The act of fishing is one thing, but the business of catching is a whole different story. I certainly don’t catch as many fish as I would like every time out, but I usually manage to put a bend in my rod often enough to keep me in the pursuit.
There’s a vast amount of equipment, lures, proper technique, and fish biology that all come into play, as well as a good understanding of lake, stream, and river conditions. If that is not enough, you can add changing weather and water conditions to the scenario. The better understanding one has of all of the items just mentioned, the more likely you are to be successful.
All that being said, however, there is one simple concept that seems to go a long way towards improving one’s hook-up rate, and that is to be especially careful of size, that is, the size of your presentation and the size of the equipment used in your presentation.
Of course, the size of your lure or bait will depend a lot on the fish species you are after. The same is true of the size and type of equipment being utilized.
Bass have big mouths, and so do northern pike, pickerel, and walleyes, but panfish like bluegills, perch, and crappies have smaller mouths, so adjusting the size of your lure goes a long way toward more hook-ups.
Ice-fishing season is fortunately still on track, and one of the biggest mistakes I see when I observe some ice fishermen new to the activity is that they are fishing for panfish with bait or lures that are too big for the fish to get into their mouths.
Over the years, I have found that by gearing down the size of my presentation, I have increased my hook-ups. The very small ice-fishing jigs tipped with a wax worm, mealworm, or a small chunk of redworm work well on panfish.
Sure, if I’m going after larger fish like pike, I’ll switch to larger lures and baits. A three-inch minnow might be fine for pike and walleyes or some of those large Lake Erie perch, but probably not a good size for panfish.
Not only is bait and lure size important, but so is the equipment used to present the offerings. We serious fishermen, have a lot of rods and reels because we must adjust to the species of fish that we are pursuing. Again, one of the biggest problems I often see is fishermen using rigs that are overpowered. Since we are still involved in the ice-fishing season, I’ll focus my attention on ice-fishing rods and reels. Ice-fishing rods are generally around two feet in length. For panfishing, I like a small, light, open-faced spinning reel or one of the inline reels that resemble a fly reel.
Certainly, you can use some type of bobber to detect strikes or the flexible spring strike indicator at the rod tip. Most often, I prefer to hold the rig in my hand and “feel” for the hit. In order to detect that very light tap, I always keep a tight, straight line and set the hook immediately. If you are fishing for panfish, I almost always go with a two-pound test line or four-pound at the most. The lighter line makes it easier to detect the often very light strikes.
If I’m after bigger fish like pike, I’ll adjust my rods and reels and lures to bigger and heavier equipment.
While I have tended to focus on size regarding the ice-fishing scene, the same applies to any other fishing size matters.
