Like many of you, I’ve been known to focus too much fishing effort on walleyes and crappies during the early ice season. Guilty as charged: If I catch a perch over early ice, it’s usually incidental to those species.
Most ice anglers, newbies and gurus alike, associate perch fishing with late-season after the walleye season has ended in most places. But while walleye season remains opens, we consider perch prolific, irritating little dudes that nibble away our bait and rarely provide much of a fillet.
Still, while the early ice legions pursue walleyes, northern pike, or crappies, there’s a strong case to be made for considering the jumbo perch search. Yellow perch, perca flavescens, after all are in the same family as walleyes, and you can’t beat big 10-inch perch in the pan.
Perch are more active during the day than walleyes, partially because they lack the tapetum lucidum, that funny, reflective pigment in the eyes of walleyes that helps with low-light vision. That’s bad for nighttime anglers but good for the guy who can steal a few hours for fishing during a weekend morning in early December.
It’s also a reason why glow lures are so effective for perch at daybreak, in off-colored water, or as natural light wanes in the afternoon. I try Techni-Glo red for such occasions, though on sunny days, when visibility is not an issue, chartreuse, green and gold are good options.
As for the search, I like fishing perch on waterways with a healthy balance of predator fish to keep perch numbers in check. Find me a lake with some special regs for walleyes and northern pike, and I’ll show you a fishery with potential for jumbos. Those larger fish simply chomp down on the battalions of tiny perch, which stimulates a healthier balance in their numbers and allows jumbos to thrive.
The standard perch mantra during early ice is to work shallow areas on areas connected to shoreline features, typically on smaller lakes, which offer a little more room for error on the safety front. (That’s an important priority this time of year not to be taken lightly. Keep an ice spud in hand when fishing these areas and check our ice conditions every few feet.)
We also associate perch with our bigger lakes, particularly in Minnesota – waterways that seem a little more intimidating, particularly during early season. A fringe benefit here: The good winter perch spots on big lakes usually are good winter walleye spots, too. These species just tend to associate with each other on these larger lakes.
Don’t let big lakes scare you, but obviously on these waterways, you’re not going to be working the same areas for perch that you will come February and March. Focus on shallow bays right now, and in particular, reaching that first breakline. Work fresh ice and transition areas like the opening of a bay into a main basin of a lake. (While you’re at it, keep in mind that these same areas often hold big perch during the latest ice of March and early April. Perch work their way out the first half of winter and slowly back in the second half!) Early, these perch are chasing baitfish that congregated in the warm shallows during the post-turnover/pre-ice transition period.
Drill several holes, so you can thoroughly investigate one area. We’re dealing with thin, clear ice so we’re very prone to spooking fish under these conditions. With my sonar (and via pre-research with a mapping GPS and map chip of underwater contours), I determine the best locations for holes, and then I drill them quickly and all at once. Quiet rules the remainder of the day.
This is the point where readers always demand “What depth!? What depth?!” but I’m not going to list a magic number because there isn’t one. I’ve caught early ice perch at many depths off the breakline, though I will offer this hint: the steeper the breakline, the better.
Most jumbo perching feeding takes place on or near the bottom, so that’s where we’ll focus our fishing. If your camera shows schools of mixed sizes, try fishing up off the bottom to selectively trigger bigger ones. Smaller fish generally seem a little more reluctant – for fear of predation – to leave the near-bottom comfort zone.
A tactic we Ice Teamers have been recommending the past couple of years is “poofing” the bottom with our ice jigs. Select a lure that you can lower quickly into deep water, and then tickle the bottom with it to send up a small “poof” flume of sediment. Then raise it up slightly so jumbos can see your offering when investigating the scene. The disruption on the bottom mimics what their prey, insect larva and small baitfish, might be doing.
To accomplish this, stick with small, yet heavy jigs or even employ a sinker to drag the smaller lure with it into the depths. The Genz Worm, which I designed, accomplishes this by diving quickly and horizontally.
The new Rattl’n Flyer Spoon offers a great new perch-specific presentation via what I call the “glide-and-drag” motion. By dropping it on a slack line, the Rattl’n Flyer Spoon glides to the side, then typically lands a foot or two off center of the hole. Then I drag it along the bottom to a position directly beneath the hole. Bottom-loving big perch love that shuffling motion with any lure, and we’ve had great success with this presentation in our testing.
Every time you drop any jig, monitor your flasher closely for signs that fish come in to inspect your bait. If fish are present but not striking, slow your motion or stop it completely. Sometimes perch just want their bait “parked.” Resume jigging, raising it up in the water column, poofing some more, then parking it again to trigger bites.
Another tip for sorting out smaller perch is to try a bare treble on your jig. Smaller fish are reluctant to peck at the bare treble hook, but the larger fish will sometimes just eat the whole lure.
You might say that perch are to ice fishing as bass are to open water fishing: They’re everywhere. Just as bass are extremely popular during the open water season because they’re so active and ubiquitous, perch are found in a huge variety of waters, from tiny ponds to our giant Great Lakes. They’re pretty willing biters, though there are times when these fish, especially jumbos, are more aggressive.
And you can’t beat the winter thrill of pinning down a pod of jumbos.
Dave Genz, the pioneer of Modern Ice Fishing techniques is featured in the Ice Team annual “PERCH”.By: Dave Genz
