what a surprise to hit the launch ramp at moses lake and see the lake iced over. about 3/8 inche thick. two aluminum boats launched first and broke a path to the perch hole by the I-90 bridge, so we decided we could follow their trail and make it with my little skiff.

what do you fishermen use to catch perch? partner did best with a slip sinker and 2 feet of light line tied to a #10 hook, baited with worm at first, then perch meat. i used a swedish pimple with either worm or perch meat, but partner, with his bait laying on the bottom, outfished me. instead of getting nibbles that jiggled the end of his rod, his rod tip would just start bending a little when a perch took his bait and pulled line through the slip sinker.

in 3 hours, we kept 5 perch 11 inches long plus one a bit shorter, and released numerous smaller ones.

but the boat anchored right next to us (see photo, and note the ice drifting by) used swedish pimples and perch meat, and caught perhaps 3 times as many keepers as we did, in the same time. i watched and watched, and could not figure out what they were doing different than i was.

any of you been substancially outfished by someone 30 feet away from you??

[img]http://users.bentonrea.com/~johnrobyn/moseslakeperching[/img]

In my experience, anybody with a lawn chair in the bow of their boat will out fish everybody else. A buddy of mine was up there this weekend also. He said they did catch some nice walley's and perch while freezing their tails off.
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Nice looking boat, wish I had one with that much free board