what is out there and since they dont have hands in the mouth it goes.

Those fly fishing reels look very interesting.

Caught 2 big .75 pounders last winter fishing walleyes in 21 ft of water on 4 inch golden shiners.

some great info.