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Post by hambone on Jul 16, 2020 8:45:34 GMT -5
Haven’t seen any report’s lately so thought I would try to start something. Is anybody else struggling this summer, like I have been,trying to catch Perch?
I have only had one good trip and that was at night fishing a dock light. I have been several times and only caught a handful. Usually this time of year I’m finding big schools of Perch fairly easily and catching tons of them. This year is complete opposite, I have not found a school yet, the only few I have caught have just been scattered here and there. Am I the only one struggling, or is this just a crazy year. I thought I was a pretty decent perch fisherman but I’m beginning to think I don’t know what I’m doing. Haha maybe Perch are quarantining too
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Post by 31Airborne on Jul 16, 2020 9:10:39 GMT -5
don't think you're alone, H-bone. lots of the perch fisher-doods on Kerr are also struggling - finding them, catching keeper sizes. i'm not the sharpest marble in the bag but i'll guess the heavy rains we had in late spring have something to do with this. it's affected baitfish movements so it has to have affected predator fish movements.
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Post by 31Airborne on Jul 16, 2020 9:12:35 GMT -5
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Post by hambone on Jul 16, 2020 10:15:51 GMT -5
I will check it out
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johnr
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Post by johnr on Jul 16, 2020 11:09:58 GMT -5
You’re not alone. We’ve been several times and only had a couple “decent” trips. And we worked for em.
Last summer was not very good for us either, but better than this summer
Maybe the population is on a down cycle?
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Post by hambone on Jul 16, 2020 12:55:29 GMT -5
I checked out Kerr Lake forum like airborne said and they are posting same stuff, they are struggling to find them also. Maybe it is to do with all the flooding we had in the spring, maybe things are just behind schedule. I have been finding a bunch on dock lights at night but have struggled getting them to hit anything, only had one decent night, where I actually caught some.
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Post by keninva on Jul 16, 2020 14:37:21 GMT -5
I was out yesterday and did I find the perch, but the couple that I caught were small!
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johnr
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Post by johnr on Jul 16, 2020 15:42:21 GMT -5
Water temp is right for em to be in a good pattern.
Maybe they’ve got an abundance of food. They can be picky.
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Post by dnoell9 on Jul 17, 2020 10:04:42 GMT -5
I spoke to Dan Wilson, with VDGIF, and he was saying that the white perch numbers were way down this year. He said he didn’t quite know why but that he thought they would be a lot harder to catch this year. Of course that would happen because I planed on trying to fish for them this year. Story of my life “should have been here last year”. Hopefully you all can find them and start catching them soon.
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johnr
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Post by johnr on Jul 17, 2020 11:40:24 GMT -5
Makes sense.
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Post by drag4striper on Jul 17, 2020 13:04:26 GMT -5
Went out yesterday evening looking for perch. Found some smaller schools and they were on the move. Only would catch one or two, then they were gone again. IMHO, from all the small sized bait in the area they were keying on those. The last two years fishing for perch I don't remember seeing anywhere close to that much small bait. I would say there was a very good bait fish hatch in the spring. I kept enough for a meal.  |
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johnr
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Post by johnr on Jul 19, 2020 10:51:10 GMT -5
Fished 6-10 this morning with my wife and daughter. Took home 40 good ones. Not much schooling. Really had to jig for them. They were glued to the bottom and we barely marked any until we hooked em.
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Post by keninva on Jul 19, 2020 11:23:33 GMT -5
That great to hear! Congrats
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Post by keninva on Jul 19, 2020 11:24:41 GMT -5
What water depths were you fishing?
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johnr
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Post by johnr on Jul 19, 2020 19:07:11 GMT -5
12-20’. Most were caught around 17’. Still looking in the back half of creeks and no wake coves wherever they are found.
Today, almost every perch we caught was located right on a break line. It took me a little bit to “see” the break line because of the way we were moving. But once I mapped the break line on our first spot, we stayed in the fish instead of just finding them here and there.
The second spot we found fish was no different. They were right on the edges of the old creek channel, which was a gentle 3-5’ drop from the surrounding flats. When we got into an outside bend of that old channel, it was on like donkey Kong.
Typically I disregard these kinds of features when fishing for perch, just because there can be so many of them in areas that you could catch them blindfolded. However on the last good trip we had, I noted perch hanging right on break lines as well, in a different part of the lake. So maybe it can be a bit more technical than I thought.
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