passaic river pike on live bait

[tycomps]

anybody been successful with minnows etc.. for pike in the passaic? just found a creek near me packed with baitfish.

[bowzonly]

You shouldnt have to resort to live bait. Those pike are very aggresive and will bite anything.

[antgogz]

I suggest live bait if lures aren't working. If you can catch your own use it. Pike will hit baby sunnies, white perch, and suckers if you can get any of them and put them in an air rador. I reeled in a smallmouth bass once on a lure and had a pike gash it in half. I prefer lures but sometimes they aren't hitting and can't resist the live bait. Try it out.

[NorthJerzyG]

+1, try it out. Just try to set the hook quickly so you don't run the risk of gut or gill hooking em.

[msgdan]

I have never used bait for pike in the river, but there were a few times that I have seen guys using bait and doing some catching, but, I am not sure if I have ever saw a pike released that I thought was going to survive after the deep hook set with the live bait. It was mostly guys with bobbers, and they were waiting for 10-20 seconds before setting the hook, and every time, the hook was WAY down in the pike.

If you plan on eating them and want to try something different, use live bait.......if you want to be sure that the pike will survive, and keep the great fishery that we have going....... use lures with a single hook.

Of course, this is just my opinion.

Danny V

[antgogz]

I agree with you dan. However, when I do use live bait I use a #4 or #6 gamakatsu octupus hook which is pretty small from what I see others use and i set the hook quick. I would say nine out of then times I hook the pike just in the corner of its mouth and release them unharmed. But i have witnessed other people use big hooks and harm the fish which is sad to see. Overall, nothing is better than catching a pike on a spinnerbait which you are the master of dan. Haha.

[saxmatt]

Don't be afraid to try dead bait either. Sometimes dead bait will outproduce everything else, especially in the winter. Big fish love dead bait too: I've fished with lots of different baits like spinners, plugs, live bait, but all my 40"+ pike have come on dead bait. For rigging I normally use either a single #2 gama octo, or a pair of #2s crimped back to back on a 50-80lb floro leader. Most of the time this rig ends up in the corner of the mouth. I usually use baits in the 8-12" range and switch to smaller hooks with smaller baits. If all you have is small bait try putting 2 or 3 small shiners on 1 hook.

Gut hooked fish:
I almost never gut hook fish but if you fish bait it will eventually happen and it's good to be prepared. If you hook the fish in the back or closer to the tail you almost never gut hook the fish, and if you do gut hook them you can learn to unhook the fish in less than a minute with some practice. I don't like trebles because you can't get them out of the gut, and even when the fish isn't gut hooked it can still be a nightmare to unhook the fish.

Here is how to unhook a gut hooked pike when using a single hook, all you need is a long pair of pliers and a spreader. With big pike use the spreader to keep the jaw open, use grippers with small pike so you don't hyper extend their jaw. Clear any bait out of the pike's mouth so you can see what you're doing. CAREFULLY go through the pike's gill plate with the pliers without nicking the gills and pull the line back out the gill plate so there is a loop of line sticking out of the pike's gills. Grab the line that is sticking out of the gill plate and pull it towards the pike's tail, this should expose the eye and about half the hook because you're turning the eye at a different angle out of the gullet. While pulling the line towards the tail with one hand grab the pliers, go in through the mouth, grab the hook by the bend of the hook and it should pop right out. Just make sure that you're careful pulling the line in and out of the gill plate and the pike will be fine. I can do this in about 30 seconds and there is usually no blood or damage to the stomach. I usually don't gut hook fish but this is a great trick for when it happens.

[tycomps]

great response guys, thanks. what I was considering was lip rigging live minnows (rather than sunny's to avoid fin spine damage to the pike) and casting them to holes to locate fish. I'd use circle hooks to avoid gut hooking at all costs and if the unfortunate did occur I'm prepared with a modified "gentle" jaw spreader and 12" forceps.

[Skunk City]

I did well with live bait early in the season, then switched over to lures once things woke up a bit. Like what was said above, the bigger the better.

[NorthJerzyG]

+1 on biggger being better. Even at that, the few pike I have caught on live, have all been average to below average in size. Even got one on a "bigger than a large shiner" creek chubb and it was only 20ish inches.