Find The Bait...Find The Fish

The bait is thick in the harbors, so that is where the predators are, specifically the perch. Using your polarized glasses allows you to find the bait schools, which is also where the perch are, but just below. My technique is two fold, first I use a shad rap with some lead to locate and collect some fish. Second step is to use a paddle bug with a split shot to catch some of the deeper and more skittish ones. We went out yesterday with four boats morning and afternoon, resulting in an average of 10 fish per trip. The guys in Michigan City and North Point only got a few, more fishing than catching for some. Today was much better, we got a late start and went out to 40 feet of water, set lines and stayed inside of 60 feet. Surface down to 30 feet, using summer patterns, resulted in 20 fish with 9 that escaped. We focused our attention to where the huge bait balls were that were seen on the fish finder, every school that I trolled over resulted in hook-ups.