Thread: How do you vertical fish your jigs

Originally Posted by CrappiePappy

Here's the article : Crappie Pappy Article

Other than using this method, if I were to encounter the same situation you've described, I would probably downsize my bait & jighead. If I had them, I might also consider adding some "meat", as Badgerloader suggests.

Their "interest" in your bait may have been more "curiosity" than a desire to feed on it. Their close proximity to the bottom could also be a sign that they were in a neutral/resting mode at the time, possibly from weather/water conditions.

Nice article. Thanks. I do have a question. How in the world do you hold your boat so still to be so still with the jig bringing it back up? When I am over a brush pile, I seem to move around too much to fish a jig the way you are describing it but may just be me. I might be able to do it during a very calm water day but that doesn't happen much around Ky LK.

I keep line tight (in contact with jig ) . Sometimes they want it still and at times they like it moving . Main thing is keep it up off the bottom . I use 1/8 oz jig heads with larger tubes . You can control fall or depth with a jig pole vertical fishing . They tend to prefer moving horizontal or up to a bait. Most say they usually don't feed down .

Originally Posted by tncrappiebass

Nice article. Thanks. I do have a question. How in the world do you hold your boat so still to be so still with the jig bringing it back up? When I am over a brush pile, I seem to move around too much to fish a jig the way you are describing it but may just be me. I might be able to do it during a very calm water day but that doesn't happen much around Ky LK.

LOL !!! .... yeah, I know what you mean, believe me. When I wrote the article I was without a boat and fished out of my buddy's Tracker TX17 ... and it wobbled quite a bit with even a little bit of wave action. I now fish out of my boat, a 16' ProCraft that it appears has quite a bit of flotation, as it also is affected by light wind/wave action.

Best way I can describe "how" I attempt to hold my rod "still" (as it relates to keeping the jig "still") ... is that I loosely hold the rod/reel in my hands and let my body absorb all the boat movement, keeping my rod tip at the same spot as best as possible. To be honest, Vertical Casting is not really a method for heavy wave action that bounces the boat around very much. But then, deadsticking, or even slow vertical jigging aren't either (IMHO) And faced with those conditions & not able to find calmer water (with fish present), I'd be more likely to be casting my jig as my primary method. Secondly I may try trolling cranks or jigs ... or even using the Drop Shot method if the fish were concentrated around a piece of cover or a small area.

4 lb test in shallow water and finicky fish ....1/32 oz and a crappie nibble and don't wait for a bite ...watch for the line to slack
most of the crappie I ketch never actually "bite" and or thump it unless they are some kinda frisky .....
they ambush it and sit with it in them crappie lips and don't run off with it like other fish do very often ....
folks that wait for crappie "bites" don't hammer lips near as much as those "watching" the line do ....
that would be my 2 cents on it

Thanks everyone for the tips and advice. My set up is a 4.6 ultra lite Ugly Stik with 4lb trilene and a 8ft BnM jigging pole with 6lb. and I think I'm going to invest in more dark colors as well, where I go a lot seems to always be a cloudy, yellow/green color with about 2ft of visibility. The area is pretty much a flat bottom bay with a few drop offs but no real structure to speak of. I'm finally going to make the trip to the "new lake" I've been talking about Friday, it's an old glacier formed lake and supposed to have all kinds of drop offs and structure...we'll see. Thanks again

First, it's impossible to hold a jig still in a boat, near motionless is the best you can hope for.A lot of the time that's just right. Boat movement from wake or wind and just being human imparts a little action. Fall rate is also important. If they don't want it on the bigger head, keep dropping the size til they do. One day I started with an eighth and the bite improved as I went all the way down to 1/64 and it was almost a fish on every cast. Also when they are finicky I sometimes don't lift the rod tip to twitch the jig, I drop it an inch and hold it there. It's a more subtle movement that sometimes is just right.

Originally Posted by tncrappiebass

How do you fish a slip float in 11-14' of water??

Set your rubber bobber stop so the jig is about two feet off the bottom. A slip sliding float system can be set in depths up to 24 feet.

I have proved to several folks that there is no such thing as a motion less presentation . I tell them to stand on the ground and hold a jig pole with a jig on the line as if fishing . Try to hold it motionless . It will jump and wiggle no matter how hard you try . The magnified motion on the long rod ,increases all the movements . That will make heart beats and breathing move the jig not counting when boat moves while fishing .