Perch Fishing with Bob and Greg 8/23/17

Yesterday was a blow day, since there was a "Small Craft Advisory" from 9am to late evening, so no report from yesterday.

Today...

I picked my crew up at their hotel at 5:30 and stopped to get some minnows from Rickard's. He was putting out signs that say they have Emerald Shiners, when we pulled in, so I was a bit excited to see that. However, when I got out of the truck and motioned to Rick with some "happy clapping" he said, "Their Pinheads", and my clapping stopped. lol

I normally hate using pinheads, because they're so tiny, and hard to keep on the hooks. I had some of my frozen emeralds with me, so I wasn't too upset about it, and he said there were goldens mixed in with them, so I was cool with that and bought 3 scoops.

It turned out to be the ticket to catching our perch today....all they wanted were the tiny little pinheads. They didn't want my larger emeralds or goldens at all today. That confused me until I put two and two together, and realized that just last week the perch were puking up tiny pinhead sized fish. I thought they were baby Gobies, but they could have been the baby emeralds in the system now. That's good to see, because we haven't had any good hatches of emeralds for a couple years, due to weather in June. or so I'm told (I'm no expert on minnows)

We even caught a few smaller perch, which I was happy to see, because I haven't seen as many little perch as we have in the past. I'm thinking that all the extra walleye we have in the system now, it is wreaking havoc on our young perch. Maybe if there is a good bait hatch, they will leave the perch alone. I doubt it though....who doesn't like a good perch dinner? Why would the walleye be any different? ;)

Bob and Greg are return customers, who like to come down here from Wisconsin and just decompress. So, it's not all about catching fish....but, it sure is more fun when we do! They ended the day with only 38 large perch that went 13 pounds at the cleaners....so, 1/2 pound fatties. They were happy with that.

We were hiding out of the wind on the east side of South Bass Island and a little SSE off the monument in 28' of water. There are a lot of fish there, and they would come and go. If we had all the fish we missed, due to their lite bites, we would have limited out quite early, but it was a tricky bite. Only a handful had them deep inside their throats. The rest were just barely hooked on the lip.

We will be out again tomorrow to give it another shot. North winds tomorrow, but not as strong, so I think we can move further north and east to give it a go.

Stay tuned....

Capt Juls

Great report. What type of perch rigs were you using, Skipper 9's?

Wow.. 2 to a pound. Those are real nice size fish.

Interesting on the pinheads. We had mix of pinheads, large emeralds, and frozen goldies Monday. Didn't deem to matter. Slow bite but when they hit one they hit them all. I fished one of each kind on skipper 9 rig with 3 hooks. Don't know how many fish I caught with them "climbing the line" They would ever so slightly tap once and you knew the bottom one was already gone. Then they would come up to the next one. Once they so lightly tapped, you had to guess, are they still there and then just hit them. Any pressure on even a very slow lift and they dropped it. If you guessed wrong on the middle one, you still had the top bait, cause if you patiently held still and just waited they would come back for it. Bout half time they won and half time I won. Jules was right though...boy was it a slow bite. Not many hard bites and very few swallowed.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Moldman

Great report. What type of perch rigs were you using, Skipper 9's?

---

Skipper 9's...yes.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LEfriend

Wow.. 2 to a pound. Those are real nice size fish.

Interesting on the pinheads. We had mix of pinheads, large emeralds, and frozen goldies Monday. Didn't deem to matter. Slow bite but when they hit one they hit them all. I fished one of each kind on skipper 9 rig with 3 hooks. Don't know how many fish I caught with them "climbing the line" They would ever so slightly tap once and you knew the bottom one was already gone. Then they would come up to the next one. Once they so lightly tapped, you had to guess, are they still there and then just hit them. Any pressure on even a very slow lift and they dropped it. If you guessed wrong on the middle one, you still had the top bait, cause if you patiently held still and just waited they would come back for it. Bout half time they won and half time I won. Jules was right though...boy was it a slow bite. Not many hard bites and very few swallowed.

---

No...no it wasn't 2 to a pound. My mistake. I asked my customer what the weight was when they came out of the fish cleaners and for some reason I thought he said 20 pounds. I found out when we went out this morning that it was only 13 pounds. Still nice fish, but not humungo-jumbos...:)

The way you described the bite is EXACTLY how it was for me today (8/24)....to the tee. :) However, the larger emeralds did work for us today too. We ended up with 52 today out in front of Lakeside, a mile and a half or so out.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Capt Juls

No...no it wasn't 2 to a pound. My mistake. I asked my customer what the weight was when they came out of the fish cleaners and for some reason I thought he said 20 pounds. I found out when we went out this morning that it was only 13 pounds. Still nice fish, but not humungo-jumbos...:)

The way you described the bite is EXACTLY how it was for me today (8/24)....to the tee. :) However, the larger emeralds did work for us today too. We ended up with 52 today out in front of Lakeside, a mile and a half or so out.

---

Ha! I was going to question if it was a typo maybe...but I thought no, don't do that as Juls always knows what she is talking about and tells it straight.

(And I knew Juls would never tell a fish story...:):D!!)

Understandable and easy to do. Glad you got them today.

Are these cool temps this weekend going to improve the bite? I have an out of state friend here I want to take out, but he is not a die hard fisherman and I want to try to avoid a skunk day, to make sure he has some fun.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LEfriend

Are these cool temps this weekend going to improve the bite? I have an out of state friend here I want to take out, but he is not a die hard fisherman and I want to try to avoid a skunk day, to make sure he has some fun.

---

I'm thinking it might. The bite was better today than it was yesterday...for us anyway. I guess we'll find out. I'm out tomorrow through Sunday too, so good luck if you go! :)

Speaking of Skipper 9 rigs....... I was looking at some pictures of them and it looks like he is using a slow death hook on them. Is this correct? Is there a reason for the slow death hook. I was going to tie a few up and try them around home this fall. Thanks

Looks like a #4 Tru-turn

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Moldman

Looks like a #4 Tru-turn

---

Do you know what the reason is for using that style of hook on these types of rigs?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Goosechaser

Do you know what the reason is for using that style of hook on these types of rigs?

---

Nope...maybe that's what he had the most of? I don't know. I don't know the guy who makes them. But, I have seen these rigs made with all different styles and sizes of hooks, so it's just a matter of preference, I assume.

I'll be making my own over the winter, because they can be made for a few cents each. I agree, they are priced way too high for what they are.