Use high-visibility colors like white, chartreuse, and bright orange. They also respond well to baits that put off lots of vibration or sound. Top choices for pike include spinnerbaits, inline spinners, lipless cranks, and loud topwaters like buzzbaits and walking baits.
What is the best lure to use for pike?
PIKE – Pike love spoons, especially in yellow, orange, bright red, and shiny finishes but around the 1 oz. size. Many people mistakenly try MUSKY lures but pike – in most instances – prefer much smaller baits than muskies.
What color lures do pike like?
The very best lures to use for pike in clear water are swimbaits, softbaits, and crankbaits with an authentic pattern and swimming action. Natural lure colors that resemble the pike’s prey, such as white, silver, green, or black, have proven most effective.
What month is best for pike fishing?
The best time of year for pike is fall, as the water temperature is slowly dropping and the pike feed and hunt very actively and aggressively. More specifically, September and October are, by far, the best months to target pike.
Do pike like deep water?
Most of these fish are caught in shallow water. Big pike, however, go deep. Many times they are in water 15 feet deep or deeper. At these times, a big deep running lure is needed.
What do pike fish eat?
Diet: Pike consume large numbers of smaller fish – about 90 percent of their diet – but seem willing to supplement their diet with any living creature their huge jaws can surround, including frogs, crayfish, waterfowl, rodents and other small mammals.
Do bigger lures catch bigger pike?
Lure Size: Mick suggests for pike fishing, to start with lures sized 12 centimetres. This is a middle-of-the-road size and great for all sizes of pike. If you go bigger, though, you’ll focus on the bigger pike, and if you go smaller you could pick up other species such as perch and zander.
Are pike hard to catch?
The northern pike is one of Minnesota’s largest and easiest fish to catch. Found in in nearly every Minnesota lake and river, the northern pike is a voracious predator known for powerful runs that strip line from your reel. Though somewhat challenging to fillet, the northern pike is excellent table fare.
Do pike stay in the same area?
During the winter they will go to the deeper parts of the lake, where the water is a bit warmer and stay there until spring time, when the spawning starts. They will most often stay in the shallow areas until the water temperature drops again.
Where do big pike hang out?
They will stick to the back of bays where water warms up quickly with the morning sun and they have lots of weeds to hide in. The really large Northern Pike are more likely to hang around points leading into bays, narrows between islands or in river current especially later in the spring.
What time of day are pike most active?
between morning and noon
The pike’s metabolism rises and falls with the water temperature, which is why it’ll be at its most active between morning and noon, when the now stronger sun, or a mild, overcast spring day, causes the water temperature to increase.
Do pike feed in the morning?
Pike in the morning are more active than usual. Early morning right before the sun rises is an excellent time to target hungry pike. You can either find them in open or shallow water hunting down their first meal of the day.
Can I pike fish all year round?
Pike can be caught throughout the year, but are most active during cold water seasons – from fall to spring. This is why they’re very popular during winter times when lakes and rivers are frozen.
Does pike come to the surface?
Generally warmer weather will mean that pike are more willing to commit to topwater strikes. Although you can never say never in fishing, cold water usually means that fish want to hug the bottom and you might struggle for action on the surface in the depths of winter!
What is the top speed of a pike?
Northern pike are known to swim up towards the speed of 8-10 mph (13-16 km/h). Have you ever wondered if the pike can even catch the lure when you’re slowly cruising in your boat and pulling your lure with you? Well, now you know that it’s all good up to 10 mph.
What is the leader for pike?
fluorocarbon line
For fishing techniques where the risk of bite-offs is lower, fashioning an 18-inch long leader from 50- to 80-pound a test fluorocarbon line is a good option. Fluorocarbon is flexible, holds knots well, and has enough abrasion resistance to turn back the teeth of pike and muskie in most situations.
What fish do pike eat most?
Northern pike is a predator fish who mostly feeds on perch, walleyes, bass, chubs, frogs, snakes, bugs etc. As pike sits on the top of the food chain in most cases, it feeds on anything it desires – even smaller pike.
Is pike good eating?
Pike — commonly called northern pike — is a popular game fish. It has great-tasting meat that you can cook in many different ways. Another reason to have pike fish is for its various nutritional benefits. As one of the healthiest coolwater fishes, it makes a great choice for those who like to follow a healthy diet.
How do you find the pike of a river?
Pike utilise cover wherever possible, be that undercut banks, tree roots, fallen trees or branches in the water. They also gravitate towards manmade structures, such as locks, weirs, bridges, moored boats or anything that can provide shade or cover… Small, slow-running rivers make for great locations to find pike.
How do you target a large pike?
The key to catching pike is locating pockets of cabbage weed and identifying the shallow and deep water edges of these weed flats. Adult pike tend to hang along the deep water edge of weed cover, while smaller immature fish set up housekeeping on the shallow weed edges.
Do spoons work for pike?
Spoons are a staple for northern pike fishermen tacklebox. The wobble of the pike spoons are great for catching the attention of northern pike as the spoon passes by. The simplicity, toughness, and effectiveness of a spoon is what makes them a long time favorite among pike fishermen.