[Fish Nut]

:Not that I was good before but I became a better fisherman during my last trip. With work, thunder storms and the heat I have been staying close to home. Most of the trips I have been targeting / harassing white perch with an occasional small rock. Most of the time I have been using Grass Shrimp for bait, which perch love. The perch fishing has been phenomenal; I can’t recall a year that they have been this thick. Since I have caught my share of perch I decided to go strictly vertical jigging with metal or LTJ with soft plastics. The perch have been located on or near the bottom which is a good sign and shows that the dissolved oxygen content of the water is still good near the bottom. Depth ranged from 18’-22’. In the beginning of the year I was lucky enough to be shown the LTJ ropes on Rock. I never really understood the subtle nuisances of the presentation or the bite. The only time I caught fish LTJ was when a suicide fish would crash the lure. With the perch being so thick I figured why not give it a try. The perch definitely cooperated. The first thing I noticed was how many bite I was missing and what a bite was. I probably missed 10 or 15 taps to a hook set at first. I had so many swings and misses I must have looked like I was swatting flies. Most of the bites came on the fall and were extremely soft. At times an extremely sharp snap of the lure was needed to get a strike. I was using a soft plastic 1” crawl and a chartreuse mister twister on a ¼ oz head rigged Carolina style. The perch liked both but preferred the mister twister. The twister was also unanimously preferred by the undersize rock.
I also used a ½ once cripple herring lure Jensen for vertical presentation. Once again with more encounters with strikes from the perch I quickly realized what I was missing when targeting rock.

I always laughed at bass fisherman and how hard they would set a hook on a 1 or 2 lb fish. I now understand you can’t hesitate when you think you feel a bite.

Give the perch a try with the LTJ equipment they will give you a lesson. I was using a UL with 4lb test line which isn’t the perfect rod due to the slow reaction in the UL. Next time I will move to a rod with a faster action.

I think the perch gave me a valuable fishing lesson and may have give me the experience to land some more Rock with the LTJ.

Give it try gang the perch are thick.