Author Topic: Cold and pike movement?  (Read 2920 times)

Offline St. Lawrence River Guy

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Cold and pike movement?
« on: Feb 18, 2015, 05:27 PM »
Anyone have any thoughts on what the cold we've had in the northeast this year will mean for pike?  Typically at the end of Feb/beginning of March you'll see pike returning to shallower waters.  However, as I heard on the news today we're on track for our coldest Feb on record.  Will the fish hold off moving shallower or are they triggered by something other than temp (daylight?).

Been skunked the last 2 times out and the amount of snow we have laying on the ice right now makes moving around nearly impossible so I'd like to find fish with my first set of holes.

Any thoughts appreciated.

Offline thomasthepikehunter

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Re: Cold and pike movement?
« Reply #1 on: Feb 18, 2015, 07:47 PM »
I've been told that the moon has a pretty big effect on when fish spawn. One weird thing that has been happening to me this year is night time pike. Before this year, I've only caught a couple of pike at night. This year, I've caught dozens. The last few trips I've only managed one or two in the day, and up to 6 in the night. ??? It also happens to be one of the worst years for snow in MN, with worst I mean none. We had some snow in November, then melted. We haven't had snow since until last week. It was actually kind of cool to be able to look straight through 2' of ice and see the weed line. Normally we would have multiple feet of snow on lakes right now. Anyway, what I'm getting at, is I feel light, maybe the angle of the sun, and snow cover have a big impact on pike. Pike don't live by a calendar. I'm going to continue fishing mid-winter spots.
-Tom

Offline northernnyice

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Re: Cold and pike movement?
« Reply #2 on: Feb 18, 2015, 08:15 PM »
Have been fishing all over the same massive weed flat in 4ft of water all season. From mid december and i will keep fishing it till March 15. Has not stopped producing. Hopefully it just gets better as we get into March.

Offline northernnyice

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Re: Cold and pike movement?
« Reply #3 on: Feb 18, 2015, 08:18 PM »
I've been told that the moon has a pretty big effect on when fish spawn. One weird thing that has been happening to me this year is night time pike. Before this year, I've only caught a couple of pike at night. This year, I've caught dozens. The last few trips I've only managed one or two in the day, and up to 6 in the night. ??? It also happens to be one of the worst years for snow in MN, with worst I mean none. We had some snow in November, then melted. We haven't had snow since until last week. It was actually kind of cool to be able to look straight through 2' of ice and see the weed line. Normally we would have multiple feet of snow on lakes right now. Anyway, what I'm getting at, is I feel light, maybe the angle of the sun, and snow cover have a big impact on pike. Pike don't live by a calendar. I'm going to continue fishing mid-winter spots.

Thats interesting. It would be pretty cool to chase pike at night. Are you getting them walleye fishing? Or targeting them. I may stay on a spot saturday and fish it sunday too. We will see if i can get a fly-by-night pike.

Offline deadsmelthead

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Re: Cold and pike movement?
« Reply #4 on: Feb 18, 2015, 09:40 PM »
really depends on the size of the body of water IMO, deeper larger lakes they will move into a little bit deeper water, smaller shallower lakes they will move towards the ice.. Lakes with a lot of snow cover  are going to be tough nuts to crack.. Pike need light for the eyes to work to their advantage, less light means less activity, with that said bring a shovel, and clear a good 6' by 6' spot around your traps to get some light down there and kinda draw them in.. Especially if its a known pike spot...
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Offline thomasthepikehunter

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Re: Cold and pike movement?
« Reply #5 on: Feb 18, 2015, 10:20 PM »
I've been getting the pike at night while fishing for walleye. Walleye night spots are much like pike spots, and are often on the weed line. I've been using shiners, fat heads, even small suckers. I did notice the night I got 6, it was a full moon, and with no snow, it must have been as bright as day under the ice. The first of the year was a tiny pike that hit my rattle reel at 2 am. I never expected it at all, and figured it was a fluke. It's been a weird year for sure.
-Tom

Offline St. Lawrence River Guy

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Re: Cold and pike movement?
« Reply #6 on: Feb 19, 2015, 08:09 AM »
That's a good point re: clearing some snow off around the holes.  Most of the time some light penetrates the surface of the ice, but we haven't had a single day of melting since January 1 it seems and the snow just keeps piling up.  We have 12-24" of snow everywhere so I'll try the idea of clearing an area of snow.

St. Lawrence is a large body of water with large shallow bays up against very deep water (80-140').


Offline HybridHunter

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Re: Cold and pike movement?
« Reply #7 on: Feb 19, 2015, 11:38 AM »
This time of year, fishing lakes with deeper water, I like under water points that run toward deeper water. I look for ones which have a nice shelf in the areas of 8-12fow which I believe these bigger pike to come up onto and feed. Towards the end of the month, I'll start moving around the corner, into the bays, and fishing the inside turns. I have a feeling that the transitions this year will be later than normal, unless we get a good warm up, which doesn't look to promising at this point.
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Offline thomasthepikehunter

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Re: Cold and pike movement?
« Reply #8 on: Feb 23, 2015, 08:51 AM »
With the weird weather this year in MN it was hard to predict fish, and it seemed to be a slow year. I decided to put all my eggs in one basket and focused on mid winter pike locations only as it doesn't feel like the pike would move to spawn yet. It just doesn't have that spring feel like it does a lot of years. I was fishing a huge flat when we finally got into a big one this year. Its funny I fish all year, and its always the end of the season we get the biggest. It wasn't my fish, but I did set the tip up down. ;D The flat we were fishing extended close to a half a mile into the lake before quickly dropping off. There were all kinds of weeds in shallow. Most of the flat was about 9' deep, but one hole happened to be closer to 5', and it was where the big fish hit. We were running all kinds of rigs, but my dad is old school. He was using a steel leader with a big kahle hook. I put the biggest bait we had on and clipped its tail off. As a group, it was a normal day, and ended up with about a dozen fish. An hour before sunset, I watched my dads flag go up, so I went to tell him. The fish was peeling line incredibly fast. By the time my dad had the tip up in his hand, I doubt it had even been a minute since the flag went up. We pulled it out of the hole right as the the line was at its end on the tip up. I had put on a full 100 yards of line on the tip up myself. Luckily the fish was hooked, and boy did that fish put up a fight all the way to the end. Finally we squeezed its head through the hole that had shrunk to about 6" and I grabbed it. We took pictures, quickly measured it, and sent it home. It was 38", and as thick as I have ever seen a pike. I'd guess it close to 18 pounds, and a real trophy for central minnesota.

-Tom

Offline HybridHunter

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Re: Cold and pike movement?
« Reply #9 on: Feb 23, 2015, 12:10 PM »
Thick indeed! Very nice fish. Congrats to you and your dad!
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Offline pikeaddict

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Re: Cold and pike movement?
« Reply #10 on: Feb 23, 2015, 01:34 PM »
Beuty!

Offline northernnyice

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Re: Cold and pike movement?
« Reply #11 on: Feb 23, 2015, 07:18 PM »
Nice pike Dad :tipup:

 



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