Smelt

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FP4LifesDad
FP4LifesDad's picture
Smelt
<p>With trout season back open again on the lakes, FP and I are going to try and head north this weekend in pursuit of our most wily adversary to date, the rotten little bait tease fly up to the hook sniff it and zip away splake lol. &nbsp;The lake we are heading to also has rainbow smelt in it, I&#39;ve watched a few videos on fishing for them thru the ice and seen a few on the lifelist section for them here, just wondering if anyone has any tips on fishing smelt thru the ice. &nbsp;From what I&#39;ve read is, it&#39;s best at night with the lights glaring down the holes, the light attracts critters off the bottom and the smelt follow them up to feed. &nbsp;What I&#39;ve watched on youtube looks like little ice jigs with waxies on them and from the looks on the video they bite harder then the yellow bass of Iowegia do. &nbsp;How deep do you set up on, how far off the bottom do you fish, etc. &nbsp;This lake is really tiny and these are about the only two fish species in it, other then a rogue stickleback and a few golden shiners. &nbsp;Any suggestions or advice would be awesome. &nbsp; &nbsp;Really hoping to finally cross off the splake from the bucket list but a two fer would be cooler yet! &nbsp;Any input on splake fishing would be much appreciated as well. &nbsp;Thanks gang.</p> <p>Here&#39;s one of the videos I watched, but it doesn&#39;t look like he&#39;s fishing deep at all or maybe just under the ice and it&#39;s during the day. &nbsp;https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MzMl51VvP-M</p>
Phil
Phil's picture
To remain in compliance in MN

To remain in compliance in MN you would not want to use an artificial light to attract fish.  If you have electronics it should not be difficult to locate suspended smelt over deep water but that's not a must have either, the most fun is sight fishing them right under the hole anyway- they will often cruise right under the ice even during the day.  I think you have the tackle pretty well figured out you just need to get to your body of water and dial it all in.  Be prepared for some whiffing though those little buggers can really tie you up in knots- Good luck!

Eli
Eli's picture
Sabiki rig with small (and I

Sabiki rig with small (and I do mean small) minnow chunks and a spoon or rap on the bottom. Sometime they'll go for the small jigs, sometimes the more aggressive larger fish will take the lure. 

You don't need artificial lights or anything like that. Around here, the smelt bite peaks mid-day, and dies down at low light hours. 

 

Eli

 

 

FP4LifesDad
FP4LifesDad's picture
Awesome, thanks fellas!  I

Awesome, thanks fellas!  I know the splake we've seen were up in 6-12 feet of water and you could see them zipping around, do you think the smelt will be up there too or should we look for them suspended over the deeper areas?  A mid day bite would be perfect as that's about what time we'll get there and Andy told me before to hit the splake at first light, so the following morning we can switch tactics at least that's the plan (usually never goes that way) haha

I seen some different rigs setup with 2 hooks like that but it's a designated trout lake also so I can only use a single presentation.  I've heard from the DNR that the splake aren't real big here so hopefully we can use a similar setup for both fish species, I plan to go tiny this time.

andy
andy's picture
Smelt Areas

I've only caught smelt in Gunflint Lake.  Up there, the smelt were schooled up on a sharp-dropping ledge near the bottom in about 40-50 feet depth.  I caught a lot on a small teardrop tipped with a spike, this fished as a dropper about a foot beneath a mid-sized spoon (forage mino) with the hook removed (this makes it legal in designated trout waters).  Just thought I'd share my experiences.

FP4LifesDad
FP4LifesDad's picture
Cool never thought about

Cool never thought about pulling the hook!  Thanks for the tips boss, that extra weight will help it get the bait back down faster too, those little jigs take forever to sink.  Can't wait to hit the ice!!

TonyS
TonyS's picture
Smelt

I've caught a lot of them in Lake Superior.  If I ever needed bait for Burbot while ice fishing I'd go find a 40'+ deep mud flat and drill until the flasher lit up like a Christmas tree.  Then I usually used a Hali jigging spoon a waxy, that always seemed to work best.  I'd get them on small jigs too, even big baits like Jigging Raps but then they get fairly large in Superior.

Lake Kantelljuhwhar
Lake Kantelljuhwhar's picture
smelt fishing (Newfoundland methodology)

Here native anadromous Rainbow Smelt run into ponds near the ocean in January.  The schools enter shallow water 3-6' depth and fish can easily be seen through the ice hole in areas of light-coloured bottom.  The action seems to heat up in the late afternoon and at dusk.  I've found very small tungsten jigs in the 1/64th-1/57th-1/28th ounce size (e.g., the Northland Fireball tungsten jig, size 16-14-12) with a tiny piece of nightcrawler on the hook, fished about 6" off the bottom, produce well.  Very small baits hook fish; with larger offerings you just get the notorious smelt bites as your nightcrawler gradually gets nibbled away and the smelt don't get hooked.  Once you have a hole with fish under it you get fish pretty much one after another.  I retain the 3" fish for bait for sea run brook trout when that opens (February 1 here) - bigger 8"+ fish retained for eating.

FP4LifesDad
FP4LifesDad's picture
Cool, thanks for all the

Cool, thanks for all the feedback guys.  I'll post some photos on how we do, much appreciated.