Tips on pickerel fishing?

[KSanford33]

1 hour ago, MassBass said:

I would argue that Esox, and especially the pickerel family, are the definition of ambush predators. They are streamlimed and powerful, but they are built for quick bursts of speed. In some lakes where there is a healthy pickerel population, you can see the juveniles lurking in the shallow grass. They just sit there perfectly still, waiting for an ambush opportunity. Their metabolic rate dosen't allow them to chase for sustained time, for example a huge musky can tire quickly and become very stressed. 

I meant members of the esox family are more chase predators than bass are. You can catch pike, pickerel, and musky by trolling much more frequently than you can bass.

[Further North]

7 hours ago, Gregorym38 said:

Less pressure in your spots huh? How far north?

I'm actually about 90 minutes east of @gimruis, but much more rural.

...and I have rivers where most folks can't get conventional watercraft.

Floated about 9 miles yesterday, had six musky follows, two on, none in the net.

[Fallser]

I normally chase them with a fly rod, but the guys I fish with like spoons, the Johnson Silver Minnow is one of them, in-line spinners, Rapalas and top waters, poppers, Jitterbugs, Zara Spooks.   I've made up leaders for them with 30# Tiger Wire.   When I fly fish for them I use a 25# fluorocarbon leader.  For live bait, medium size shiners work well on the lakes we fish, which are mainly in the Poconos.  I do get over to South Jersey to fish some of the lakes there for chain pickerel and bass.  I was curious as to where New Brooklyn Lake was.  Unless there's another New Brooklyn Lake in NJ, you drove a fair distance to get there.   That whole area, particularly the Pine Barrens, is chain pickerel central.  There are a lot of unnamed small lakes, ponds, abandoned cranberry bogs, on state land that don't get a lot of fishing pressure. 

[Gregorym38]

23 hours ago, Fallser said:

I normally chase them with a fly rod, but the guys I fish with like spoons, the Johnson Silver Minnow is one of them, in-line spinners, Rapalas and top waters, poppers, Jitterbugs, Zara Spooks.   I've made up leaders for them with 30# Tiger Wire.   When I fly fish for them I use a 25# fluorocarbon leader.  For live bait, medium size shiners work well on the lakes we fish, which are mainly in the Poconos.  I do get over to South Jersey to fish some of the lakes there for chain pickerel and bass.  I was curious as to where New Brooklyn Lake was.  Unless there's another New Brooklyn Lake in NJ, you drove a fair distance to get there.   That whole area, particularly the Pine Barrens, is chain pickerel central.  There are a lot of unnamed small lakes, ponds, abandoned cranberry bogs, on state land that don't get a lot of fishing pressure. 

Really?? Thats awesome. What do you use for them?

[Fallser]

On 10/28/2022 at 10:13 PM, Gregorym38 said:

Really?? Thats awesome. What do you use for them?

I prefer top water bugs for them.  I've got a weedless frog pattern they like.  Poppers, sliders.  A fly rod version of a swim jig, various types of streamers and a 25# fluorocarbon leader.  If I start getting bite offs,  I'll add a 40# bite tippet..

[PhishLI]

On 10/26/2022 at 6:01 AM, Deleted account said:

If you are going to use a spinner, bend down or cut off one of the points (or switch out to a single hook) and don't squeeze the poor thing around the neck like everyone seems to do, put a bent finger in the gill plate to lift it, or better yet, remove the hook with the fish in the water.

Whoa! Beneath that leathery exoskeleton there beats a heart of gold? Who knew? I'm verklempt.

[Deleted account]

3 hours ago, PhishLI said:

Beneath that leathery exoskeleton 

A carapace made of chitin thank you very much...

 

 

 

[T.J.]

On 10/27/2022 at 10:15 PM, Fallser said:

Unless there's another New Brooklyn Lake in NJ, you drove a fair distance to get there.

I was going to say the same. I’m about 1 mile from new Brooklyn lake in south jersey.

That lake is shallow and very weedy so it is hard use some lures. Johnson silver minnows are a good pick or weedless rigged plastic flukes. Inline spinners would be hard unless they are just below surface. The lake has limited shore access and gets a ton of pressure. I don’t fish there much and it is the closest lake to my house.  Normally I will only go over like now through early March a few times a year. Just after ice out is good or with a few patches still floating around. Had some good days there while it was snowing. I think all my pickerel out of there came on suspending jerk baits including in the spillway. 

 

All the lakes around me have pickerel so we end up catching as many of them as bass. Fishing in the boat, we get them on crankbaits the most. Second would be lipless and spinnerbaits. We (my son and I) use 8-15lb mono all the time and I don’t recall having one pickerel break off in the last few years. We had some bass break off at the side of the boat tho. I also fish rocky water in PA a lot and have gone back to just using mono on all the rods. It works for me and Big Game is so inexpensive that I might respool ever month or two. I do carry steel leaders but I don’t bother using them even if targeting pickerel. I will use them for pike up north. 
 

I don’t take a lot of photos but here is one from Union Lake. Lenape has some nice ones as well. 

 

[avidone1]

I used to crash a lot of pickerel 

they will hit many bass lures but my favorite was to cast a devils into shallows 

they would travel to crush it   Great fun 

[J Francho]

Go bass fishing with your most expensive lures. Always works. 

[Gregorym38]

On 11/3/2022 at 8:03 PM, T.J. said:

I was going to say the same. I’m about 1 mile from new Brooklyn lake in south jersey.

That lake is shallow and very weedy so it is hard use some lures. Johnson silver minnows are a good pick or weedless rigged plastic flukes. Inline spinners would be hard unless they are just below surface. The lake has limited shore access and gets a ton of pressure. I don’t fish there much and it is the closest lake to my house.  Normally I will only go over like now through early March a few times a year. Just after ice out is good or with a few patches still floating around. Had some good days there while it was snowing. I think all my pickerel out of there came on suspending jerk baits including in the spillway. 

 

All the lakes around me have pickerel so we end up catching as many of them as bass. Fishing in the boat, we get them on crankbaits the most. Second would be lipless and spinnerbaits. We (my son and I) use 8-15lb mono all the time and I don’t recall having one pickerel break off in the last few years. We had some bass break off at the side of the boat tho. I also fish rocky water in PA a lot and have gone back to just using mono on all the rods. It works for me and Big Game is so inexpensive that I might respool ever month or two. I do carry steel leaders but I don’t bother using them even if targeting pickerel. I will use them for pike up north. 
 

I don’t take a lot of photos but here is one from Union Lake. Lenape has some nice ones as well. 

 

 

Very good to know!! I have heard of ppl fishing union but supposedly it wasnt the best, maybe my intel is wrong? and yeah brooklyn is overfishing and very shallow, but i know there are pickerel in there, i saw a lot of bait fish being chased and jumping out of the water

[TheSwearingAngler]

I’ve been catching them fishing a Zman Goat as a topwater… they miss it a lot though, but it’s fun to watch. I had one make 5 misses yesterday.