Tackleboat nailed it. Get off to the edges of the bait. I actually am just fine not being around any bait as long as I'm seeing perch in tight groups on the bottom. If you see a massive bait school all tightly bunched, that bait isn't being preyed on. The depth of the bait does tell you what depth to look for your perch. I fished Murray today jigging. It was actually a little slower today but Dad and I got 67 perch, stripers and largemouth. The perch want the jig very slow moving right now. We got a lot of hits just slowly raising it or even holding it still. The stripers want the classic big sweeping jigging motion and it free falling so I was mixing that in a good bit. But if I was on Monticello that doesn't have stripers, I would be jigging just like tackleboat said, small movements. For perch I hit bottom every time with the spoon unless I see them blowing way up on the depthfinder. We have been picking up big catfish jigging lately too.

if you have structure scan it is a big asset in identifying perch right on the bottom. You will see little clusters of dots just a little bigger than the dots that the baitfish makes. If you see three or 4 of these dots in a tight cluster on the bottom, mark the spot and fish it. If they are actively feeding they will eat immediately. If they don't eat quickly move on and keep moving till you find ones that will eat right away.