Tips for very cloudy water

[docbas]

I have a problem...I'm trying to help a friend out by catching the pike out of his pond, but the water is so cloudy, I can only see about 18 inches down.  I know pike are big sight feeders, what can I do to increase the chances of catching one?  Any suggestions are welcome, I'll try anything once.
Thanks guys.

[Swift]

Something noisy using a rod. Rip, Rip, Rip, let it hang at a depth, start over and change depth. Work it down the water column, then back up and move. Big Rattle Trap or Blade bait types should work

[RLWagner]

You will want to impact the sensories of the pike other than sight to have a better chance at them big boys. Sight will still remain important, but exploit smell and vibration. Use oily baits, slash the sides of them to send blood into the water, and to increase panic signals from the bait. Add rattles like the ones used for rubber worm insertion.

Also scrape the snow from the ice surface to allow for increased light penetration. Then add silver or gold large blades to your terminal end by the bait, spaced with beads to keep them from getting hung up. The light penetration should give you better flash from the blades.

Good luck.

[Wiener]

We usually do better for pike on a bright sunny day.

I would start with gaudy colors.  Bright Orange, Chartruese, Black, Silver etc.

Oily baits such as smelt will help, if the pond has lots of "hammerhandle" size pike, you could try using the Johnsonville Stadium Brats as bait.

It does work, but I have not caught a very large pike on 'em.  Cut the Brat into pieces.  Do not scrape off the grease / fat.  That is the scent that you want into the water.


Give it a try, you may be pleasantly surprised.


Wiener

[docbas]

Thanks for the input, although, I will have a real hard time feeding stadium brats to the pike, I'll eat them before they ever get to the water.  I had the same types of thoughts.  I'm looking for whole smelt, has anyone tried any cleaned smelt as bait.  Not real sure it would work all that well.

[Wiener]

I've used cleaned smelt.   They work ok.

Just make sure that they are not completely frozen, this makes them float.

I like them 1/2 froze.  That way they hold the hooks better.


Wiener

[walleyeslayer1978]

Thats why they call it SMELLLLT. 

[oldman50]

Hey docbas, I fish for pike on a large pond that is on a creek. We get an inflow and an outflow. When it rains, it clouds up badly. I have actually caught my largest pike when the water was clouded. I don't use any spinner blades on my rigs and usually use dead suckers. Never underestimate a pike's smeller.

[kvdism]

do you ever cut up bait fish send them down the hole for scent
i do 50% chance of getting the bigg one

[esoxeye]

When the lake got dingy last year in March the tip-ups went dead, we down sized a bit and jigged and went with rattles and glow jig heads, The best were large buckshot spoons tipped with minnows and a wide gap lindy jig (glow) with a small dead sucker and stinger hook. We still fished tip-ups with large live and deadbait but the jigging was producing better in the dirty water.

[BillyGoat]

well they are big time dead bait feeders try that