Whitefish's little relative the Cisco (Tullibee)

[Water Wolf]

How many of you guys like to fish for the cisco {tullibee)? I do as they are neat little fish, who are quite aggressive, travel in larger schools and highly completive. I find if you catch one you will catch a pile. My favorite rig for these guys are droppers with a small chunk of minnow or Berkley power grub. How about you?

WW

[grumpymoe]

we manage more than our fair share when fishing Delta for perch....I know Trophyhunter gathers abit for catfishing in the summer......last winter, the commercial had so many, that they dumped them in huge piles every couple hundred feet.....unbelievably how many around.....Grump

[Trophy Hunter]

Yup Grump's right I like to keep some for fall cats. Tullibees also make excellent pike bait under a tip up on a quick strike rig. Sometimes my vex will light up like a christmas tree when the tullibees come into the cone. I also noticed they would charge up to my bait before I even get in the bottom 6ft zoom and just stop dead and look at it..... tiny tiny jiggles to entice a bite. I like 1/16th or 1/32 oz jigs tipped with a minnow head or a garlic salmon egg or gulp maggots work awesome as well. They are a scrappy fish.

[buzzbomb]

The tullibes from the fishing lakes and Last Mtn have parasites in the flesh that have to be candled and cut out to make them edible.  They tried marketing them smoked from the northern lakes (no parasites from those) at Safeways about 20 years ago but they were too oily to sell.  Good for bait for jacks but that's about it.  Last winter we caught tons of them in Mission and Echo and I was surprised they were even taking big walleye eyes. 

[bigredonice]

My relatives ate a few that I caught once, and thought they were fantastic.

[buzzbomb]

I bought a boxfull from a farmer back in the '70s and smoked them and they were pretty oily.  The public's opinion was divided about evenly between bad, good, and just ok.

[bigredonice]

my aunt fried them...maybe thats the trick?

[buzzbomb]

I tried one fried (there was one really hard winter when I ate everything that lives in our lake) and it was muddy tasting.  I think it must have something to do with the lakes because the ones from up north don't have those egg-like cysts in them.  The whitefish from Last Mtn are not as good as those from the northern lakes either.  Even with walleye the time of year and size of the fish can mean it's not good eating here.  Tullibe are commercial fished from Last Mtn and processed as pet food.  Whitefish are commercial fished for a variety of end users.  If the tullibes were good to eat here it would be great because some days that's all we can get through the ice and we just throw them back.

[jacksmelt71]

around here we dont have ciscos but we have the round (river) whitefish and the bigger lake whitefish. i find the rounds fight better than the lake whites even though they are smaller. probably due to living in current. a 19in. round is a good size one. really fun on a flyrod during a spring midge hatch!

[HOS]

We caught quite a few Tullibees this past season from Lake Manitoba. My buddy smoked a bunch and they were fantastic. We'll be keeping quite a few again for smoking. 

[firefighter]

Catch piles of them some days at Twin Beaches on Lake Manitoba. Can be real bothersome at times as one can't get a perch lure to the bottom past the tullibee, ciscoe, lake herring...what ever you want to call em. Caught some nice ones last March...14-16 inchers. They fight like nuts! I keep a few big ones to hot smoke as only goldeye are better than tullibee.

Firefighter

[HOS]

For me it's just fun catching Tullibee's. They do fight hard  and the action at times is non stop!  It just upsets me when some people throw them on the ice deliberately to rot. 

[Tambo]

I've caught a bunch in lake nipissing.  they are fun to catch, and put up a good fight.  however, I find them very oily, and are not work killing as I don't like the taste, and I'm a big fish eater. 
Tambo

[Woodsman]

I have also caught them in the past on Lake Nippising. I also found they were full of parasites. They do fight well but tend to circle which can tangle a lot of lines in a hut. A russian pearl dropper a few inches below a jigging spoon (ie: swedish pimple) 5'-10' below the ice can be deadly.

Good Luck

[adkRoy]

We were shocked when my brother caught one out of Lake George last year while jigging for perch. We didn't know they were in there.

[Pasquatch]

We were shocked when my brother caught one out of Lake George last year while jigging for perch. We didn't know they were in there.

We always get a couple every year jigging for lakers! Pretty damn aggresive lil buggers!

[flockshot]

small swedish pimples.about an inch-inch and a half..nothing on them..just jig in AM in about 60 feet of water...we hammer'em...there are alot of lakes in Oakland county (MI) with them...no one ever fishes for them and they fight hard and are easy to catch...this time of year especially,,,,really easy to pattern and place...PM me if you want to try it in this area...ill let you know were to go.

[fishuhalik]

I use to catch alot when I was crappie fishing on the lake I grew up in.  The craps were in 45' fow, and whenever I'd see a fish come in about 20' off bottom, I'd throw down a #2 pimple w/ a couple waxies.  They were almost always willing to bite, but I could never find the big schools everyone has talked about.  They were almost always in singles or doubles.  The most I ever got in one school was 4

[Big Burk]

very fun to catch but you cant eat them here because of them bloody parasites