Killer tactic for big pike.

[Bushleague]

Today I was marking some big fish, but using lures was only picking up small pike, and big herring under a bobber were getting ignored completely. I decided to try something new and started fishing my 8" herrings like jerkbaits, a couple hours later I'd caught and released several nice pike in the 36" range.

I used a 2/0 wide gap single hook through the eyes and back through the body behind the gills (this hook could have been a little bigger IMO but that's the biggest hook I had on hand), a #6 treble on a stinger near the dorsal fin, and no sinker at all. I alternated between slow, gentle sweeps and twitches and letting the herring slowly sink on a slack line and lie on the bottom for up to a several minuets at a time. Watching my slack line closely I could see a pike pick up the herring, giving the fish some slack line and about 10-20 seconds before setting the hook resulted in a better hooking percentage, tight lines and instant hook sets are not your friend here.

A few finer points I picked up on.

You need to use herring, most other bait fish are too soft and will fall off the hook after a couple casts. I always salt my baitfish as it toughens them up and keeps them on the hook, a very good idea in this case. As well you will need a stout rod, preferably fairly long for lobbing around these big baits.

Keep your rod tip high when working the bait, that way if you feel a strike you can quickly drop the rod, maybe open the bail, and let the fish swim off with it. Like I said, instant hook sets were rarely successful.

To make your herring last longer, when the head end of the herring starts getting ripped up you can put the big single hook through the tail meat and fish it backwards. The pike dont seem to care.

Well, I'm off to grab another pack of herring and hit the water again, there's a 40"er swimming around with my name on it, best of luck.

[raw outdoors]

Fishing with no weight? What depth of water?

[Bushleague]

Originally Posted by raw outdoors

Fishing with no weight? What depth of water?

I've been fishing in 3-6' of water, the weight of the leader and the hooks will make it sink very slowly. Its sort of a crossover between fishing a suspending jerkbait and fishing a deadbait. I spent all afternoon doing it, with good success, pretty much a strike every cast. I kept using lures and got a few nice ones on a Williams Trophy spoon, which also needs to be worked at a snails pace.

A couple more coments, if you miss a strike the odds of getting the fish to hit again is very high.

Although I probably didn't invent this technique I am going to name it... "Jerking Meat"... spent all day doing it, not to brag or anything.

[58thecat]

We use to hook the head, wrap line around fish to mid section, another hook and then wrap line around fish to the tail section and have the last hook. All hooks are in the fish so weed less, line wrapping kept the smelt together as they tend to get soft over time and are less to fall apart when hit.

[aulrich]

The real question is was it the meat, or the size/presentation that did the trick

Over the weekend for me the fish were not responding to anything with speed. The only lures that really produced was a #1 Len with a crawl retrieve with long pauses or a 5” soft plastic jerk bait with a worm hook twitch ,twitch pause …..

[Bushleague]

Originally Posted by aulrich

The real question is was it the meat, or the size/presentation that did the trick

Over the weekend for me the fish were not responding to anything with speed. The only lures that really produced was a #1 Len with a crawl retrieve with long pauses or a 5” soft plastic jerk bait with a worm hook twitch ,twitch pause …..

I think it was the speed, like I said the Trophy spoon was working pretty well too with its super slow retrieve. I think the big fish didn't want to chase anything fast, but they weren't hitting a bait that was sitting still. The meat jerking retrieve would have been very similar to what you describe with your plastic jerk bait, but being a stinky herring it worked even when it was left lying on the bottom for a bit.

I think Jerking Meat is a good trick to have up my sleeve, It allows one to fish very slowly but still cover water and make a little bit of commotion. A good combo today.

[RavYak]

I don't fly fish for pike often but have noticed something similar on a couple trips. When they are not in an active mood they don't want to chase but if you hang a twitching bait in front of them long enough they will often bite. Had one day in particular where I tried a number of my go to lures and nothing was really working with great success, pulled out the fly rod and used a really slow presentation and caught a number of fish because of it.

Scent might have helped a bit in your case but I am betting it was the slow suspended action that was key.

[Bushleague]

Originally Posted by RavYak

I don't fly fish for pike often but have noticed something similar on a couple trips. When they are not in an active mood they don't want to chase but if you hang a twitching bait in front of them long enough they will often bite. Had one day in particular where I tried a number of my go to lures and nothing was really working with great success, pulled out the fly rod and used a really slow presentation and caught a number of fish because of it.

Scent might have helped a bit in your case but I am betting it was the slow suspended action that was key.

On a side note Rav, have you ever tried the Williams Trophy? Its not really one of my go-to lures but it seems to produce when nothing else will. After my experiences today I would say because of the speed, if you fish this spoon beyond about half the speed of any other spoon it will spin.

It didn't produce quite as well as Jerking Meat, or possibly twitching a streamer, or a plastic jerkbait... but it sure took the guesswork out of it.

[RavYak]

Originally Posted by Bushleague

On a side note Rav, have you ever tried the Williams Trophy? Its not really one of my go-to lures but it seems to produce when nothing else will. After my experiences today I would say because of the speed, if you fish this spoon beyond about half the speed of any other spoon it will spin.

No I haven't tried that one, speed could very well be the reason. When the bite is off the biggest reason is that they just don't want to chase. I find this is more common early and late season when the water is cooler too. Have to slow down your presentations to get bites some times(or just keep moving fast and cover ground in search for active fish).

[Bushleague]

[QUOTE=RavYak;3788903]No I haven't tried that one, speed could very well be the reason. When the bite is off the biggest reason is that they just don't want to chase. I find this is more common early and late season when the water is cooler too. Have to slow down your presentations to get bites some times(or just keep moving fast and cover ground in search for active fish).[/QUOTE

True that, another time that the bite is off is after a cold front. For as aggressive as Pike are made out to be they sure can be sissies about a cold front, shut right down worst than trout or walleye IMO. The next time I end up fishing for pike after a bad cold front I can think of a few tricks I'll be trying thanks to this thread.

[Bushleague]

So today I was thumbing through my copy of the excellent book, "Northern Pike and Muskie", and I found the technique well described in there. Pretty much the same tips and findings as I came up with, it mentions that using a baitfish too large results in a poor hooking percentage, which also mirrors my own experience. Switching down to a 5-6" herring has improved my hook ups.

So I didn't invent jerking meat, but I'm still naming it.

Another point of interest, I've been using a leader made out of 80lb Berkley Big Game Leader material... mono. Being more boyant than steel or flouro I can get the herring to sink slower. Over 20 fish caught on the same leader at this point, its getting a little chewed up on the end, and I should trim it back, but I'm kind of curious how many fish I can land on it. Far cheaper than flouro too.

[RavYak]

I shared this earlier this year, interesting results.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KiQTvmM-1cY

[Bushleague]

Originally Posted by RavYak

I shared this earlier this year, interesting results.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KiQTvmM-1cY

Thanks for the link, very interesting. The next hard water season I'm going to try using 25-30 lb mono leader material on my tip ups. Given how well the 80lb stuff has been working I'm pretty sure I should be ok.

[RavYak]

Originally Posted by Bushleague

Thanks for the link, very interesting. The next hard water season I'm going to try using 25-30 lb mono leader material on my tip ups. Given how well the 80lb stuff has been working I'm pretty sure I should be ok.

Pike can bite through 25/30 easily enough, especially on a tip up which usually results in the line being inside the pikes mouth.

Especially if fishing for bigger fish I would stick to using 60-80.

[cube]

Originally Posted by Bushleague

Today I was marking some big fish, but using lures was only picking up small pike, and big herring under a bobber were getting ignored completely. I decided to try something new and started fishing my 8" herrings like jerkbaits, a couple hours later I'd caught and released several nice pike in the 36" range.

I used a 2/0 wide gap single hook through the eyes and back through the body behind the gills (this hook could have been a little bigger IMO but that's the biggest hook I had on hand), a #6 treble on a stinger near the dorsal fin, and no sinker at all. I alternated between slow, gentle sweeps and twitches and letting the herring slowly sink on a slack line and lie on the bottom for up to a several minuets at a time. Watching my slack line closely I could see a pike pick up the herring, giving the fish some slack line and about 10-20 seconds before setting the hook resulted in a better hooking percentage, tight lines and instant hook sets are not your friend here.

A few finer points I picked up on.

You need to use herring, most other bait fish are too soft and will fall off the hook after a couple casts. I always salt my baitfish as it toughens them up and keeps them on the hook, a very good idea in this case. As well you will need a stout rod, preferably fairly long for lobbing around these big baits.

Keep your rod tip high when working the bait, that way if you feel a strike you can quickly drop the rod, maybe open the bail, and let the fish swim off with it. Like I said, instant hook sets were rarely successful.

To make your herring last longer, when the head end of the herring starts getting ripped up you can put the big single hook through the tail meat and fish it backwards. The pike dont seem to care.

Well, I'm off to grab another pack of herring and hit the water again, there's a 40"er swimming around with my name on it, best of luck.

I believe the Brits call it twitching.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8Q_wFdinxA

Have you ever tried the slip bobber version?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oMgeSto8jYo

[EZM]

Although there are hundreds of guys who caught BIG pike casting a tiny spoon or small lure - it's generally accepted that the really BIG pike don't actively expend too much energy chasing anything too often.

That why, consistently, the biggest pike are taken on dead baits (open water or under the ice) or using twitch baiting or bobber twitching.

I do, however, like the "jerking the meat" name far better ..... I chuckled a little. I have had some success doing the same with huge circle hooks arranged in tandem on a heavy fluoro leader using a herring as well - it works for sure.

[58thecat]

Originally Posted by EZM

Although there are hundreds of guys who caught BIG pike casting a tiny spoon or small lure - it's generally accepted that the really BIG pike don't actively expend too much energy chasing anything too often.

That why, consistently, the biggest pike are taken on dead baits (open water or under the ice) or using twitch baiting or bobber twitching.

I do, however, like the "jerking the meat" name far better ..... I chuckled a little. I have had some success doing the same with huge circle hooks arranged in tandem on a heavy fluoro leader using a herring as well - it works for sure.

Yup biggest pike I ever saw was the one my wife caught....yes my wife...reached in the tackle box and tied on a clear rubber grub like bait with bright sparkles, tossed it over, by the time her father was ready they proceeded and yup she was snagged...on 48 inches of pike.....what a beast....we made our way over due to the hooting....jaw dropper for sure!
Bessnard lake 1994
She still is the pike boss too

[Bushleague]

Originally Posted by cube

I believe the Brits call it twitching.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8Q_wFdinxA

Have you ever tried the slip bobber version?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oMgeSto8jYo

I've used the slip bobber version on trout, never on pike though for some reason. I've found to get the bait to jig one needs to weigh the bobber down while leaving the bait more or less un-weighted.

I have some popping bobbers somewhere (pretty much just a bobber with a cupped top, works like a popper when you jerk it) that I picked up in the Keys that I always intended to try, seems like it might get the bait some attention... knowing pike though they'd just as likely hit the bobber though.

I've really been enjoying jerking the meat though... its got its own special charm, gone through about 4 packs of herring so far.

[rasta]

Rayvak is spot on regardless if it’s after a cold front there are always active fish just gott a findmmm sun goes away changes everything sun come out back to dark or is it bright god dam lulllls or ****ty sonar lol