Vertical Jiging/longline Lil Minnow

[Kelly Peterson]

Yesterday got out for a couple hours late in the day. Was bothered by excess dead leaves and pine needles floating on top of the water so could only do vertical jigging. It was windy, too so was limited where I could go in my little 8 foot Sun Dolphin Sportsman. Did manage to catch this 10" Perch and an 11" Chubb-they fight really good on ultralight tackle.

[Kelly Peterson]

Then today the weather turned for the better, 70 degrees and no wind so I headed back to the little 7 acre mill pond in our town, which is fed by a sizable river(about like a 2 lane highway). 6 feet maximum depth away from dam with most areas 2-4 feet. Been wanting to fish the main part for awhile so started there and not a half hour into it I tagged this 11" yellow perch. Guys these are big perch for my area. Also caught lots of big Chubbs and Shinners 6-11", boy are they fun on UL tackle(kept all the big ones for trapping bait) plus lots of perch from 2-10" and one small SMB. Probably 50+ fish in total.

Special thanks goes to Slip Sinker for all his help/reporting of his success with the Lil Minnow(1.5") on a 1/64 ounce jig. Because of the calm condition and the lack of debris on the surface today was able to do lots of long lining-most fish were caught this way and in 2-4 FOW.

 

[Slip Sinker]

I’m glad it worked for you Kelly! Congrats!... sounds like it was a great day. Gotta love that flat water! Beautiful scenery!

Which rod did you use on this trip?

[Kelly Peterson]

Used my 6 foot 6 ultralight, Plunger Supreme reel with 5# red Power Pro. My 8 foot rods made on fly rod blanks are a little too long for this little boat. Need to bring one along one of these times to see how it casts the 1/64 jig tipped Lil Minnow.

[Slip Sinker]

looks like your a week or two ahead of us on the leaves... im not looking forward to that mess.

yeah ... any y.perch over the 10" mark on my county inland lakes are "big" also...  and they really seem to like that bait.

[Kelly Peterson]

Yup the perch do like that bait no matter the size. caught several today about 2-2.5" long, assume they are YOY class and every size in between. Wonder how it will work thru the ice?

The Fall foliage should be farther along up here, we haven't had a freeze so far but that comes tomorrow night. The leaves on ash and some other trees are already down.

Got a couple other small lakes to try yet this fall before hard water comes-last year it came early November and we already had 4" of snow by this time last October.

[Slip Sinker]

hoping it will perform well... did you notice the slight buoyancy of the plastic that levels out the jig and tail perfectly horizontal when jigged vertically?

[Kelly Peterson]

No I didn't but then our water is pretty tea colored. Do know that plastic floats some. I was using jigs made on long shank #6 hooks so it hung just slightly below horizontal. Using one of those no tie clips where one just slips on/off the jig.  They are loose so the jigs action(up and down) is very good.

[carl hendrix]

YEA KELLY;; FALL TIME OF THE YEAR MEANS ALL KINDS OF LEAVES;  ON TOP WATER;; BUT CAN ALSO MEAN GREAT FISHING TO !     KOOKS LIKE YOU DIALED IN ON SOME NICE ONES !