Tips & Techniques

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BOBBING WITH A BOBBER | PATTERN CASTING | WALLEYE - NORTHERN PIKE
PIMPLING FOR WHITE FISH | SPECIAL NOTES ON ICE FISHING - WALLEYE

BOBBING WITH A BOBBER

Match a spinning reel to a 7 to 8 foot medium light action rod with 4 to 6 lb. Test monofilament line. Use a piece of 10 lb monofilament line and tie a double overhand knot on your main line. (This is the slipknot for the bobber stop). Trim off the tags of the 10lb. Line. Place a small bead on your line and slide it up to the knot. Place your slip bobber on the line and tie on a #2 or #3 Swedish Pimple. Vingla or Flute Spoon. To adjust setting the bobber, simply slide the 10 lb. Test knot up and down the 6lb test main line, this raises or lowers the spoon.

Live bait added to these small jigging spoons is very effective on walleye, trout and pan fish. Cold front conditions that slow up the bite are ideal settings for slip bobber fishing with our spoons. This works best with our #2 for bluegills, #3 for perch, crappie, cisco, etc, in shallower water down to 12 feet or so. Bait your single hook lure with a wiggler hooked at the rear of the body into the tail to keep it alive and pulsing. Or use white grubs, small minnows, mousies, etc. Drop your line to the bottom, raise it up one foot. Set your small bobber. Now twitch the rod tip just enough to tip the bobber on end in the water this is about 1 inch. Sitting there shivering from the cold is just about the right action. On any tip of the bobber the other way, set the hook!

This is one to use when the fishing is slow and the fish almost drop the bait as soon as they take it. If the fish are more active you can give them more time to mouth the bait. This also works well in spring and early summer when the fish are in shallow water. Rig the bobber about 5 feet up from the lure and bait, cast it out in the shallows with a spin rod. Again retrieve the line by twitches, just enough to tip the bobber. Set the hook only on a good moving bobber.

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PATTERN CASTING

I believe most fishermen miss or spook more fish by just casting to get their lure out where they hope a fish may be.

Pattern cast!... First make short casts - take up slack line- allow the lure to settle nearer bottom, vary your retrieve, slow fast stop, let the lure settle again, slow fast, slow, twitch, settle and fish it right up to the boat or shore!

Still with short casts, spot cast, left or right 6 feet or so from the last spot. Cover all the available water area you can reach in this manner. No go?
Cast your lure another 10 feet beyond the first range and repeat all around your area. Gradually increase the distance until you reach maximum accurate range.

Generally use the interrupted retrieve to keep your lure at a fair depth. The experience behind this pattern will point out the productivity. If there are fish available in close, and you cast your lure out as far as it will go, by the time you have passed over this fish, your lure is probably too close to the surface. The fish may follow and then spook at the boat!

With short casts you could have picked up this one because you were in his preferred depth range. If it didn't hit the short casts, the next one passing near him may have enraged him into striking. The trick is to get the fish to strike, not to follow and spook. The pattern method turns the trick!

Try our Vingla lure with special wobble action for black bass, white bass and trout. On walleye, add a piece of a night crawler to them and fish slow - slow. But do not overload it with bait and spoil its action. For northern and big trout try our Laker-Takers and Swedish Pimples - with or without shaved and split bait or minnows - or our new bigger, heavier lures with a medium action rod tip. With light spinning rods, our smaller Flute Spoons with the single hook work well, baited with small baits or tails, again with an interrupted retrieve and a lot of twitches. These are wild on big pan fish, all bass and smaller trout.

If the fish are deep, pattern cast and work these lures deep. If they are working surface minnow schools, fish them shallow but use the same pattern. As a personal observation, I have noticed the big ones usually usurp the deeper strata of water and the smaller class above them. The big ones also take over the best feeding and cover spots. If you take a good pike or bass from one of these spots, work it again, the next time out. The next best fish in the area will have taken over this spot.

Remember, hot spots in a lake are limited, so keep track of yours! Try our original Swedish Pimples also on your spinning rod. If the fish are feeding on schools of small minnows, these are deadly! Use a size as close to the size of the minnows the fish are feeding on.

On surface feeders like trout or bass, retrieve the lure quite fast, all the way in. On deeper feeders, use the interrupted retrieve and intersperse very light twitches of the rod tip for best jig action.

Try our sizes #3, 4,5,6. This gives you a size variation and weight from 1/5 to ½ ounce. Start with the nickel finish lure and switch to gold, white pearl or copper in the bright sun or evening. Our hammered finishes, fluorescent orange or fluorescent yellow colors, reflect prism colors, will often trigger a strike when the old standards are ignored. Often a change of color or lure size will fill your limit.

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WALLEYE - NORTHERN PIKE

Walleye and northern pike have a lot in common. Each of these predator fish feeds on forage fish such as perch, shiners, smelt and alewife or shad. The Swedish Pimple, Flute Spoon and Vingla imitate forage fish very effectively. Use a medium action spinning rod with a balanced reel spooled with 8 lb. Test line. Attach the lure to the line via a snap. Cast the spoon and allow the lure to fall. During the fall, count to yourself "one thousand-one - two" until the line settles showing you the line has hit bottom. With a lift hesitation fall retrieve, slowly reel in line. Do this fast enough to keep the lure from snagging up. If you feel a tap, added weight on the line, or see a hesitation or movement in the line, set the hook immediately.

Adjust the fall of the lure by retrieving earlier during the count down method. Vary your method of retrieve by side rod twitching lifting the rod sharply or slowly and by varying the time of pause before reeling. Also use these lures while drift fishing, spring or summer. Let the line run out to bottom and jig the rod tip about 8 inches with a sharp twitch. This will make the lure shoot around about three feet in various directions with each twitch. If the lure doubles back and fouls the line, cut back on the lift and twitch as currents and speed of the drift may combine for too much action.

The size and color of the spoon you use should imitate the forage fish that are present and should be governed by water depth and rate of current or wind drift. Use the right weight to keep your lure working just off bottom. The Swedish Pimple. Flute Spoon and Vingla can be fished with or without live bait. Many will use our special single hook baited with a minnow, leach, night crawler or perch eye when vertical jigging or slow drifting. Often a stinger hook works to protect the bait and hooks short strikers. Our Flute Spoon series is ideal when used this way.

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PIMPLING FOR WHITE FISH

Whitefish are usually found in deep water 40 to 100 feet so use a short (4 foot) rod with a limber tip and a quality casting reel with a reliable drag. To assure sensitivity and reduce line stretch use 15 to 20 lb. Test Dacron line and a six foot leader of quality monofilament line. Others like hand lining with a chugging stick. In water depths less than 40 feet use our #6 - ½ oz. Swedish Pimple, a #7 - ¾ oz at 40 to 65 feet, 1 #8 - 1 oz to 100 feet, 1 #9 - 1 5/8 oz. To 150 feet and #10 - 2 oz to 200 feet.

The favorite, most effective colors are White Pearl, Nickel, Nickel with Fluorescent yellow, Fluorescent Orange or Pearl trim. Some fishermen modify their pimples by using a #6 or #5 treble hook on both the front and back split rings. The line is attached to the front split ring with the improved clinch knot of at least five turns. Many use extra white, yellow, or red flippers on the hooks. Some use added fish scent, fish oil, smelly jelly or fish spawn or eggs on the bottom treble, or on a short dropper line. Drop the Swedish Pimple to the bottom, bounce it on the bottom, slowly raise it about a foot or more, hold it, drop it and repeat. On a take or hit, set the hook. Many experts use locators or fish finders to locate and stay with the schools. If the fish move, you move. Some run the locators continuously to be ready for action.

Whitefish usually are in schools. Lakers are usually the larger loners. This vertical jigging technique is equally effective on open water fishing or ice fishing.

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SPECIAL NOTES ON ICE FISHING - WALLEYE

First ice is usually the most productive time to ice fish for walleye. Action can be fast by jigging Swedish Pimples without bait. React quickly by setting the hook to any tap, strike or line hesitation. As winter progresses, walleye feeding habits change. The action is usually in the morning or late afternoon. Attach a 2 to 3 inch minnow to the Swedish Pimple. A slower lift - fall presentation with a pause will produce good walleye.

All fish bite better and strike harder with first ice. Often the action is so fast no bait is used on the Swedish Pimple. In this case, set the hook hard on any strike as you jig the Pimple. But as the winter progresses the water gets cold, the fish become more sluggish and feed gingerly.

Now use bait on the Swedish Pimple (i.e., a 2 ½ inch or so minnow hooked through the back on a single hook, or a 1 inch minnow on each barb on a treble hook). At a touch, wait! Let the walleye take it. Hold it! When the line begins to move off at about a 30 angle under the ice set the hook and bring it in. More walleyes are lost in winter by striking too soon than too late.

Anyone can soon learn to tell a walleye touch from a pan fish nibble so play them with care. The hooks are always set in deeper and more solid if you strike, as the fish is moving away from you. However, on any hard strikes, set the hook at once. Remember, when the fish hit hard, you hit hard, when they play with the lure, you play with them.

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BOBBING WITH A BOBBER | PATTERN CASTING | WALLEYE - NORTHERN PIKE
PIMPLING FOR WHITE FISH | SPECIAL NOTES ON ICE FISHING - WALLEYE