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There is a single best answer - change their mood. Take them from picky to the fastest-feeding fish in the lake using attractants.
With the use of attractants, you create competition. Did you know you can actually increase the speed and reaction at the top of the water on your bite indicator?
With a little practice and very accurate use of attractants, you can make a 2 fish day into a 50 fish day with ease. I don't worry so much about the fish being picky any longer - I force them to eat my hook bait before fish #2 or fish #8 steals their meal.
With more than one fish looking at your hook bait, using attractants, you create pigs out of finicky fish. It's like the last slice of cake in a church basement baby - someone's gonna race another to grab it or its gone. This works on bluegills and crappie.
Cant argue with Keith's comments about the "Golden Hours"... an hour each side of sun-up and sun-down.
Mid-day is still a time to catch fish, but the fish themselves have a mid day routine you have to learn. The Golden Two Hours probably are your best bet, all things considered.
Anthony,
David has given you a whole lot of great advise! (Hope you don't mind if I swipe it for my use as well)
The only thing I could add to David's very complete information would be TIME OF DAY. Fish are a lot like people in that they like to hang out where they are the most comfortable. If I have limited time to fish, I concentrate my efforts during the "Golden Hours" of the day. For me these are the 30 min. either side sun-up and sun-down. You can certianly catch fish any time of day, but when the weather starts to heat up or the day will be bright those are your best bets.
When I was a kid I heard an old gentelman say, "If ya wanna learn to fish, ya gotta fish." He was a cranky son-of-a-gun who always hung out at the local baitshop. If you think about it though, he was right. There really is no substitute for just getting out there and trying things out.
Get out there and catch some fish, take some more pictures and pretty soon you will be giving US advice!
Good Luck!
Keith
Alright Tony, try this. There are a few things that are accepted when it comes to catching panfish.
1. Structure
Look for them around weeds, wood or rock, most of the time. These things provide the shelter they like and the food they want. Wherever these things are near or in deep water, that is also where you will tend to find the larger fish.
2. Food
The foods most panfish consume are terrestrial insects, aquatic invertebrates, small fish and zooplankton. It can vary with the time of year as to what they PREFER, but present them with these or simulations and you will be offering what they want most of the time.
3. Water depth
Panfish are generally shallow water fish. You don't normally find them in a hundred feet of water. 5-30 feet is an average range, with infrequent exceptions. The larger fish tend to be in the midrange and around structure close to these depths. In very clear water, they tend to be deeper.
3. Season and weather
Fish move around. In the spring they look for warmer, shallow water to breed. In the summer, they hold in water with the right temperature and oxygen levels. In the winter they go deeper and feed less. When weather fronts pass through, they go off their feed for a few days and hold tight to structure. High and clear skies drive them to cover and deeper water.
SO why am I telling you all this? Because these things are universal in their application. Understand them and you stand a better chance of finding fish that feed well when you are there.
As for technique and bait - go with worms, larvae, crickets, crawfish and small minnows until you find active fish. just give that 5-item list to the bait store and have them hook you up. Use pencil slip floats - not bobbers - to work varying depths until you find the fish, and to detect "shy bites". Smaller terminal tackle (hooks, shot, etc.) and lighter line in the 2-6 lb test range helps.
Now, as to your question. If I were to give you one "secret" fishing technique to help you get fish to bite, it is this: CHUM.
Use chum to get the fish in a feeding mood and turn on their competitive feeding drive. Feed it in small amounts, frequently, and mix in small bits of your hook bait occasionally.
There are as many chum formulations as fishermen, but for panfish, the simplest is bread crumbs or ground up dog food. Here in the South we have a saying - "The best place to catch fish is under a piece of bread." Personally, I like stale cornbread.
Thats Funny Keith I need some
And i Dont know whats wrong
Dynamite...
Keith
How about a little information as to what is wrong? There is no single best answer, all the time and everywhere.
Crappie and Bluegill are different, too. Only sometimes do things overlap from one to the other.
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