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Early ice is one of the best times for panfishing. Fish are more aggressive and easier to catch. They move shallow and hang around channels until they migrate to shallow weedy bays where they relate to edges and open patches around weed growth. This is the time of the year when you can perfect your presentations for later in the year when thicker ice makes fishing tougher. Here are some techniques we tried last season that I'll share with you right now. Glow in the dark jigs for panfish Ice jigs and spoons painted with phosphorescent glow paint are key presentations in dark or …

Ice fisherman are notorious tinkerers and we are not any different. We tinker with our tents, rods and especially with our jigs. Lets take a look at how jig tinkering makes a difference and adds to fish catching! First and foremost, look at a typical ice jig. If you bend the hook slightly to the side and slightly up you will increase your hooking percentage tenfold! Next you’ll want to check the hook for sharpness. You can sharpen the hook with a ladies hand fingernail file. Finally, you’ll want to clean the eye of the hook free of paint, unless you are using a Custom Jigs & Spins …

When a fish hits a blade bait, she'll try to rip the rod from your hand!  Even when you have 34-degree bodies of water, when walleye can only be caught on a jig head with a stinger hook, they will still hit a blade bait with reckless abandon.   While the trend on new lures is to soften them up, scent them up and adapt them to make the fish hold on longer, none of this applies to a blade bait.   A blade bait is a flat metal spoon with weighted nose that vibrates on the retrieve and vibrates on the lift.  Blade baits are fairly heavy for their size, so …

Bluegill and the rest of the panfish provide great sport and excellent eating. If you want to learn how to catch gamefish like largemouth bass, pike and muskie, then you need to start small. Small lures and small fish. You see a bluegill shares nearly the same habits and instincts as his gamefish cousins, so learning to hunt these panfish will get you to become a fish catching machine, no matter what quarry you’re after! So in order to catch bluegill and panfish the right way, you need to get geared up. You'll need an ultra-light rod with a soft fast tip. Any 1000 series reel will do as …

Poppee was fighting a mighty white bass and he yelled for help.  “Come here Waaalt, I neeed you nowww!”  “Leave me alone, Poppee, I’ve got one of my own on the line and there’s a school down below”, I replied.  “Even through his yelling, I could his little reel screaming drag that’s no white bass, I thought. I flipped up the Frabill Trekker tent and sure enough, his rod was straining.  Off went the gloves, out of the hole came the Humminbird transducer and then we waited.  Sure enough, Poppee gained quickly, too quickly and a 12” white bass popped through the hole …