During the cold winter months, ice fishing for yellow perch is a great pastime. As soon as the ice is safe to walk on, anglers can’t wait to get out there. Excellent catches of perch can be made while ice fishing; sometimes producing more fish at that time than in the other seasons. Some locations allow an angler to fish with two rods while ice fishing. This is a bonus.

While ice fishing, you have a good opportunity to catch jumbo perch as well. My definition of a jumbo perch is twelve inches or longer.

One thing about ice fishing is that you must dress properly to brave the elements if you plan to fish without an ice-hut. If you dress properly, you should last the day, if you don’t, you may last an hour. It’s better to over-dress than to under-dress. Setting up a wind-break also helps to keep you warmer. The best comfort of all is of course ice fishing from a heated ice-hut.

When ice fishing for perch, it’s good to know that perch can be caught roughly from six to sixty feet of water depth with the bigger fish tending to be in the deeper water.

Perch bite best during daylight hours. Night time catches of perch are rare. Fish are on the bite at first crack of dawn with slower action around noon and then picking up again later on in the afternoon. Some days are better then others as far as bites are concerned.

When I was younger, I’ve watched perch through the hole in the ice in crystal clear water (eight feet deep or so) and there were days where they totally ignored the bait. They would swim close to it but wouldn’t even stop to look at it. At other times I’ve seen the majority of perch that came close to the bait eagerly take it.

My next three Ice Fishing for Perch articles will share different important tips and techniques as well as proven rigs and setups to help you catch more perch while ice fishing.

Claudio

PS: here’s a quick link to part 2