Bluegill - Big Bluegill

Do you love big bluegill?

Prompted by huge success last season with vertical jigging for big bluegills ,perch, and crappies on PA/Ohio's Pymatuning reservoir, I've been tying jigs daily in anticipation for the coming season. Yet in checking ice fishing results throughout the north, I'm rather taken with the use of a single BEAD to tip ,used instead of bait. These are mostly featured on the modern models of a "Russian jig" (actually a specially curved spoon -brands like Ken's Hook, McGathy "slab-grabbers" , etc), which seem to totally takeover an angler's attention, once he gets on to them. My latest jigs look very neat with a bright red bead at the bend of the hook, and acquire a swimming action! Of course, our spooners here could use this trick easily, saving a bunch on live bait, or acquire yet a new type of effective jigging spoon by seeking the well honed commercial models.

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Sounds neat John.....any photos you could post? Be interesting to see.....

Don't know that the following pic will take, but here's some pics of the ice "jigs" that are such a rave .Note the very visual bead in the back!  I'm thinking, too, take any bluegill jig and place a bead over the hook,cut back any material that extends beyond that and you have a winner!!

Beach, Ice Fishing, Ken's Hooks, Perch, Walleye


Thanks John......always seen the beads used for salt water applications......no surprise the gills would hit them.....neat looking baits for sure.......

Thanks for posting John .Let us know how they work !

those r cool looking baits john

I like it sorry I never thought of it.

John ,Glad to see your always coming up with something new, at first glance those thing look  like hippy leaches, cool looking , keep up the good work. LOFR

another great idea!!  thanks for sharing!!  think I'll make a few for myself!!

Great info John

Wow, those are definitely eye-catchers. Add a bit of live bait, and there's a two for one special attracting the bigger predators.

Very interesting spoons.
What about your jigs, can we get a look at those ?

David, I'll TRY to get a photo of the jigs up, but I'm a notorious dub at posting pics that I take! My ties are quite simple, for a mental image,tho - I use a 1/24 oz round jighead, place a big ringed red plastic bead over the hook bend & lash it in place. Then I wrap a thin layer of natural,unprocessed wool  from bead up to the jighead, finishing with a few short strands of white/gold satin on each side for motion&flash. I really think the red bead ,tho it sets the small jig into a side to side wiggle, is the visual trigger that they hone in on & is most conducive by roundness  to the hoovering take of bluegills!

LOFR, Hi ,ole pal! Thanks for the compliment, but I can't take the credit and really have to thank folks like the family at McGathy's Hooks who have really fine tuned the use of a bead as a replacement for bait (their site has lots of good info and they even offer a video on working bead jigs!). Heck, my homemade lures have worked superbly ,but any small jig or spoon with a bright bead as the tail will work for this method!

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