3 questions

[noonthirtyjoe]

1. What line/size/type seems best for perching on Lake Erie? I have perch fished my whole life on lake Michigan and 4 pnd mono has done me well, but them are bigger perch and the bite is not as lite as I have been experiencing on Erie. I'm fairly new to perching on Erie and there seems to be a big difference in techniques here. 2. is anyone using small spinners here for jumbo perch. That is how I always got the jumbo's back home. (chitown) 3. softclaws? back home this is all we used and I can't find them here. softclaws are the claws only and come 50 to a container. They out produce minnows bigtime (back home). Thanks in advance for any answers.

[Spoon addiction]

Everyone has their own preference, but mine is an ultra light rod with 30lb power pro braid tied to an in line sinker with a 1 foot give or take 20 lb mono leader tied to a # 4 or 6 plain hook.

[noonthirtyjoe]

Wow that is different.

[amcfall]

I use a 6ft ultra light graphite rod with a 1000 size reel with 10lb braid. I use 15lb floro for the perch rig. Feels like a mac truck when you get a huge sheepshead. I always seem to catch big sheepshead and the occasional keeper walleye so I use the stronger line. People will probably make fun of me but a few weeks ago we spent a while just catching big sheeps head on our perch rigs I think it's a ton of fun catching 5-7lb fish on an ultra light rig.

[Mark]

I usually keep 2 types of rods on board for Perch. An Ultra-Light 5' with 4 Lb test mono,and a 6' Ugly with 12 Lb mono. Usually you'll find the smaller Perch at this end and as the weather cools the bigger ones start to move in. I'll start the day with the UL and if we're over the Farm I'll either move or switch to the 6'er. Tell me more about the soft Claws, are they from the Crawfish? Are they sold frozen, fresh? What size hook and how do you rig them? Thanks

1. What line/size/type seems best for perching on Lake Erie? I have perch fished my whole life on lake Michigan and 4 pnd mono has done me well, but them are bigger perch and the bite is not as lite as I have been experiencing on Erie. I'm fairly new to perching on Erie and there seems to be a big difference in techniques here. 2. is anyone using small spinners here for jumbo perch. That is how I always got the jumbo's back home. (chitown) 3. softclaws? back home this is all we used and I can't find them here. softclaws are the claws only and come 50 to a container. They out produce minnows bigtime (back home). Thanks in advance for any answers.

[wakina]

I use a 7 ft. med action graphite rod, spinning reel with 30 lb. braid and a long armed crappie/perch rig. I normally use #2 tru-turn or eagle claw turning hooks both are thin wire Aberdeen hooks in red color. The bait holder type hooks are to big in diameter to get good hook sets in a consistent manner. I also use a minimum 1 oz. of weight to get me to the bottom faster and thru the junk fish that usually are just above the perch and at times I will use 1 1/2 oz. of weight.

Now before you laugh to hard at the 30lb line, I use that because it is 8lb diameter and will handle the largest sheep head out there. It also makes filling the reel with braid easier with a 125 yd. filler spool as most small to medium reels will have line capacity information for 6 and 8 lb. line and is almost always at or just below 125 yds. I also set my drag just like I was using 8 lb. mono line with about 2 to 3 lbs. of drag tension. But can tighten the drag when I hook one of those big farm animals without worrying about breaking it off and having to (heaven forbid) re-rig during a hot bite. I can also horse the fish out of the perch strike zone so it does not chase those yellows away.

If the shiners are small(pinheads) I will switch to a #6 or even a #8 hook to make hooking and keeping those small shiners on the hook without breaking them in half. The size of the shiners will determine what size hook I use.

[Hoytman86]

I use a 7 ft. med action graphite rod, spinning reel with 30 lb. braid and a long armed crappie/perch rig. I normally use #2 tru-turn or eagle claw turning hooks both are thin wire Aberdeen hooks in red color. The bait holder type hooks are to big in diameter to get good hook sets in a consistent manner. I also use a minimum 1 oz. of weight to get me to the bottom faster and thru the junk fish that usually are just above the perch and at times I will use 1 1/2 oz. of weight.

Now before you laugh to hard at the 30lb line, I use that because it is 8lb diameter and will handle the largest sheep head out there. It also makes filling the reel with braid easier with a 125 yd. filler spool as most small to medium reels will have line capacity information for 6 and 8 lb. line and is almost always at or just below 125 yds. I also set my drag just like I was using 8 lb. mono line with about 2 to 3 lbs. of drag tension. But can tighten the drag when I hook one of those big farm animals without worrying about breaking it off and having to (heaven forbid) re-rig during a hot bite. I can also horse the fish out of the perch strike zone so it does not chase those yellows away.

If the shiners are small(pinheads) I will switch to a #6 or even a #8 hook to make hooking and keeping those small shiners on the hook without breaking them in half. The size of the shiners will determine what size hook I use.

If Wakina or Skipper9 say it, listen. That is all the advice I can offer on this particular subject.

[noonthirtyjoe]

Tell me more about the soft Claws, are they from the Crawfish? Are they sold frozen, fresh? What size hook and how do you rig them? Thanks

Yes they are claws from smaller clawfish. They come in little round containers of 50. They are soft and partly frozen. They sell them all over lake Michigan for perching for about 4 dollars a container. They consistently out produce minnows for both numbers and size. The rigging is the same as minnows, just a plain 2 hook and weight off bottom or a standard crappie rig. Now I personally would switch to a Mclurch spinner to get jumbos casting/dragging. The Mclurch was a very small spinner dragged across the bottom slowly. I never anchored when using the spinner rig.

[noonthirtyjoe]

If Wakina or Skipper9 say it, listen. That is all the advice I can offer on this particular subject.

That's good advice as I always look for their posts. Thanks everyone for replying. I found a few things to try in your posts. Red hooks? cool. Braided line to the mono leader, cool. Heavier weight to get down faster= good ideal. Lake Mich is deeper & cleaner and small line is very important there. Oh and very little junk fish outside of golbies. Man o man have the golbies gotten bad there.

[noonthirtyjoe]

Has anyone tried really small spinner rigs on Erie? I have not heard anyone mention them.