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Pike perch is a fish that does not often find itself on a fishing hook. There are many reasons for this. It can be the wrong tackle, the wrong fishing technique, the wrong place to fish, even just the banal absence of zander. However, more often than not, the wrong choice of bait becomes the cause of failure.
The behavior of pike perch in nature
Pike perch is a bottom predatory fish. It feeds on a small fish that has an elongated body. These are mainly bleak, minnow, ruff, roach, fry of other fish species. Pike perch usually does not touch large fish. Small eats with pleasure worms, larvae, crustaceans. There is a close relative of pike perch, bersh. It feeds on worms and crustaceans even as an adult, but it is much smaller and more common in more southern latitudes.
Pike perch has good night vision and changing scale color. Freshly caught from the water, it has a darker color, especially at night. Then, when he falls asleep, it becomes almost whitish. On the back there is a large spiny fin, like a perch. By the way, his last close relative has much in common with pike perch. The mouth is dotted with a large number of teeth, from which large fangs can be distinguished. Bersh doesn’t have them. It does not open very wide, so the fish in its diet is usually medium-sized. The pike-perch’s eyes are cat-like and glow in the dark. Caught out of the water at night, it has a frightening appearance in the light of a lantern – luminous eyes, bared fangs, splayed prickly fin. Neither give nor take, sea devil!
In the warm season, it leads mainly a nocturnal lifestyle, going hunting to the shore, and at night it sits in deep places. A large one, in which the metabolism is already slowed down, does not leave the channel ditches and deep pools at all, since it has enough food even there. In the cold season it becomes more active during the day. But even in winter, the best time for zander fishing is twilight, both in the morning and in the evening.
Pike perch is a schooling fish. He hunts in the same way as perches. A flock of pike-perch tries to enter a flock of small things from two sides, displacing it and snatching the prey, skillfully pursuing it and not letting it escape. Larger ones often hunt alone. Underwater shooting well demonstrates the nature of the hunting of this fish in winter. Attracted by the game of the bait, the zander turns around so that it can be seen with both eyes and correctly assess the distance. Then he makes a throw. If the bait is located near the bottom and moves slowly, he can make a throw, focusing on the senses and the lateral line, trying to cover the prey with his body and chin. When jig fishing, about 20-30% of zander can be caught by the beard or belly, this is a normal situation.
Spawning of pike perch occurs in April-early May, at a water temperature of 10-12 degrees. This fish spawns in fairly deep places, from one and a half to two meters. Places are chosen near snags and flooded debris, near large stones, on which pike perch can rub and spawn and spawn. After spawning, the male remains to guard the clutch for some time, driving away other fish from it. Then the zander move to their summer camps. Usually these are deep pits near sandy spits, where a lot of fry accumulate. In such places, the fish do not need to make long transitions for night hunting.
In autumn, small fish gradually move away from the shore, and pike perch less and less often approaches it, more often moving at depth. His daily poklyovki begin. It is often possible to catch this fish when fishing for burbot at night, if a ruff is placed as a bait on a bottom or an elastic band. In this case, bites can be massive. Flocks of pike perch become larger by autumn. In winter, this fish adheres to the daily rhythm, making periodic fixed movements along the reservoir, the so-called “fish paths”, and never stray far from their habitual places.
As studies show, pike perch consumes most of the food in the spring, during spawning, before it and a little after – more than 50%. In spring and summer, in total, pike perch eats a little less than their spring diet. And in winter, he eats only 3-4% of the annual volume. Therefore, the fact that the best time for catching zander is winter is a delusion. It is best to catch it in the spring, but at this time fishing for it is prohibited and is poaching.
Summer lures and fishing methods
There are several ways to catch walleye in the summer. The most advertised is spinning. Indeed, this is the first thing that comes to mind when they want to catch this fish. However, is it always effective? The fact is that in the dark, spinning baits are significantly inferior to natural, live bait and fry. They give off the smell characteristic of a wounded fish and their behavior is more natural for zander than the most skillful game of the most perfect jig bait. And here more traditional ways of fishing come into play – live bait donka and float fishing rod with live bait on the hook. But most anglers still consider spinning to be more sporty, and then we will talk about spinning fishing.
Blyosny
The two most common baits are spinners and silicone. Less commonly used are sinking wobblers, rattlins, mandula and other less traditional fishing methods. Of the spinners, rotating ones should be preferred. They give quite intense vibrations that are able to attract fish that are guided by hearing and sensory organs. Excellent results are shown by non-traditional turntables – with holes in the petal, with an asymmetric petal, without collars. The color of the spinner is not very important here, but it is better to use good turntables that have a fluorescent petal color. You can determine it using the currency detector. Over time, it is washed off, so it is necessary to change it from time to time.
There are many opinions that homemade turntables are better than serial ones. This is sometimes true. However, more often an angler, buying some kind of lure and trying to catch it, chooses one catchy one that brings a good result. Then he can lose it and buy the same one in the store. If it was a cheap spinner, then the repeatability of its behavior in water would be low. It seems that the same lure will not catch anything, and the angler will lose a lot of time before he finds his treasured lure again.
If this is a good bait of a well-known company, then it will have a high repeatability of behavior, and it will catch in the same way as a torn one. It will even be possible to advise her to a friend, and he will also be able to catch her in these conditions. It makes no sense to talk about the repeatability of the game of handicraft lures. They are made without the use of high-precision modern equipment and are usually unique. Those who want to catch pike perch on spinning should start with real branded turntables.
When it comes to firms, Mepps is the universally recognized king of turntables. In form, all the classic turntables of this company can be divided into three groups – Aglia, Lon and Comet. Aglia has a penny petal, lon has an elongated petal, and comet has something in between. Actually, such a qualification is rather arbitrary and more characterizes the sound component of the game, and even among the Aglia series there are long petals, but this is an exception. There is also the Fury series, which has the most aggressive action, but is less suitable for zander fishing because of it.
These spinners are very different in the game. Lones have a pronounced slow game, Komet – fast rotation, Aglia – from medium to fast speed. Comets also have the largest lobe angle and wind up fairly quickly. For catching zander, all three types of spinners can fit. There is an opinion that it is best to catch pike perch on bosoms, but this is not so. It all depends on the specific preferences of this fish in the pond.
The size of the spinner is also selected experimentally for the conditions of fishing. It happens that the largest pike perch takes only the smallest lure, and it happens that it catches only the largest. In any case, zander fishing is unlikely to involve ultralight spinning, and here it is better to use turntables from the third number and above. By the nature of the wiring, the best results are intermittent. Here, the lons will lose, since they start up rather slowly, and with short pulls, you should choose Comets and Aglia. However, here again it all depends on the fish. All other turntables usually copy Meps to one degree or another, and you should switch to them only after you have mastered the Meps.
Loose lobe turntables are not traditional. They catch great and give less hooks in hard places than traditional ones. However, some skill is required to catch them, since their game is very unstable and highly dependent on the work of the angler with the rod and reel. To catch them, you need a more sonorous rod and a good reel. Often they are made on the basis of serial turntables, using petals from them. But there are also many subtleties in manufacturing. Fishing on these turntables is a kind of jig fishing.
jig lures
Jig lures are used more often than silicone ones. Rarely used lures with a free play, which work on a uniform wiring. The fact is that the most effective way to catch zander is with a drop-shot rig. When fishing, the weight is at the bottom, and the bait is attached to the fishing line 30-100 cm above it. For one movement of the weight, the reel makes two or three twitches with the bait, put it on the bottom, and play in other ways with the help of a rod. This behavior best imitates a wounded fish, which is most attractive to zander. Not only silicone fish are used here, but also worms, cuttlefish, and other baits. You can also put foam rubber fish, but they are good to catch with a drop-shot only in a fairly strong current.
One more thing can be said about silicone – it is best to use high-quality edible. Edible silicone allows you to fish much more effectively, as it gives not only sound vibrations under water, but also a small trace of smell and taste in the water. It is also desirable to use high-quality, soft baits that realistically imitate fish or aquatic life that have a fluorescent color. It can be determined on the currency detector. It is impossible to say something categorically about the color of the baits, but it has been noticed that dark worms are more effective than light ones, but tail fry with a fluffy silicone fan, on the contrary, are better than light ones.
Such silicone costs more than usual, but it will be better to catch. You can even say this – the type of bait is not so important as its quality. A branded vibrotail, which is not often used for catching zander, will bite better than a poor quality worm, even with the most skillful game.
Only one thing can be said for sure about the size of the baits – you should not use silicone that is too large, more than 10 cm. If healthy rubber bands work just fine for pike, then pike perch can ignore them. Sometimes only the smallest elastic band, 2-2.5 cm long, brings success. Again, this is determined only by experience in specific conditions, and nothing else. It is better to start fishing with small baits, and then move on to larger ones if they are not successful.
Other baits
Sometimes when catching pike perch, wobblers, spinnerbaits, rattlins are used. Traditionally, these are pike baits. However, often when fishing for zander they put them, and achieve good results. Sometimes a bait like a cicada also helps to get away from zero. It is not bad for perch, but it can also show good results when catching pike perch on a summer night. It is optional to use other baits when the spinner and silicone do not work.
Winter lures
In winter, pike perch can be well caught on balancers, spinners, rattlins and cicadas. For a beginner, it is worth recommending to start winter zander fishing with balancers. They allow you to quickly localize the fish, drilling holes not as often as for spinners. This is important for large lakes, where the angler is fishing for the first time in his life. The balancer allows you to catch a large area, its game is not as difficult as the game of the spinner, and it is not too expensive compared to the rattlin. Also, fishing from a boat in a plumb line is practiced on a balancer, it allows you to achieve a good game even with the oscillations of the boat and rod on the waves.
Rattlins are another type of winter bait. It is worth using winter rattlins, which play well on jerks. Rattlins are distinguished not only by their playing, but also by their sound – there are rattlin-rattles, with inaudible voice acting and silent ones. It is desirable for a fisherman to have several rattlins in his arsenal, and each of them has three types of acoustics, so that he can choose not only according to the game, but also according to the sound. The technique of fishing with rattlins is almost no different from fishing with a balancer.
Winter cicadas are good zander bait. They have a high-quality game and are able to replace both the balancer and the rattlin. The special play and brilliance make it possible to attract fish from an even greater distance, and to localize them even faster. However, it is difficult to find a good winter cicada on sale, most often these are handicrafts that exist in a single copy in the arsenal of a skilled fisherman. Fishing for cicadas is almost the same as for balancers and rattlins.
Spinners are a traditional pike-perch bait. Winter spinners are divided into two types – gliders and carnations. For zander, carnation or carnation with a short pause works best. They help to annoy passive fish and make them attack the lure with a stable, clear game. Gliders are used to search for fish, in modern fishing they are almost completely replaced by balancers. Among the huge variety of winter baubles, only by experience can you choose the right one, and most anglers have their own cherished lure, which he keeps as the apple of his eye for a rainy day, on which the fish does not want to take anything else, and more than death is afraid to hook it.
Among winter baits, bottom baits can be mentioned. These are burbot stalks, bottom spinners. They allow you to catch passive fish well. All kinds of beetles, phantoms, show themselves well when fishing on a hard bottom, where pike perch is usually found. By the way, it is practically useless to look for it on a soft clay or muddy bottom. The stalk is used when catching burbot. This is a jig head type lure that has a large tide at the bottom and a support platform. It is used with a nozzle in the form of a dead fish, a bunch of worms or meat. She is rhythmically tapped on the bottom, burbot or pike perch approach her and press down with her chin. Most often, pike perch for all types of bottom baits are caught precisely by the beard, and not by the lip.
In conclusion, it should be said about the type of winter baits. For pike perch, it is most reasonable to use medium-sized baits, from 5 to 8 cm long. This applies to everything – spinners, balancers, and rattlins. The fact is that small bait has a low provoking ability, and pike perch can simply ignore it. But too large one may also seem too big and strong to the zander, and he, especially in the wilderness, will not waste his strength to catch up with solid prey.