Ice Fishing Soft Plastics – Overlooked Presentations for Panfish & Walleyes

Learn the benefits of adding soft plastic lures to your ice fishing arsenal and how to use those baits effectively.

I can easily recall my first time ice fishing with soft plastic lures because it was my first time ice fishing. I fished with a couple of fishing industry friends, both veteran ice anglers from Minnesota. Jigs and spoons owned the ice fishing world at that time, and few ice anglers ever used soft plastic lures. To me, though, it seemed like the same lures I used for vertical presentations to cold-water crappie and bluegills on open water should work through the ice. So, I begin my ice pilgrimage by going against the grain, using a soft plastic crappie bait on a jighead that wasn’t even an ice jig.

You likely know where this account is headed. The soft plastics turned out to be the ticket that day, outproducing the traditional ice lures. Within a couple of hours my friends had switched to plastics and then helped me refine presentations with their knowledge of ice strategies and fish behavior.

That was nearly two decades ago, and much has changed in the ice fishing world. Use of soft plastic lures has gained popularity, and some plastic baits are even developed primarily with ice fishermen in mind. That said, this approach remains vastly underutilized by most ice anglers.

Soft-Plastic Appeal

Whether you’re talking about a true micro bait like a Bobby Garland Itty Bit Swim‘R or grub or swimbait designed primarily for open-water bass or walleye fishing, soft plastic lures offer fluid movements that can make them appear very natural.

Soft plastic baits also come in every imaginable shape and size, which is valuable for matching different types of forage and for creating a broad range of actions. Similarly, color options for soft-plastic lures are pretty much limitless.

Most Soft plastic baits hold scent well, and while it’s often a good strategy to tip the hook with a spike or minnow head, if the natural bait gets stolen, the offering does not lose its appeal. And because fish visually relate to the soft plastic, they tend to attack the whole offering, which leads to better hook-up ratios and less stolen bait.

Baits & Jigs

Many types of soft plastic will produce at times, but the body styles that typically yield the best ice fishing action for walleyes and panfish are baits that offer fairly slender profiles and that quiver with any hint of motion. Several baits from Bobby Garland Crappie Baits excel for ice fishing because they were designed in part at least for similar fishing techniques in open waters.

Top picks for walleyes include the Baby Shad, the 3-inch Slab Slay’R and the Slab Hunt’R, which has a minnow profile and double-lobed tail that jiggles like a real minnow’s tail at the slightest lift or drop.

For crappies, the Baby Shad again gets the nod as a top pick, as does the Baby Shad Swim’R, which has the same body, but features a slight joint in the tail section and a tiny paddle on the tip of its tail.

For perch and bluegills, it’s tough to top Bobby Garland’s Itty Bit Series, which includes the Itty Bit Slab Slay’R, Itty Bit Swim’R and Itty Bit Slab Hunt’R. Each has a different profile and action, but all are tiny and exceptionally well suited for panfish ice presentations. The first Itty Bit baits were actually designed primarily with ice fishing in mind, and while these baits are the most popular with the open-water crowd they work exceptionally for those originally anticipated ice applications

Crappie Pro Mo’ Glo Jigheads and Overbite Sickle Jigheads work nicely for presenting soft plastics through the ice for a couple of reasons. First, they are balanced to hang horizontally, allowing for natural bait presentations. Also, they are painted with glow colors, which significantly increases visibility beneath the ice.

The 1/8- and 1/16-ounce Mo’ Glo heads are sized right for walleyes. The Overbite Sickle heads are designed to fit extra small baits, making them perfect for many panfish applications. For a smaller hook and very compact package, an excellent option is to fish one of the Itty Bit baits on a Lindy Tungsten Toad.

Presentations

As with any ice fishing techniques, the best presentation for fishing soft plastics varies immensely by day and situation. Sometimes a certain cadence, a sharp snap of the wrist or a very tight quiver is the ticket, and it’s critical to experiment and pay attention to what works. Watching electronics helps exponentially with seeing how fish react to different types of presentations, but only if you experiment and pay attention to responses.

Those things acknowledged, as a rule, “more is less” with soft plastic bait presentations. The subtle natural movement of the baits is a major draw, and the best way to take advantage of that is with gentle action and intentional pauses.

In many cases, the BEST way to fish a Baby Shad or an Itty Bit Swim’R is to get it down to the zone where you expect fish to be, jiggle it a couple of times and then hold the bait completely still. As still as you can anyway. Resist the urge to add any action, and watch to see what ends up happening!

When fish are eying soft plastic offerings and won’t quite commit, sometimes the best way to trigger a strike is to simply start lifting the bait away, steadily and s-l-o-w-l-y.

Alternative Rigs

Two alternative rigs that can be highly effective through the ice are a tandem rig and a drop shot rig. One note: Check state and local regulations before using either. Laws about multiple baits on a line vary by state, and some places do not allow a weight to be beneath a hook (drop shot rig) because of snagging implications.

Where allowed, a tandem rig with crappie jigs and soft plastic bodies, can be highly effective. Beyond simply doubling your number of baits, this presentation allows you to test two levels of the water column and to try different body shapes, sizes and colors, which speeds up the patterning process. If you start catching everything on your bottom jig, switch the tails to help figure out whether the depth or the bait is the difference maker.

A drop shot rig, with a hook attached a foot or two up the line with a polymer knot and a weight at the tag end, allows for very free bait movements. Nose-hook your offering on a small, short-shank hook, and it will dance uninhibited with the tiniest of rod movements. An ideal presentation, if fish are a foot or two off the bottom, is to put the weight right on the bottom and quiver the rid tip so slightly to give life to the bait without moving the weight.

Bonus Species

While we’ve focused this discussion walleyes and panfish, it’s worth noting that soft plastics can be effective for pretty much any sport fish that ever feeds on minnows or aquatic insects (which encompasses a lot, of course).

My biggest ice caught largemouth bass, lake trout and cutbow trout (and probably more) fell to soft plastic baits. The bass was a true bonus fish. I was crappie fishing with Bobby Garland pro staffer Doug Sikora and using a Baby Shad Swim’R. Both trout were targeted catches. Let’s consider a few bonus species and good options for targeting each.

• Largemouth Bass – 3-inch Bobby Garland Slab Slay’R
• Northern Pike – Gene Larew Long John Minnow
• Rainbow Trout – Lindy Fuzz-E Grub
• Lake Trout – YUM Tube
• Sauger – Bobby Garland Slab Hunt’R