Thread: Live Bait Cost Effectiveness

Originally Posted by SlabSeeker0485

I’m a minnow guy mainly because I’m not good with jigs. Never had anyone really show or explain jigging because there is definitely good and bad techniques. I have the bad ones mastered apparently lol. I minnow fish bc I catch more. I would love to be able to boat the same amount if fish on jigs bc I pour out minnows all the time.

I keep my minnows alive in a DARK color bucket for 3 weeks using aquarium air pump and a little fish food , ready for the next trip.


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Originally Posted by matt1991

all depends how u fish if you dont have a boat fishing from the banks then minnows are better as u can cats out a few rods n watch them vs only 1jig rod

I don't have a boat. I fish one rod with jigs only.

Only one rod allowed in Minnesota, and moving minnows around the shoreline is quite a chore. Little jigs and plastic tails are every bit as effective, do not die on you, need no special equipment to maintain and are far easier to carry a variety. If I am going to a fishing dock I will carry three or four prerigged UL rods and a bag of tackle; if walking the shoreline, I will take only one rod and a pocket full of extra jig heads and a variety of plastics. I have not bought live bait for crappies beyond some waxies and some spikes in winter for a very long time - something like over a decade.

Originally Posted by Snubby

A lot depends on where you fish as well. I would like to see some of these "I ain't got a fool with a minnow, I'm a pro jig man" type guys come show us how it's done on the Big 4 in MS. Certain times of the year you will be the ones at the ramp when asked, how many you catch? None! They just ain't biting

Up here in Minnesota I average about 5 crappies an hour, some trips a lot faster, some not so much, all on jig and plastic, and we are only allowed one rod at a time. But you are correct in that one must learn to jig, whether casting or vertical along dock pilings, etc. and those are not quite the same thing. Finesse is the key, and for a lot of vertical jigging especially when the bite is slow, size and depth are key along with a real slow retrieve once you determine whether they want vertical or horizontal movement. That is actually a whole lot like ice fishing. Depth can be 20-25' and size can be 1/64 with a 1" tail on 2# line. With practice you can get that tiny a presentation that deep, but you have to match light lines with tiny jigs.
For casting I use a 5' UL with a small spinning reel and 4# GAMMA primarily with 1/32 heads and 2" or less plastic tails. Be sure to have a real smooth drag, because every thing eats tiny quite frequently meaning that you will need the drag for such bonus game fish as come along and there will be some. My biggest was 40" musky that picked the little jig. You might also see bass, pike, walleyes and even carp over line test.
For jigging I have gone down to an ice rod with lines as light as 2# with a direct ice reel with free spool to eliminate jig spin and a 1/48 or 1/64 jig head and tails as small as 1". Recently I have converted to some small ice jigs made of tungsten. They go down real fast, maybe too fast.
And then I am a line watcher. Probably 1/3 to 1/4 of my catch is nothing more than a tick on the line or just slack when there shouldn't be, nothing there to feel no matter how sensitive the rod and the line are. I am a firm believer that you cannot fish crappie jigs too slow. We primarily have black crappies around here, and unless they are actively feeding they tend to be bottom oriented; so that is where I start until they tell me differently. One other thing: partner fishing helps a team work through to find the proper presentation, type and color of tails and location of schools much faster than fishing alone. One more thing if there is no bite during the day, the last hour of light before nightfall can be magic. Pretty much all of our local waters that have any fish in them have crappies; so it is more a matter of figuring out where on a particular water they are, and for shore fishermen what direction the wind is; so you can locate a sheltered shoreline or dock so you can fish the lighter presentations and control them.
Don't bother if there is a party on the dock or a bunch of jumping and hollering along the shore line you plan to fish. Noise and vibrations will put crappies down almost as fast as a musky moving in will.

Originally Posted by yobuck

I think some of us have (the touch) when using jigs, and some of us just don't.
For those of us that don't, minnows seem to help.

I would say the #1 thing that helped me be a better artificial bait fisherman was the use of a loop knot. I used to use a cinch type knot on my jig heads. No bueño.

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I have always used the Palomar knot to tie on my jigs and snell on the circle hooks when fishing bait (as for cats and carp). I am going to give the loop knot a try this coming open water season. It makes a lot of sense, but I just never got around to it before.
BTW what helped me most was ice fishing. Slow, small and deep and vertical ... Here we also have solid fishing docks that float on a very thick pad of styrofoam and reach out generally to water over 20' deep; so we have overhead structure as well as bottom structure from shallow to deep. Jigging into the dock shadow starting deep and working up the depth breaks until they are located produces a lot of crappies for me.

I've never used a loop knot.

A cinched knot can cause a jig to hang vertical/unnatural

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