Winter rituals can help reel in the fish!

The winter solstice occurs this week. Back in the day, the solstice precipitated all manner of strange rituals. While I am not a proponent of sacrificing goats, there are rituals that will help anglers catch more fish.

In the winter, as the water temperature cools the water clarity improves. In clear and cold-water conditions, small profile lures in natural colors tend to get more bites. So, for the next several weeks, my lure selection will be a Z-Man TubeZ (in the colors PB&J and The Deal) on a 1/5th ounce NedLockZ jig and a StreakZ 3.75 (Blue Back Herring) on a 3/16th ounce finesse jig. These lures work well for redfish in the shallows and trout in deeper water. In either situation, a slow jigging retrieve with a long pause is recommended. The strike will often be a slight tick. Anglers using light tackle have a definite advantage when it is cold. In the winter, I fish with a Shimano Zodias 6’8” light rod matched with a 1000 frame reel that is spooled with 10 pound PowerPro braid. This tackle system excels at casting light lures and feeling light winter bites.

If I see fish on the flats or on the depth sounder and they do not respond to natural color lures, I switch to a rod rigged with a 1/5th ounce NedlockZ and a Trick ShotZ in the color Twilight. I don’t know why but sometimes fish will react to a bright-colored lure when they have no interest in natural-colored lures. This was the case the other day. On the depth finder, we could see trout stacked up on a submerged ledge in 10 feet of water. They refused to eat any of our natural colored lures. After several casts with no bites, I switched to a rod rigged with a Trick ShotZ and began catching trout on pretty much every cast.

A lot of anglers quit fishing in the winter because it is more difficult to catch fish. However, anglers that adopt these rituals will find that they can catch fish on even the coldest days. So, give my winter rituals a try. It sure beats sacrificing a goat!

Contact Captain Greg Peralta at captgregp@gmail.com or call (843) 224-0099.