Steel vs. Non Steel Leaders

[iceintheveins]

I know that the only thing that can basically guarantee no bite offs from pike of any size are wire leaders. In my experience, they can bite through regular mono as much or more than 1/4 the time. I have used fireline and never had a biteoff, but I know that people say they have had it happen before fairly often. I also hear people say that thick fluorocarbon is best cause it's hard but not impossible for pike to bite through, and they cannot see it.
So my question is: does steel leader turn off pike? Since I have extreme difficulty getting any pike to strike through the ice in my home state of Colorado. Should I go with thick fluoro or continue using my 14/6 fireline?

Tyler

[billditrite]

last year i used teflon coated wire from berkley and made quick strike rigs with them.i got a lot of hit and runs on my tipups. i think it was the pike FEELING the wire rather than seeing it.im gonna try the flouro this year and see if it makes the difference.

[oakorchardfishking]

last year during the conesus lake ice gathering here in NY, i caught a northern (36" & 12.39lbs.) on a tip-up! my rig was the usual 20 or 35lb. green dacron tip-up line with a leader of 14lb. fluorocarbon with one treble hook and a tail-clipped 4" bass chub. i went with a higher pound fluorocarbon just incase of bite-offs. i figured all i would need is about 8 pound but wanted the security of a little bit more thickness.
thats all i have ever used during ice and have had great success with it for pike and muskie! only thing i am adding this year it a spinner blade. (suggested from here.)

[LoneWolf]

I decided to try a fairly new product this season called BOA No-Kink by Malin. It's a single strand stainless/titanium alloy shock leader. It can be tied with a clinch knot or perfection loop. I'm using 20# and it's the diameter of 6 # mono. What I really liked was they state it won't kink or twist and it actually "stretches" about ten percent. When you tie it and snug down (using pliers) it actually stretches and locks the knot. After completing a few 14" leaders with bb swivels and bb duolock swivels I pulled (holding each end) and the leader actually stretches I'd say about one inch and snaps back. I mainly jig and I use swimming lures so I'm hoping this will work out.   

[MeadowPikeman]

after catching literally catching thousands of pike over many seasons i would say line or in this case leaders make little differece when it comes to catching pike. use black coated wire though rather than bright steel leaders(i also use 40lb black braid)picking good bait is more important than line , i use dead perch or tulibees, as this is the main diet of big pike in our area, but make sure you are using a bait that the pike usually feed on in that lake. it does make a differenence to match the food available. from my experience dead bait will beat out jigging especially for trophy fish. although the movement from checking bait on a tip up often brings a strike in the following minutes. a big key i've found is time of day. early morning can be good but overall for some reason tip ups always go nuts just as its getting dark, sometimes its pitch dark when the frenzy is over, my biggest "ice" pike was taken at sunset last year and was 25#. one more important factor is drilling holes drill holes and quit don't drill some, fish then maybe drill some more in the same area as this will spook big pike, may catch smaller ones after drilling but the big ones always come at least a couple hours after the tip ups are set and the drilling stops, if its warm return to an area and use old holes that you have drilled the day before and just chisel them out. typing about this is making me think about the upcoming season which should be a banner one. already started getting the tip ups ready and scouting for bait, should hit the ice for northerns in 3 weeks or so can't wait!

[billditrite]

in maine it is illegal to use any spinyfinned fish as bait...no perch !!

[MeadowPikeman]

they are deadbait use them frozen

[WVBoy]

Ive used everything from fireline,spiderbraid,steel, and fluro.Last year my partner and never had a break off with fireline but we lost nearly a 1/2 dozen very nice northern because the fireline actually slipped through the little opening on the hook eye and fish and hook gone with no break off!So that is out now.And experimenting with over 50 tipups we put leaders to the test.We used steel leaders that rarely got touched.They kink up and dont allow bait to have much movement.And they are visible.Spider braid works great using the camo color in 60lb. test.But the overall winner was multi strand rig i set up with fluro.I used a couple of strands of fluro tied seperately that acts like a"Safety" system.You can add more if you want.And I also tie a live bait loop for the hook.Im not sure of the name of the knot but it is used frequently in saltwater fishing.It allows more bait movement.And actually, we had no break offs yet.Just play the fish more instead of hauling them in.

[MeadowPikeman]

live bait is illegal in all of sask other than nightcrawlers, leeches, maggots. so we don't worry to much about wire preventing bait from moving cause all our bait is dead and sits still, just the way the monsters like it. on waters like Tobin we have averaged close to 20lbs a fish some days and seen a number of fish come out that were an honest 30# and probably close to or over th 50" mark. all of these fish were taken on wire leaders and fish this size will bury or snag in timber faster than you can say DAVE GENZ!!! so you need to control them in a hurry the norm in northern sask is a 25-30 main line tied straight to a black wire T harness, which holds the bait horizontal. i kinda think in some waters very low pike numbers might make them less aggressive, but here that is not the case location and bait are infinitely more important than leader material. this is espcially apparent when pike attack the housing on the aqua view cameras, if they attack that on a sheilded camera cable i doubt if a wire leader will make a difference.

[WVBoy]

In meadowpikemans sask. territory steel leaders sound like a must,and where you cannot use live bait.But in Colorado where mackdaddy fishes and some other areas pike are sometimes more finicky than people think.I fish lake champlain.

[MeadowPikeman]

i'd venture to say that the pike fishing is probably a lot tougher in many areas than up here, on a couple of my favorite lakes a couple dozen flags an in afternoon is the norm and on tobin a day with no double digit fish is very rare.

[iceintheveins]

What I wouldn't give to have those lakes nearby me, MeadowPikeMan. I don't know whether it's because pike numbers are low in our "good pike lakes", or because some environmental condition causes them to act differently. There is no way you can get valid info from the CDOW about pike because they have a bias against pike so most of their info is not accurate. They will tell you a place is "infested" with pike when in reality it may only have a few here and there, just so they can get rid of them. Now in open water, I usually catch 1 - 5 pike per trip. I generally do not catch them through the ice, but I only go once or twice each year. I fish all the locations in fisherman and other pike experts say to, with the same presentations, and nothing. If only pike around here acted like the ones that you have. I find that almost impossible that a pike would attack a camera, though I do believe you. I think I will have to do my own studies to see if pike really are numerous or not in our pike lakes. However, I do know we have BIG, BIG pike in these lakes. Twenty pounders come out pretty regularly. So I am going to go with fluoro or fireline. No steel for me.

Tyler

[MeadowPikeman]

both burbot and pike regularly actack the housing on the camera when they are this aggresive usually they will promptly wheel around and smack your hook too.

[Van_Cleaver]

Though I don't often fish for pike, some of my rigs are made with Fireline leaders. To avoid knots slipping through the eye gap of the hook, (as mentioned in a previous post) simply run the line through the eye and snell around the shank. Though I haven't landed any recently, muskies tend to like the waters where I go for perch. This way there are way less surprize bite-offs.