Sunday outing on the Chesepeake Bay

[Goody]

https://youtu.be/aJRBo4Eynhs

[john from md]

Aw, come on man. Stop recycling Perch flicks from several years ago.

All kidding aside, you did good and must have had a fine time doing it. Hopefully they will come into the Severn in those kinds of numbers shortly.

[ronaultmtd]

Been spotty, that’s for sure...had some great White Perch days and some lousy days...just not the steady, reliable days of the past years...hopefully the heat arrived to change the spotty patterns...

[Mark]

Goody illustrated an alternative perch pattern. He fished offshore in water I typically cross to get to the shallows where the perch have been hit or miss this year.

Congrats to him on a good outing and for sharing another way to catch them.

[belairfishing]

Goody,

Were you trolling with those beetle spins, or just casting and covering a lot of water?

[J.A. Veil]

I am finding plenty of smaller perch in the Severn creeks while casting a Bignose spinner. They typically range from 7" to 10". I look for shaded areas that have a sloping bottom from 1 to 4 ft deep. Often spots that look ideal to me do not yield any bites -- I just keep moving and looking until I find where they are. Because the shoreline spots close to my launch points seem to be heavily fished, I have been paddling longer distances to find creeks with less fishing pressure.

A shallow water spot I have visited 5 times recently in my boat is loaded with giant perch. My fishing partners and I have caught two dozen of them with nothing smaller than 10.5". Yesterday a young man on our crew caught a 12.5" (he was disappointed that he did not quite reach citation size). I have caught 13" and 13.5" perch on recent trips. I was throwing a 3/16-oz jighead with 12 Fathom Fat Sam mullet paddletail at that location looking for stripers. When the perch come to the surface they look huge -- more like largemouth bass than typical white perch.

I almost never keep fish, so they all went back in the water. This particular spot receives little fishing pressure, has moving water, and structure. It is not easy to get to and offers risks to propellers in order to maneuver into position. But it is one of the few spots I can get to where shallow water structure casting pays good dividends.

[CHOC]

I've trolled beetle spins for perch successfully before. I had to keep my speed between 1.4 and 1.7mph and I trolled as closely as I could to jetties.

[Mark]

I've caught some white perch while trolling for stripers -- usually overachievers biting lures they couldn't possibly swallow. But I've never deliberately trolled for perch. That's what I found intriguing by Goody's method.

[J.A. Veil]

I've caught some white perch while trolling for stripers -- usually overachievers biting lures they couldn't possibly swallow. But I've never deliberately trolled for perch. That's what I found intriguing by Goody's method.

In my book "Fishing in the Comfort Zone" I describe a perch-catching technique I called "ultralight tackle trolling". Here is the excerpt:

"On a hot summer day in 2011, I tried a technique I call ultralight tackle trolling (ULTT). I was casting to shorelines for perch without much success. I eventually got to a stretch of shoreline that always looks fishy, but which typically does not produce well using casted lures. I decided to troll very slowly (~1 mph) through this area with three ultralight rods using several different types of small lures. My normal paddling rate would have been much too fast. I had to use a paddling cadence of stroke/stroke/gliiiiiiiide, to keep the lures moving slowly. This cadence allowed the lures to move up gently in the water column during the stroke portion and to drop in the water column during the glide portion.
All three rods caught perch that day. All of the lures I used were small and had either a paddle tail or a spinner blade, or both. I made a bunch of passes along the same 75-yard stretch of shoreline and caught perch almost every time. Apparently, the fish in that region preferred a slow trolled lure to one that was cast out and retrieved. I stayed as close to the shore as I could but far enough out to avoid sunken tree branches."

[Mark]

In my book "Fishing in the Comfort Zone" I describe a perch-catching technique I called "ultralight tackle trolling". Here is the excerpt:

"On a hot summer day in 2011, I tried a technique I call ultralight tackle trolling (ULTT). I was casting to shorelines for perch without much success. I eventually got to a stretch of shoreline that always looks fishy, but which typically does not produce well using casted lures. I decided to troll very slowly (~1 mph) through this area with three ultralight rods using several different types of small lures. My normal paddling rate would have been much too fast. I had to use a paddling cadence of stroke/stroke/gliiiiiiiide, to keep the lures moving slowly. This cadence allowed the lures to move up gently in the water column during the stroke portion and to drop in the water column during the glide portion.
All three rods caught perch that day. All of the lures I used were small and had either a paddle tail or a spinner blade, or both. I made a bunch of passes along the same 75-yard stretch of shoreline and caught perch almost every time. Apparently, the fish in that region preferred a slow trolled lure to one that was cast out and retrieved. I stayed as close to the shore as I could but far enough out to avoid sunken tree branches."

John,

Stands to reason -- while casting a pause during the retrieve causes lures to drop in the water column and sometimes that fall entices a bite. I can see why your method worked.

[Goody]

Goody,

Were you trolling with those beetle spins, or just casting and covering a lot of water?

I tend to troll more but do both. I usually troll more and keep one in the water and occasionally cast ahead or to the side with the other until my arm gets tired at which point I troll both for awhile. You only need to cover water to find them. Perch tend to move around alot.

[Goody]

Aw, come on man. Stop recycling Perch flicks from several years ago.

All kidding aside, you did good and must have had a fine time doing it. Hopefully they will come into the Severn in those kinds of numbers shortly.

What! This is from last year. Lol.

Usually there are alot more than this. We actually had to work to find these guys and there weren't as plentiful as last year.

[Goody]

Been spotty, that’s for sure...had some great White Perch days and some lousy days...just not the steady, reliable days of the past years...hopefully the heat arrived to change the spotty patterns...

i hope the spotty patterns changes too.

[Goody]

Goody illustrated an alternative perch pattern. He fished offshore in water I typically cross to get to the shallows where the perch have been hit or miss this year.

Congrats to him on a good outing and for sharing another way to catch them.

Thanks Mark.

[Goody]

I am finding plenty of smaller perch in the Severn creeks while casting a Bignose spinner. They typically range from 7" to 10". I look for shaded areas that have a sloping bottom from 1 to 4 ft deep. Often spots that look ideal to me do not yield any bites -- I just keep moving and looking until I find where they are. Because the shoreline spots close to my launch points seem to be heavily fished, I have been paddling longer distances to find creeks with less fishing pressure.

A shallow water spot I have visited 5 times recently in my boat is loaded with giant perch. My fishing partners and I have caught two dozen of them with nothing smaller than 10.5". Yesterday a young man on our crew caught a 12.5" (he was disappointed that he did not quite reach citation size). I have caught 13" and 13.5" perch on recent trips. I was throwing a 3/16-oz jighead with 12 Fathom Fat Sam mullet paddletail at that location looking for stripers. When the perch come to the surface they look huge -- more like largemouth bass than typical white perch.

I almost never keep fish, so they all went back in the water. This particular spot receives little fishing pressure, has moving water, and structure. It is not easy to get to and offers risks to propellers in order to maneuver into position. But it is one of the few spots I can get to where shallow water structure casting pays good dividends.

John - you hit the nail on the head. Look for shallow water structure and moving water. Kayakers also need to take advantage of areas where boats can't get to.