Pike Fishing: How to Catch Northern Pike in Every Season

A weedless spoon lure with a wire weed guard — Photo: R. Henrik Nilsson (CC BY 4.0)

Pike fishing comes down to one method: cast or troll big spoons, spinners and plugs along weed beds in daylight, on a wire leader. Wisconsin DNR puts it at about eight hours of fishing per pike hooked. The catch is the season: pike move through the year, and the big ones leave the weeds in summer.

Wisconsin DNR’s estimate: about eight hours of fishing to hook a northern pike. Its creel surveys log 27 hours for each muskie. About half the pike in a lake end up on a hook every year.

What do you need?

The kit is short. Wisconsin DNR’s list for open water is a sturdy rod, medium-weight line with a wire leader, spoons and streamer flies. For bait anglers it adds small suckers and chubs up to 8 in (20 cm).

Cory Schmidt’s In-Fisherman piece gives two casting set-ups. Field Editor Steve Ryan throws spinnerbaits and double-bladed bucktails fast on a 7 ft 6 in (2.3 m) heavy-power casting rod with 65 lb braid. Colorado guide Nate Zelinsky goes lighter, with medium-heavy casting tackle and 14 lb Berkley FireLine.

Lures. Large spoons, spinners, spinnerbaits and buzzbaits, diving and topwater plugs, poppers and stick baits. Every one of the five agency lists has spoons. The pike lure picks name the models.
Bait. Suckers and chubs, large minnows, golden shiners and small suckers fished dead or alive, herring under a bobber, and dead smelt under the ice.
A leader. Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan and Alaska name wire or steel; Maine asks for “highly abrasion resistant leaders”. See wire or fluorocarbon.
Long-nosed pliers. Minnesota DNR: remove hooks “with long-nosed pliers, not your fingers”.

Where are the pike, season by season?

Season	Water	Where the pike are	What to throw	Who says so
Ice-out	Mid-30s to mid-40s °F (2–7 °C)	Shallow weedy bays, spawning	Spoons, slow spinnerbaits, dead or live bait	Maine IFW, Wired2Fish
After the spawn	Low 60s °F (about 17 °C)	Big fish linger in the spawning bays, then new cabbage and sand beaches	Spoons, plugs, spinnerbaits worked faster	In-Fisherman, Minnesota DNR, Wired2Fish
Early summer	65 °F (18 °C) and up	Weed lines; bigger pike start to slide deeper	Cast or troll the weed edge; crankbaits on lead-core	Maine IFW, Wired2Fish
High summer	Surface over 77 °F (25 °C)	Small pike in weeds; big pike in cool depths, springs, inlets	Deep: trolled crankbaits, spoons. Weeds: spinnerbaits, topwaters	Michigan DNR, Wisconsin DNR, In-Fisherman
Fall	Cooling	Shallow again	Spoons trolled along weed lines	Maine IFW, Wired2Fish
Ice	Under ice	Mouths of big bays early, then into the bays	Tip-ups with dead smelt or live shiners; jigged spoons	North Dakota G&F, In-Fisherman, Alaska DF&G

Maine’s fisheries department writes that “trophy-size adult pike concentrate in shallow water areas” as the spawn approaches. At ice-out, it adds, anglers do best on big pike in “shallow weedy areas where pike are spawning”.

After the spawn the fish do not leave at once. Schmidt describes big pike on large northern lakes such as Rainy, Wabigoon and Lake of the Woods lingering in their spawning bays into early May, then moving on as the water climbs into the low to mid-60s. Guide Jeff Gustafson looks for isolated sand beaches with early cabbage in 6 to 12 ft (2–4 m) of water. Walleyes load up on those beaches and become food for big pike in late May and June.

In fall, Maine again: “shallower water areas again offer productive fishing.” Wisconsin DNR lists late summer and early fall among the best times of the year.

Why do big pike vanish in August?

Trautman and Hubbs confirmed it from Michigan creel records in 1935: “the catch of northern pike per hour does fall off very notably in the summer”. Wisconsin DNR gives the two causes they guessed at, food and warmth: the pike is “well-fed and less inclined to bite”, and it seeks “cooler, deeper waters in very hot weather”.

The temperature half now has numbers behind it. A telemetry study followed pike in three Minnesota lakes. In August, fish over 28 in (71 cm) chose water of 61 to 70 °F (16–21 °C), with water up to 82 °F (28 °C) on offer. In the two lakes with lily pads, small pike stayed in the warmer shallows; in the third, with no such cover, they went deeper. For them, the study found, temperature came second to cover.

Michigan’s pike plan, citing an Ohio reservoir study, adds the threshold. Once the surface passes 77 °F (25 °C), pike hold in the coolest water that still has 3 mg of oxygen per liter, and stay there for two to three months.

Wisconsin DNR points to inlet streams, springs and, in deep lakes, “the cooler depths near the bottom”. In-Fisherman’s Dan Johnson quotes biologist Bruce Carlson: in a deep lake with oxygen below the thermocline, by mid to late August “virtually all big pike are below the thermocline”. His targets are 55 to 60 °F (13–16 °C) water and structure at 35 ft (11 m) or more.

A Canadian federal review says pike rarely go below the thermocline. Oxygen settles it: where the deep water is breathable, big pike use it; where it is dead, they follow the thermocline or find a spring or an inlet. The water temperature chart sets the pike’s numbers beside other species.

How do you work a lure in open water?

Fish the edges of cover. Minnesota DNR: “casting or trolling around beds of aquatic vegetation and stumps in shallow water”.
Keep it moving. Wisconsin’s phrase is “keep the bait moving”. Alaska’s is “Try a fast retrieve”.
Finish the cast. Wisconsin again: a pike “may strike a lure repeatedly, or follow a lure right to the boat before charging”.
Go over the top in weeds. Alaska recommends topwater lures and weedless hooks where the vegetation is thick.
Match speed to temperature. Wired2Fish’s sequence: spoons in cold water, spinnerbaits rolled slowly, then faster as the water warms.
Fish in daylight. Pike “bite best during the daylight hours” (Wisconsin); Minnesota calls the pike “a daytime feeder”. A Canadian review describes dawn and dusk peaks in summer.

How fast to troll? The one figure in these sources is Wired2Fish’s for fall: spoons at 2.8 to 3.5 mph (4.5–5.6 km/h) along weed lines.

Fly anglers get a paragraph from Alaska: salmon rods, smolt, frog or mouse patterns, and a wire tippet of 20 or 40 lb test.

Why is ice the big-pike season?

Wisconsin DNR writes that pike are “caught more easily in winter than in summer”. At Houghton Lake, Michigan, the ice fishery took 82% of all pike harvested.

The standard tool is the tip-up with a live or dead baitfish under it.

Paul Bailey, North Dakota Game and Fish biologist. Early in the ice season he fishes “deeper depths, sometimes 20 feet or more, near the mouths of large bays”. He sets dead baits “about 18 inches off the bottom” (46 cm), and 3 ft (0.9 m) or more in clear water, “as pike are accustomed to attacking prey above them”. His bait is the largest vacuum-sealed rainbow smelt he can find, up to 10 in (25 cm) for pike of 40 in (102 cm) and up. He spools 40 lb braid.

Doug Stange, In-Fisherman. Lively 6 in (15 cm) shiners or chubs on tip-ups; a dead sucker of 6 to 8 in for jigging; bigger dead baits at late ice; line of at least 14 lb. Morning, he writes, is “almost always more productive than late afternoon”.

Alaska Department of Fish and Game. Fresh herring where bait is legal, a flasher fished above a baited hook, and spoons or jigs worked in shallow water.

How do you tie and fish a quick-strike rig?

A quick-strike rig ends the old wait for the pike to run and swallow. In-Fisherman’s Rob Neumann explains the name: two small trebles mean “you can set instantly, rather than letting the pike run”. His build:

Cut 20 to 25 in (51–64 cm) of wire for a finished rig of 15 to 20 in (38–51 cm). “The standard wire is 18- to 27-pound uncoated stranded.”
Fix one treble at the end. Use a #4 or #6. Stange found those sizes “have better hooking and landing rates than larger sizes”.
Add a second treble “riding a few inches above” the first.
Hook the bait in two places. “Insert the end hook near the dorsal fin of a baitfish, and the upper hook in or near the tail.”
Hang it under the tip-up or float at the depth for the day.
Set the hook at once. That is the whole idea of the rig.

The point is the release. In Neumann’s words, “since pike are hooked shallower in the mouth, hook removal is made easier, increasing chances for survival.” Wisconsin DNR backs him: anglers who release should “use quick-strike rigs” and “not let the fish completely swallow the bait”.

You will also read the opposite. The same Wisconsin leaflet tells minnow anglers to wait for the swallow, and Alaska says to wait “until you are sure the pike has swallowed the bait”. That is advice for a fish going home. Alaska wrote it for Southcentral, where pike were illegally introduced and there is no bag limit. In the freshwaters of West Cook Inlet and the Susitna River drainage, anglers may not release a live pike at all.

Wire or fluorocarbon?

Who	Leader	For
Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Alaska agencies	Wire or steel	All pike fishing
Doug Stange, In-Fisherman	20 lb fluorocarbon	Live and dead bait rigs
Jack Ballard, MeatEater	Wire; 50 lb fluorocarbon, about a foot	Lures; flies
Paul Bailey, North Dakota G&F	100 lb fluorocarbon	Dead bait for big pike under ice

Minnesota DNR states the case for wire: without it “those sharp teeth will easily cut through your mono-filament line”. Stange states the case against: by his own count he has landed well over 100 pike on 20 lb fluorocarbon without a cut-off, one of them over 20 lb (9 kg). That is one writer’s tally on bait rigs with small trebles. Nobody has published a controlled test of wire against fluorocarbon.

Wire is the only leader material no source here reports a pike cutting. A lure bitten off stays in the fish, so when in doubt, wire; the pike’s teeth show why.

How do you unhook a pike?

Minnesota DNR’s rules:

Keep “fingers well away from the fish’s mouth”, and use pliers.
“If a hook is deeply set, cut the line and leave the hook in place.”
“Never put your fingers in the gills or eyes to lift or hold the fish.”
“Always hold a fish horizontally. Holding vertically places stress on the vertebrae.”
Keep the fish in the water as much as possible, and use a net of “soft nylon or cotton”.

For a fish to be released, Wisconsin DNR says do not land it at all: bring it alongside the boat and take the hook out with pliers, or cut the hook with a wire cutter. The catch and release guide has the rest. For a weight without a scale, the fish weight calculator works one out from length and girth before the release.

Are pike hard to catch?

No, and that is their weakness. Wisconsin DNR estimates that about half the pike present at the start of a season get hooked during it. In a few Alaskan lakes, anglers have been able to catch 80 to 90% of the pike over 12 in (30 cm).

Big fish go first. A Minnesota DNR report worked out that on a 100-acre lake, keeping one 35 in (89 cm) pike removes a full year’s production of large fish. Keep small pike for the pan, where they are the better meal (are northern pike good to eat), and let the big ones go. The northern pike page has size by age and weight by length.

Which state is best for pike fishing?

No agency ranks the states, but agency figures point to two for size. Alaska Department of Fish and Game says pike of up to about 20 lb (9 kg) “are common in some Alaskan rivers and lakes”. The fish is native to the north and west of the state, and the record is 38 lb (17 kg) from the Innoko River. In North Dakota, the Missouri River system (Lake Sakakawea, the Missouri River and Lake Oahe) has produced about 80% of the 20 lb and larger pike entered in the state’s Whopper Club.

For a steady bite, Wisconsin DNR describes the pike as widespread across the state except the unglaciated southwest, with a typical catch of 18 to 20 in and about 2 lb.

And muskie?

Same water, different clock. Wisconsin’s pike leaflet puts a pike at eight hours and a glimpse of a muskie at nearly 100; the state’s creel surveys from 1990 to 2011 measured one muskie caught per 27 hours. The pike family page and muskie vs pike tell the two fish apart.

For what to throw at one, start with the muskie lure picks.

Gear for pike and muskie

Gear guide
Best Northern Pike Lures: Six Classics the Agencies and Guides Agree On, and When to Throw Each
Northern pike lures by the evidence: a 1 oz spoon first, then spinners, spinnerbaits, plugs and topwaters, with the water and season each one is for.
Gear guide
Best Muskie Lures: The Classic in Each Class, and the Water Temperature to Throw It
The muskie lures guides and magazines keep naming, one per class, with maker-checked sizes and the water temperature each is for, from 40 °F to 75 °F.