Aggressive Tactics for First-Ice Walleyes

Most good walleye anglers get real excited when the first good ice of the year appears. The fish are aggressive and still willing to swim a fair distance for something to munch on. As a result, it pays to be aggressive in your tactics to catch them. New rattling spoons and advances in lure design will allow you to be even more successful than traditional methods.

For example, the Rattlin’ Flyer Spoon offers the fish a vertical presentation, holographic flash and sound plus the ability to "cast" under the ice that’s deadly when walleyes are nearby.

Another new aggressive vertical jigging lure that is now available is the Lindy Darter. This bait can be pumped aggressively, has an irresistible, life-like action plus brass rattles which bring fish in.

Other baits can be effective, but they often peak in performance during the golden hours around sunrise and sunset. While these low-light periods are still the best times to have a lure in the water, aggressive tactics will help you catch walleyes all day long.

Location
Finding the best location is the key to catching fish. While there is no such thing as a magic lure that will catch fish all the time and everywhere, you must drill holes in their neighborhood.

In natural lakes, first ice will find walleyes near the steepest breaks on shoreline structure. Study a hydrographic map and look for the fastest drop-off to the deepest part of the lake. Humps and points are good spots as well.

Early ice is often the time to visit those shallow prairie lakes that were too weedy to fish effectively in summer. Focus on hard-bottomed spots like rock piles and even small structural features. A slight rise or hard spot on the bottom can be holding areas for walleyes.

Stick with shoreline structure on bigger lakes like MilleLacs or Lkake of the Woods. Check out spots where reed beds stick up through the ice. The edge of the reed beds will hold walleyes.

As always, points are the prime real estate in reservoirs, but look for the ones with the sharpest breaks into the old channel, which will be the deepest water in the system.

Gear
It is best to use an ice rod that is fairly stout with a stiffer tip, like St. Croix’s Legend Ice - LIR24M. If the rod is too limber, you can move and jiggle it all day long and little of the action will be transferred to the bait. You must be able to shake a Rattlin’ Flyer Spoon or Darter hard enough to get them to make some noise and work well. Remember that whatever the rod tip is doing, the lure is doing below.

Start by using low-stretch mono in 6- to 8-pound-test. If you’re fishing deeper water, try using a super braided line, like Power Pro, to increase your sense of touch detect bites, feel bottom, and transfer action to the lure.A hand-held GPS helps to locate spots you hopefully programmed in during the open-water season, when moving around to scout was much easier than after the ice formed.

A flasher or electronics is critical. Humminbird’s new ICE 55 is awesome and easy to use. Sonar offers the ability to detect walleyes that move close to your bait. You can also watch the display color change as the fish move ever closer. Gauge their mood and the action they want by whether they continue to move to the center of the hole and take the bait or veer off. Too many near misses are an invitation to change jigging action or color.

Keep your color choices simple. In low-light periods, red Techni-Glo works well because red glow is the brightest. When you charge it with your Tazer (a small hi-intensity flashlight which is designed to light up glow lures), fish can see it the farthest away. At sunrise and sunset, they will be attracted a long ways.Blue glow lasts the longest, so it’s a good night color when bigger fish are more apt to bite. Effective daytime colors vary according to water color and walleye preference. Chartreuse is always a good choice, but play with the greens, the oranges and the yellows. Keep adjusting the color to what the fish are telling you.

By using and understanding your electronics, you can tell when fish are coming by and not biting. If that happens, make color changes, adjust your jigging motion, or change lures entirely. An underwater camera can help if you aren’t moving around a lot.

Fishing a Spoon
The design of the Rattlin’ Flyer Spoon mimics its predecessor, the Flyer Jig. They glide when they are dropped down the hole, allowing ice anglers to cast a 6-foot radius around their hole. What you do next is critical.

Don’t just lift it and let it ?pendulum’ back below the hole. Slowly drag and twitch the spoon as you bring it back. You’re "casting" almost fishing like you would in open water, thus covering more fishing areas from one spot.

Walleyes often inhale it right from the bottom. But if not, the next step is to pound it into the bottom over and over. It puts the "poof" factor on your side. There’s always sediment on the bottom. When you lower the bait to the bottom and shake it or pound it, it will cause the sediment to mushroom up. It looks like fish feeding on bloodworms and larvae. It can cause a feeding frenzy of perch and then the bigger fish come in to feed on the perch.

The last step is to lift the lure off the bottom and jig the bait aggressively to make the rattles work for you. It’s like a dinner bell for a curious walleye. A major mistake many anglers make is to lessen the intensity of their jigging when a walleye shows up on the flasher.

When a fish shows up, don’t freeze up! Keep jigging aggressively to keep the rattles working. If fish turn away, then try modifying your jigging action.So, the lesson is: first drag, then pound, and then jig the spoon.

If you like fishing with live bait on a bobber, that’s not a problem. Just leave one hole for aggressive jigging. There will be times when you’ll be jigging and get nothing, then quit a moment and the bobber next to you goes down. It’s not hard to figure out what happened. You called the fish in with the rattles, but maybe it wanted sometime more neutral looking so it turned off and took the minnow on the ?dead stick’ or tip-up instead.

If aggressive jigging doesn’t do the trick, try switching to a Genz Worm or a Fat Boy dressed with several colored maggots, or ’spikes’ as they’re also called. Poof the bottom with them, too, pounding the jig to send sediment into the water to attract perch and walleyes.

Learning the Different Types of Fly Fishing Lures

Learning the skill of fly fishing is no easy sport for every angler. It involves angle precision in order to achieve the target position of the artificial flies. Fly fishing is almost a game for many because interested anglers are challenged to catch many different fish species with use of the fly rod by imitating insects to lure the fishes. The success of fly fishing depends on many factors and one factor is the fly fishing lure. Imitating insects are done by attaching lures or flies into the fly line to be thrown to the water. This imitation of flies can lure the fishes and eventually trap them and catch them.

There are different types of fly fishing lures or flies and each are listed below

Wet fly This type of lure imitates aquatic insects below the water surface. Meaning this type of lure design are the patterned after drowned insects.

Streamer Lures

This is a type of lure that is a form of wet fly lure. This type is designed to imitate small fishes that are being eaten by large fishes.

Dry Fly

This type of lure is designed to imitate adult stage of many aquatic insects. The lure should be able to ride on the water surface smoothly to make it almost real and close to insects that falls into the water such as beetles and ants.

Nymphs Lures

This Lures imitates the larval form of aquatic insects. This is a special form of the wet fly lure.

Surface Lures

This are also called bass poppers. This type of lured design imitates frogs or mice. They are made from bright colors that are attractive to large fishes such as Northern Pike or Bass especially when they cause commotion due to water movement.

Lures or Flies may be bought in the market or can be self-made. Making flies or lures is a skill and many anglers are learning to make their own lure instead of buying in the market. They are up for the challenge of making the difficult yet best flies to lure the fish close and eventually fall trap to it. Lures may be made from feather, fur or light cloth and tied together with a tie specially made for making fly fishing flies. There are many books or videos providing step by step procedure in making the lures. One just has to follow them properly in order to make the best lure to catch fishes.

how to take a Kid fishing

How to Take Children Fishing

This article is for anyone who has taken a child fishing, thinking it would be fun, and it turned out to be a disaster. Kids need action to keep their attention. This will show you how to catch enough fish to make it enjoyable for all.


Steps
Buy high-quality fishing equipment.
Forget the cute, cheap, fishing rods that are sold for kids. They are usually too difficult to cast, and the line is usually cheap. You will spend more time untangling knots than actually fishing. It will be tempting to buy the Donald Duck rod, but skip it.
Buy a good, ultra-light rod and reel. They come in five to six feet. Try to buy the shortest one you can, but not less than five feet.
Buy a spool of good line. There are a lot on the market. Stren is recommended for its ease of casting and fewer tangles. Go for a two - four pound test.
Buy a few torpedo style floats. There are some that are specially made for flies. Ask a clerk at your local tackle shop.
Buy some flies that are made for fly fishing. Make sure they are for dry fly fishing. This means they will float. They make some sponge spiders that do really well, and some called "Pan Pops," too.
Spool the reel, or have them do it for you at the tackle shop. Attach the float so that it can slide along the line to the desired length. Tie on the fly, and you're ready to go.
Choose the right pond. Try to find one that isn't very crowded. Kids can get enthusiastic with their casting, and we want to catch fish, not people. Also, look for a pond that has a lot of pan fish. We're not after a huge bass. Kids will be very happy with a bunch of bluegill.
Keep the float way up by the fly, and teach your child how to cast somewhere in a field or empty parking lot.
Pull the float down away from the fly, about four to five feet once your child is confortable with casting.
Have them cast out into the water. They don't have to cast far. In fact, they may have better luck casting closer to shore.
Let the fly just sit for a few seconds. Sometimes the fish will strike it as soon as it hits the water. If there is no action right away, start them reeling in slowly. Use a start and stop action.
Let them raise the rod up once they feel a tug or bite. Usually there is no need to set the hook.

Reel 'em in, baby! If there are fish in the pond, they will hopefully catch more than enough to keep them happy.

Tips
Practice catch and release, if you do not intend to eat the fish.
Try to purchase barbless flies, or mash down the barb with a vice grip. This will make things so much easier when trying to release the fish, or to get it out of your child's skin, too!
Keep a pair of needle nose wire snips handy. Sometimes the fish will swallow the fly and you will have to clip the line (if you are releasing your fish it is very important to try to get the hook out without further injuring the fish, you want them to survive being released - however, if you cannot get the hook out, clip the line and the hook will dissolve over time).
Empty clear pretzel containers found at most places like Sam's Club, Costco, etc., that hold about 2 gallons of water make a great holding tank so your kids can look at what they've caught.
Cut-up pieces of hot dog, cheese chunks, dough and corn kernels make perfect bait for squeamish little ones who don't want to handle worms, and bluegills love the meal! Don't say no if the little ones ask to bait their hook with a french fry from lunch; bluegill and catfish are especially keen on burger king french fries.
Remember, kids don't necessarily care how big the fish is - they just want to catch fish.

Always remember the age and maturity of the child. Hooks are sharp and need to be handled carefully. Remind children to keep an eye on their hook while casting, or they might hook someone's eye!
Be very careful near water of any depth, especially with young children. Always make them wear life jackets. Ensure enough adults are present to keep all children in sight.
Fishing accidents can cause severe eye injuries. Always were protective eye glasses. Polarized lenses help you see the fish.

Calculate a Fish's Weight Without a Scale

How to Calculate a Fish's Weight Without a Scale
Did you just bring in a "fish of a lifetime" and you need to get important measurements like weight? Well if you find yourself in need of a scale, just use the easy formula ((Girth x Girth)x Length)/ 800 to get a very close estimate of your fish's weight.

Steps
Take the girth measurement. You need to measure the fish's girth by wrapping the measuring tape around the widest part of the fish. Take that measurement and square it.
Find the length of the fish. Take the tip of the tape to the top of the nose of the fish and extend it to the longest tip of the tail when pinched. Multiply this by your girth x girth measurement.
Divide the final calculation. Take your last result and divide it by 800. This will give you the weight of the fish.

Tips
Be as exact as you can in your measurements.

Things You'll Need
Tape Measure

morning greets the dakotas

Thunder storm on the Creek

This little storm cleared the air and stired the caddis hatch, what was a rain drop and what was a Fly?