What your go to presentation

I got to thinking today while walking down the aisles of Fleet Farm and Gander Mountain, the sheer amount of jigs stocked in the aisles. Then I got to thinking at how many more styles of horizontal jigs there are on the market today. Every company seems to be moving more and more into the horizontal jig world. Now I remember my father telling me that in his youth 30-40 years ago, horizontal jigs didn’t really exist for ice fisherman, at least to his knowledge or re-collection. His old tackle box was stuffed with vertical teardrops, flashers and spoons. The only horizontal bait he remembers was a famed “diver-doo.” It got me to thinking even more, for pannies or any species for that matter what is your go to? A vertical presentation or a horizontal one? For pannies I find myself in the ice season tending to favor vertical offerings such as moon jigs, cj&s demon jigs, and an array of thin flashers from cj&s and other companies. But yet in the spring time and summer on the open water I nearly always use horizontal offerings, I thought nothing of it until today and it got me wondering if its just me or what? What say you sages of the hard and soft water?

Well for gills I usually go with a gill getter(horizontal) or a teeter-totter(horizontal) for crappies just a simple jig head with and impulse plastic. I never seem to catch anything with vertical jigs.

90% vertical jigs. I have tried horizontal jigs alot with plastics but can’t seem to get much action on them. Maybe I am fishing them wrong?

Tungsten jigs and waxies does the trick.

1/16th spoons in pink tipped with a waxie. This season its the tingler spoon. 2nd option is pink Northland Mud Bug tipped with a waxie or plastics.

For years and years I fished with teardrops, moonglows, and other vertical presentations. I still do use verticals, but I have found myself working more toward the horizontal presentations. Favorite vertical crappie is little cecils, in pink, glow, purple when I can get those beauty 12″ and bigger fish to chase from close to the bottom to 10′ and higher off the bottom… It just doesn’t get any more fun than that.

Favorite horizontals have to be diamond jigs, tungsten, ratsos, gill pills & mini merts, making sure that line ties are helping the jig a maintain its level attitude. I always try to have each of my six or so rods tied with 2 or three of each variety vert vs. horiz. and then look at different color combos in each of the areas…

Mark