Muskie Fishing
Ontario Muskie Fishing
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Ontario Fishing Trips
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  Jigs
on Cold Fronts
by Pete Maina
Cold fronts generally aren’t the greatest news
for any fishing, other than the fact that
pre-frontal conditions usually bring a feeding
spree as barometric pressure drops. Following
this though, when cold air, high, clear skies
persist, muskie and pike are usually laying
pretty low, just trying to stay comfortable,
digest, likely pass a little gas … generally not
too fired up.
A tremendous standby for cold front conditions,
or any low activity period – are jigs. They work
for all species, and certainly those big toothy
esocids included.
When they are “off” and skulking – generally, hitting them right on the
nose (it’s so easy they just can’t pass it up)
is the only hope to trigger a positive response.
If it’s above and/or “away”, it’s quite likely
to be ignored; for structure, presentations that
come very close to or purposefully contact
structure are generally most effective. Jigs and
jig-type lures are very effective for this. To
be honest, I don’t enjoy using slow
presentations; in fact I really hate it … but
during cold fronts Esox species seem to like ‘em
a whole lot more than I. Jig and scented
soft-plastics like Gulp, often small stuff, as
well as live and dead baits on jigs (weight
chosen to match depth to be fished) are
effective; super enticing soft plastics like
Sebile’s Magic Swimmer work well; jig/jerk soft
plastic body baits like Red October’s tubes,
jigged and worked vertically are great. Work
these presentations up and down edges and
parallel to structure. Be ready for strikes on
pauses. Often just a “hop” in the line means a
strike. For very sharp and irregular breaklines,
generally straight vertical jigging is most
effective; especially for this – add to the
prior list, Sebile’s Flatt Shad.
 
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