Pondering the Perfect Ice-fishing Hook Set

December 18, 2008 at 9:12 pm

Setting the hook well, results in way more fish. How and when to do this properly while ice-fishing is still up for debate.

There are a ton of variables to consider, buts lets say you are fishing in about 15 feet of water for Pike. You are using a jig with a little bit of bait on it.  What’s the plan?

At a minimum, there are three options:

1.  You feel a little tension and you immediately jerk your arm up and/or wrist up trying to lodge that hook right into its mouth. Certainly this is the traditional open-water approach for fish with toothy tough mouths. The challenge here is not to pull the jig right out of their mouth. It could depend on the time of year. If it is still in the shoulder-frozen seasons they could still be relatively active. If in the dead of winter, there is little oxygen, they are passive, and they are saving energy. Passive means a lazy strike from the fish, like they just grabbed at it, but not firmly enough to be rooted in their mouth. One also has to think of the angle of the line, through the hole and then running downward parallel.  I would suggest it is just too easy to pull it out of their mouths with a quick snap.

2. You feel a bit of tension and you calmly grab the line, match that tension and slowly pull back on line. In this case, the fish has taken the jig turned, realizes it has something uncomfortable in its mouth and runs.  You are counting on the fish to have hooked itself through the turn and hoping that it is firm enough to keep it on the line as you slowly pull it up through the hole.  There is a fair bit of hope and luck here and depending on the fish, a fair bit of opportunity for it to spit the hook. I find especially as they come up the hole.  With gravity working against you and their body tension against the hole making it harder…its too easy to lose them in the hole without a firm hook set.

3.  You feel tension, calmly grab the line and let them run, once they stop, you jerk the line firmly for the hook set.  The idea is that they have grabbed their prey and turn with it. They are gauging whether it will struggle or not.  Without the tension they inhale it further getting down.  Realizing no problem, they stop, you set the hook firmly in their mouth while it is going down or down further.  They have turned away from the hole so the angle of the set works against them.  Now you play the fish as usual and bring it through the hole.

I am opting for number three in the scenario of using a jig with bait.  When I first started ice fishing I used to be a number one guy.  I thought it was like open water fishing, and I lost fish.  I then became a number two guy, because I was scared of losing fish…and lost fish.  Now I am learning to be a number three guy.  I still lose fish but not as many. 

What do you think?

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