Ok you get to your favorite spot and the Marcum lights up like a XMAS tree. You work hard for the next couple hours throwing the book at them. But nothing will bite 
Do you stay there and hope they turn on or leave the fish to find more cooperative fish ? ?
A couple of hours trying to convince them to bite? Im out of there. Unless its getting close to dark or I have some other reason to think they may turn on even a half hour over inactive fish can be to long.
Throw 3 or 4 confidence baits at them then go.
Good question Pat! I for the life of me can’t leave fish behind. I have a spot in the metro that I see this happen quite frequently. Sometime it’s a wave of inactive fish that just won’t commit, but usually the next wave has a few biters. The spot I’m on sees alot of roaming fish, so if one group is inactive I usually wait em out for a school that is active.
Hello,
I personally would move. You can’t guarantee there catchable fish unless you got a camera to drop down to get a visual, it could be a school of dink sunfish or a school of baitfish.
Take Care!!!
Kevin
LEAVE!! It would be a different story if you were picking up one here and one there but if nothings going get out of Dodge!! Fishing cant get worse if your catching none! I will always check back on fish. In pressured areas I will leave fish intentionaly until the world gets setup for the evening bite then I will sneek back on to them so not to be seting hooks left and or right while guys are piling out on the lake!
I will leave these fish for a different time throughout the day. I am on the move to find biters/active fish. I will keep that spot in mind and revisit if I am not fishing too far away.
Sometimes is a tough call on what to do, great topic.
I should add that these fish are my targeted species via the camera. 
I myself don’t give the bite much time. One hour of no bites or little fish and I’m out of there. Sometimes it’s a small move on the same lake or a big move to a different lake.
Here sometimes, bite windows open up for like an hour and if you are there when that happens, you might go home with a limit. If I see people moving all over the place or outright going home, I sit tight and wait for it. What are you going to do go home and watch soap operas? The opposite is also true, If I get bit and the school(s) move off, it is time to chase them.
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I will leave these fish for a different time throughout the day. I am on the move to find biters/active fish. I will keep that spot in mind and revisit if I am not fishing too far away.
X2 for me!
Leave your buddy on the “Tight Lipped” while you search for an active school. Make him promise to motion you over if he gets them juiced up. For me another determining factor revolves around the target species. If Crappies….I’d probably wait those finicky “Frisbee with Wings” out. Crappies I’ve always said are the easiest and the toughest to ice. Most of the time they will hold at a simliar depth, so often times school is open or closed. Walleyes on the otherhand seem to locate themselves on structure based on their mood in this neck of the woods. I would definately fire the auger up if seemingly witnessing the walleyes in a resting pattern rather than feeding. We try locate anglers on different ambush points on structure to pinpoint feeders.
Great question Pat!! Everyone deals with a dilemna like that at some point!! 
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Ok you get to your favorite spot and the Marcum lights up like a XMAS tree. You work hard for the next couple hours throwing the book at them. But nothing will bite
I don’t know, I left a long time ago before I sat there 2hrs 
Like mentioned above, if I believed I left good sized fish I might hit it again later on.
I would leave after 10 minutes if no takers. I carry a number of rods rigged different and they would get a 2 minutes each. If no biters I’m out of there. I will even leave biting fish if they aren’t big enough or active enough. I will keep the spot in mind and may come back if I can’t do better. I always thought that “to acheive excelence you have to leave mediocrity behind”.
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Ok you get to your favorite spot and the Marcum lights up like a XMAS tree. You work hard for the next couple hours throwing the book at them. But nothing will bite
Couple hours worth of fruitless jigging?
On ‘sippi ice leave em but a return trip to that immediate area within 3 days is in order.
I’m the guy that is thinking,….”I’m really close” when I see a pile of inactive fish. IN the scenario you describe I would punch out a 40-50yd radius and see if they are relating to any forage nearby.
I’m thinking you’re after crappies. The problem with pies is that they’re like pirahnas. If one is feeding, you can bet the majority are too. If the school isn’t feeding, there will be a few active.
In the case of the inactive pies, I would head to the nearest weedy breakline and wait for them to go on a splurge. Often times when you see them as you described, you’ve just found them resting in area safe from predation. So if you’ve found them resting, the next challenge is to figure out what direction they go when they’re hungry 
depends on how cold it is outside and how nice and warm my Otter fish house is on the inside .
Just joking lol, crappies i would stay on em, ive seen it where if the sun peeks thru once a cloud passes by they will turn on and then another cloud comes and they shut down again. They are bound to eat sometime.
Walleyes on the other hand, im outta there. Theres always active walleyes feeding somewhere in my book
I’m definitely outta there and off to greener pastures.
Im young and like to punch holes……nuff said
Why does it matter to you Pat? You just sit in the shack while I’m out drilling 200 holes looking for active fish. Or are you asking if I should move more while you wait out the Crappies?
I will try to assess the fishy behavior. If they ain’t sniffing and nibbling anything, I’ll move on.
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Leave your buddy on the “Tight Lipped” while you search for an active school. Make him promise to motion you over if he gets them juiced up.
That’s the perfect plan I normally sit tight and my partner searches
How many do you catch before you “motion” ? ? 
How many do you catch before you “motion” ? ?
Your limit and half of his
My brother did that to me one time. We were shore fishing at that point, so he ended up going in the lake AFTER we had both of our limits. 
I pushed and then ran like heck. It was great! Don’t push someone through the ice though. I heard that this thing called hypothermia is pretty bad for ya. 
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