Live-Lining Pickerel
Matt Litton with an early season 25-inch pickerel. He began live-lining that day, then switched to spinners, which he caught this one on. Especially when water temperature rises above 50, as it did on this day, lures may out-fish shiners.
When the Water’s Cold
Sorry I’m late in getting this post to you. We’re having flooring put in, and I’ve been packing all our things for the movers. Everything but what’s on the walls and on shelves, the kitchen and bathrooms, has to go out. This one about live-lining pickerel is another New Jersey Federated Sportsmen’s News article, It was published March 2025, by New Jersey State Federation of Sportsmen’s Clubs.
When the water’s cold, pickerel will hit spinners, spoons, plugs, jigs, Senkos, and other lures. But using live shiners is the opposite of “cheating” because the natural quality is real and authentic. Live-lining is slower than retrieving a spinner, so it has a quality of absorption in the pleasure of taking it slow. If you generally prefer catching fish on lures as opposed to live bait—as I do—it’s still possible to outsmart your own predilection.
Whether you’re live-lining in March or October—or during the winter in between—-pickerel feed avidly on shiners.
Brian Cronk and a pickerel caught by live-lining a shiner.
Low-Key Activity
I’ll break with my predilection and live with the guilt, because when I’m live-lining pickerel, I get over any guilt altogether. Listening to my bubbler helps. Marine Metal Products makes a couple of aerator models I’ve used: Quiet Bubbles and the Bubble Box. I’ve allowed my position to be demoted to operator of the less expensive model—the Bubble Box. I like the louder noise. I did have a moment of worry shortly after the purchase, but now it sounds like a perfect drone of low-key activity while I fish.
That’s what live-lining is—low-key activity. It’s similar to live-lining herring for walleye. Hybrid striped bass, too. But if instead you only get bogged down by doubt while doing it, eventually catching some pickerel remains a likely proposition even if the water is in the 30’s. Water temps in the 40’s will be an advantage over colder and soon temps will rise above 50. I’ve live-lined until water temps get out of the mid-50’s. When the trees get that slight green fuzziness, it’s all over between me and live bait. And yet, as much as I’ve been using lures in March and April, last year I caught a pickerel when live-lining the mule barge pond connected to the Delaware and Raritan Canal in Lawrence Township. In the canal itself I caught bass, when I expected pickerel.
I caught this pickerel—I’m almost certain—on a live shiner.
The Rig
Rigs are fascinating to learn. Even simple rigs, and for live-lining a simple rig is best. You may need a foot or 18 inches of 20-pound-test fluorocarbon. Using wire instead is clumsy, but if you do opt for it, you’ll ensure that any pickerel that do get hooked don’t cut the connection. You might lose a pickerel or two sometimes to fluorocarbon. I vaguely recall fishing the same basin pond about 25 years ago and losing a pickerel that cut 15-pound-test fluorocarbon. At the least, you almost always need to retie a leader after a catch, because you’ll find the teeth have frayed it, unless the eye of the hook has taken position outside the mouth. I’ve used plain shank size 6 hooks for decades, but I might give small circle hooks a try. I think any larger than size 6 will feel clumsy on a live shiner and weigh it down. Whether you tie directly to the hook’s eye-loop or tie a snell to the shank beneath an inward-angled eye loop, at the other end of the leader, tie a loop so you can attach it to ball-bearing snap swivel. You want that snap swivel to be strong enough to hold up under pressure, if you hook a really big pickerel. Tie a braid mainline to it of 20-pound test, because you’ll find pickerel in residual weeds or among sunken brush or sticks. With a medium-heavy rod, you can force a big one away from that stuff. You don’t always need more than a medium power, five-and-a-half rod and reel loaded with 15-pound-test braid. And if you want fish an even simpler rig, just tie the fluorocarbon directly to the braid by uni-to-uni splice, and if you need a little weight, add a split short.
A lake with 45-foot depths and lots of good-sized pickerel among weeds that grow as deep as 20 feet.
Shallow and Deep
Whether pickerel will be shallow or deep depends first on whether the lake or pond you fish has any depth. The Delaware and Raritan Canal is a good spot for pickerel in March and April, not to mention fall and winter, but don’t expect to hook any out in the middle away from cover. Look for brush in the water, which is usually close to the bank and not much more than a few feet down. Lakes like Tilcon and Wawayanda offer a lot of choice in deeper water while it's more efficient to fish relatively shallow. Some of the pickerel might be in water as shallow as three feet, but others may be 30 feet down.
I avoid any fish I suspect are really deep. I have caught pickerel 30 feet down during summer, and I’ve seen them caught that deep while ice fishing, which is why I suggest some will be that deep in March and April, too. Since my rigs are weighted by no more than a snap swivel and hook, they work fine down to about 12 or 15 feet. A shiner doesn’t struggle much to stay at the surface; it eventually gets down to the bottom or into residual weeds.
It may get a little hung up in the green stuff, but usually you can work it free and continue a retrieve. I never retrieve on a tight line. I let the rod tip do the work of my wrist, then I reel in the slack. As I said at the beginning of the discussion, it’s slow going. Mostly, what I do is anticipate the upright position of the shiner. Always hook it between both lips, so when you do pull slowly on the rod tip to carry it forward, it does indeed move in a clean forward direction. You don’t want the shiner to appear too erratic or unnatural, and it already will appear injured, because it’s under the duress of the rig and line. It is injured. You don’t need to impart any more action than occasional and subtle rod tip twitches.
I like to revisit spots I know produce during the warmwater season. Getting a shiner down among weeds I can’t see, and that don’t entangle it, is very satisfying when I feel a pull, confirming my notion that enough of the warmwater green stuff is down there to hold pickerel in the cold. I drop the rod tip, quickly open the bail, and let the pickerel finish its initial run. Then I tighten the line by lifting the rod tip while keeping my index finger on it. Keep in mind that pickerel always seem to take a shiner in the middle. That’s why, if you set the hook too soon, you might reel in nothing but a shiner head attached to the hook. By carefully applying just a little pressure on the pickerel from the tip, you can feel it on your index finger as it turns the shiner headfirst towards its gullet.
When to set the hook is always a guess, but as you get hit by more pickerel, those guesses can become more educated. You’ll never solve the problem altogether, but if you get the knack of setting the hook once the shiner is headfirst in the mouth, you can avoid gut hooking. The possibility of that happening is always a good reason to use a small, size 6 J-hook that doesn’t obstruct the passage of food intake, until that hook will rust out. If you do use them, make sure they’re the bronze type that do rust.