Easy Way To Pre-Rig Ice Spoons

Easy Way To Pre-Rig Ice Spoons

From: Chip Leer

Ice fishing is notorious for offering anglers just brief windows of opportunity to catch fish in multiples. Sure, you can often catch a few walleyes throughout a day of fishing, but you’re really just marking time until the 6 p.m. frenzy that may last only 20 minutes. The same goes for crappies, which seem to go mad during the first hour after sunset. That’s when you want to be fishing fast, efficiently, and without any downtime.

Chip Leer is a Northland Pro staff member and an experienced tournament angler with a degree in fishing efficiency. And he’s developed a system, based on the unique Minnow Head Hook, that allows him to keep a spoon in the strike zone as much as possible during the critical dinner rush.

“You’ve just caught a fish, hooked up a new minnow head, and dropped the spoon,” he says. “Then, on the first jig stroke, you can feel that the head has come off the hook. Who hasn’t been there? It’s frustrating for sure.

“I get around that by rigging up a bunch of Minnow Head Hooks with real minnow heads, as well as Impulse® Perch Eyes and Impulse® Minnow Heads before I go fishing and store them in separate large-size bait pucks. The bait (natural or artificial) rests inside the hook bend—protected. It can’t fall off the hook. And when you do need to change it, you can swap the Minnow Head Hook for a new, pre-rigged hook in a couple of seconds. It’s a fantastic way to maximize your productive time during the active period.”

An added benefit, he says, is that the Minnow Head Hook hangs farther from the spoon, much like a dropper hook. “It has more of a pendulum action that’s attractive to active fish.”