Every angler out there has a special place in their heart for a certain species, and if you grew up in the Northeast or Midwest, it’s likely to be the yellow perch. These hardy little fish are abundant, beautiful, and among the best-eating fish in freshwater. But their appeal goes deeper than that.
Perch are a fish of our early days, back when our eight-year-old selves would head down to the local boat dock, farm pond, or rocky river bank with a pack of worms, hooks, and bobbers. As we grew older, most of us moved on to what we believed were bigger and better species. But yellow perch are still there waiting to spark the same child-like joy they brought us all those years ago, even during the coldest winter months.
Catching yellow perch through the ice can be fast-paced at times and very rewarding — especially when you’re catching big ones. Targeting these jumbo, rod-bending perch can be a challenge, but when you know where and how to fish for them, you can fill your ice bucket with chunky perch all day long.
Find Your Honey Holes
For the most part, yellow perch that live in lakes and ponds tend to travel in groups. They’ll gather in schools according to size, with groups of small fish and big fish moving to different areas as they hunt for different types of forage. Smaller fish tend to stick around the shallows near weed beds and other shallow structure, where they feed on insect larvae and small minnows. Larger perch, on the other hand, tend to be rovers, transitioning from shallow to deeper water as they hunt for schools of baitfish. This can make finding and staying on top of big perch difficult, but there are still certain areas worth focusing on.
One of the best tools for targeting yellow perch through the ice is a bathymetric map or mapping app. These maps show the contour lines of depth changes along the bottom, allowing you to pinpoint both sharp drop-offs and gradual descents into deeper water. Big perch will hunt the edges of these contours, moving in and out of the shallows between 7 feet and 25 feet of water.
Your best bet for finding fish is to focus on the inside edges of these contours, paying special attention to areas where long flats of shallow water slowly drop off. Drill several holes along these areas, starting in around 6 to 8 feet of water and moving out to 20 feet or more. You can then use electronics like sonar or an underwater camera to explore the area beneath the ice and try to pinpoint the big schools you’re looking for.
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If you aren’t equipped with electronics, you can set several tip-ups along the descent. (More on this in the next section.) Or you can try jigging each hole individually like a prospector panning for gold, staying at each hole for a few minutes at a time until you strike perch pay dirt. As previously mentioned, big perch generally travel in large schools. So once you have a general idea of where fish are holding, you can zero in on them and start stacking them up, provided you’re using the right lures and baits.
Fish Bigger Baits and Rig Your Tip-Ups Properly
Like a roving winter wolf pack, jumbo perch are voracious and constantly on the hunt. They will consume anything from small minnows and leeches, to shiners and smelt, to baby bass and bluegill. If they can fit in their mouths, it’s officially on the menu. So, to catch them consistently, you’ve got to give them what they want: meat.
While you can still catch big yellow perch through the ice on small panfish jigs, you’ll often have better luck using the larger jigs used for walleye. Some of my favorites include the CPT Clam Drop and the Northland Forest Minnow in size #6, #8, and #10. These jigs are incredibly effective when tipped with chunks of worm or maggots, and they become absolute perch magnets when tipped with a live minnow hooked through the lips or a small plastic grub like the Crappie Maxx.
Jigging spoons and body baits are also favorites among big perch anglers. These larger, flashier lures create a lot of commotion in the water and are fantastic for drawing in fat perch from a distance. Some of the best spoons include the Swedish Pimple,Buck Shot Rattle, and the Clam Speed Spoon, all of which will call big perch in like angry piranhas, especially when they’re tipped with worms, maggots, or minnow heads. Body baits like the Rippin’ Rap and the Jigging Rap can also be fantastic options, especially when you’re trying to pull big perch out of deeper water.
Read Next: Best Ice Fishing Lures for Panfish of 2025
Tip-ups are also incredibly effective tools, especially when you don’t have any electronics because they allow you to spread out your set-up at a variety of different depths to find perch. You just want to make sure they’re rigged and baited properly to keep smaller perch and other fish from triggering them, which will have you chasing false flags all day.
Start by attaching a small barrel swivel to your tip-up line and then tie 2 to 3 feet of 4lb to 6lb monofilament or fluorocarbon line to the other end of the swivel. Add a #6 bait hook to the end of your line and a small spit shot 6 to 8 inches above the hook. Then hook on a 2-inch to 3-inch shiner through the base of its tail, just behind its dorsal fin. This will cause the bait to hang head down where it can be easily inhaled headfirst by a big perch allowing for a clean and efficient hookset. Often, once you catch a couple fish, the activity of the struggling fish beneath the ice will bring in the rest of the school, turning the spot into a hot hole and allowing you to bring your jigging rod into play.
Stick and Move
While the old saying is “never leave fish to find fish,” one of the biggest mistakes that big perch hunters make is staying in one spot for too long. This is especially true when an area has produced a couple of fish and you’re hoping they’ll return. That hope can keep you planted in a spot for far too long, however. (Remember, schools of perch like to stay on the move.) So when the action slows down, it’s important to keep moving if you want to stay on top of the fish.
Big perch are usually very willing to play, so if you’ve spent more than 10 minutes at a hole without a strike, it’s time to move to a new spot. When perch schools are feeding, they’ll generally stay at the same depth for large chunks of time.
Consequently, when you get a lull in the action and feel like the fish have moved, you’re going to want to try to parallel the school. Instead of moving forward or backward into deeper or shallower water, try moving a few yards to the left or right and drilling a new hole at roughly the same depth you were previously fishing. It’s likely that the perch school is still close by and by staying in the area you’ll probably run into it again. Only after you’ve done this a few times with no luck is it time to make a bigger move toward deeper or shallower water.
Although most anglers like to jig and set their tip-ups within a few inches of the bottom, big perch aren’t always feeding at that depth. Sometimes they’ll be active only a few feet below the ice as they hunt for suspending baitfish. So when you’re prospecting in a new spot, start jigging or setting your lines shallow, and then gradually drop your baits deeper every couple of minutes until you start finding perch or decide you’re fishing an empty hole.
Stack ‘Em Up Responsibly
It’s important to remember when targeting jumbo yellow perch (or any other type of fish) that the big breeders are the future of your fishery. These female fish are the largest, most mature fish in the system that are carrying the most eggs. And by specifically targeting and harvesting them, you could put a dent the resource. So be sparing with the big perch that you bring home for dinner, even in lakes with liberal limits. By letting a few big fish go you can ensure that future generations can experience the spark of joy that is catching jumbo yellow perch through the ice.
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