Whitefish and tullibees often hang in a lake’s deep basins and feed on bugs and small fish. Jigs or spoon-and-dropper setups work well. (Photo courtesy of Clam Outdoors)
January 07, 2025
By Matt Breuer
Midwestern ice anglers are lucky. We have some incredible fisheries for walleyes, perch, giant pike, trout, crappies and bluegills. Often overlooked, however, are the less desirable fish inhabiting our waters that many anglers see as nuisances.
Surprisingly, many of these fish can provide some of the best fights of the season, and once you’re dialed in on them, they can offer unreal days filled with hooksets and fun. Let’s examine some of these under-the-radar opportunities.
BURBOT The burbot goes by many names—lawyer, lota-lota, eelpout, lingcod ... the list goes on. Widely viewed as an annoyance, this feisty freshwater cod typically feeds on or near bottom. However, in winter, it can also be a ferocious predator found anywhere in the water column, chasing anything from other gamefish to bugs. They’re rather opportunistic predators, and when they bite, be ready for a battle. Burbot are a blast to catch and, despite their unappealing look, are delicious.
Eelpout are truly a working person’s fish, with the best action typically starting after sundown. While burbot can be caught during the day, especially around the spawn, hardcore anglers fish them well into darkness, as that period offers the best odds.
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Burbot are visually impaired and rely heavily on scent and vibration, so large baits that glow brightly and produce ample noise work best. Big Nasty Tackle’s Trout-N-Pout Spoon is a longtime favorite and proven burbot candy. The heavy chunk of lead lets you pound the bait against the lake bottom, causing a ruckus and calling fish from afar.
Tip each hook on the treble with a shiner or shiner head. Large profiles are good, and they move a lot of water when jigged. When a fish shows up on the flasher, slow down and let the burbot find the bait. Use 36- to 38-inch heavy walleye or light lake trout gear and 20-pound braid running directly to the spoon.
Destinations: Famous Minnesota walleye fisheries like Leech, Cass, Winnibigoshish, Lake of the Woods and Mille Lacs are also home to burbot. However, smaller lakes with good depth and clarity often hold solid numbers of unpressured fish. Lake Erie and Lake Superior are famous burbot fisheries, too. While North Dakota isn’t renowned for burbot, the Missouri River system holds good numbers and some big fish.CATFISH Anglers heavily target catfish in summer, but few chase them beneath the ice, as they can be lethargic and difficult to catch unless you know where to look and how to target them. Catfish are a Southern culinary staple, but have you ever had a po’ boy made from a catfish caught through the ice? Beyond their great taste, they’re excellent fighters and offer a fun hard-water challenge.
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Deep holes in lakes and rivers often hold good numbers of cats. Fish typically school up heavily in winter, roaming lazily and feeding when they see fit. If they shift during the season, look to large flats on shorelines with a little bit of depth. Similarly, check flat areas with less current on rivers.
Matt Johnson (mattjohnsonoutdoors.com ) runs guided ice-fishing trips for catfish each winter in central Minnesota and is also Clam Outdoors’ pro-staff director. He says catfish rely heavily on scent and various ways of “tasting,” and successful anglers appeal to these senses. The guide packs minnows or minnow heads on each hook of a spoon’s treble to triple the scent and flavor.
On tougher days, dead-sticking produces the best results, and hits can be surprisingly light. A medium or medium-light rod with a fast tip, like Clam’s Jason Mitchell Dead Meat , and 6-pound-test monofilament is ideal.
Destinations : Any lake or river that holds good numbers of cats is in play. Just be safe, as ice on river systems can be sketchy at times.STURGEON For her sturgeon setup, Elena Mathys uses a heavy ice rod, large reel, 1/2-ounce sinker, J-hook with nightcrawlers and a foam bobber. (Photo courtesy of Elena Mathy) When many people think “sturgeon fishing,” they envision the open-water action each spring during the fish’s annual run up Minnesota’s Rainy River. However, sturgeon fishing is very popular with some ice anglers for good reason: They are massive and put up a huge fight.
Sturgeon typically aren’t that hard to find. Deeper holes in rivers that let them rest and feed on forage that gets pushed into the lower current regularly hold fish. Slopes leading into holes and current seams are two great areas to inspect, too.
Elena Mathys, who runs the Whisker Outdoors Facebook page and YouTube channel, knows much about sturgeon. She won first place in the 2022–2023 King of the Sturgeon winter contest and spent roughly 600 hours on the ice targeting them.
For her setup, she drills two 10-inch overlapping holes, providing 19 to 20 inches of side-to-side clearance to land fish. She likes a heavy ice rod, like those from River Freak Custom Rods , with a larger ice reel spooled with 40-pound braid running straight to the bait. On the business end, she runs a bobber stop, followed by an Ice Buster Bobber , set to depth. Below that, she has a simple 1/2-ounce egg sinker, four to five beads and a 2/0 J-hook, which she packs with two to four nightcrawlers or fatheads.
“Once you have the right gear, the only thing left to do is wait for the bobber to wiggle and be prepared for a fight like no other,” Mathys says. “You can wait for hours, or even days, but when you hoist a fish potentially as long as you are tall, you’ll be hooked for life!”
Destinations : Wisconsin’s Winnebago system, where spearing is king, is a hot spot that draws thousands annually. Minnesota’s St. Croix and Rainy rivers are great for hook-and-line anglers.TULLIBEES/WHITEFISH Tullibees and whitefish are misunderstood. Most anglers can’t differentiate between them, and most don’t want to catch them anyway. While oily and stinky, they’re also a blast to catch and incredible on the plate. Both exist in the same family, but tullibees (aka ciscoes) are a smaller version of whitefish. They’re much lighter in color due to their silver scales and have a mouth that opens upward. Whitefish are usually darker, with a yellowish hue to their scales, and have a mouth that extends downward.
Both often hang in the same areas in lakes and feed on similar things, so angling tactics are nearly identical. In winter, tullibees and whitefish typically occupy a lake’s deepest holes, so in lakes with either species, start by searching the deep basins. At dusk and dawn, they’ll often feed heavily on breaks and humps, but for a consistent bite, go deeper.
Setups and techniques vary, depending on how you like to fish. A small tungsten jig like Clam Pro Tackle’s Drop-Kick works great, especially when tipped with a maggot or two. These fish have small mouths and commonly feed on bugs, which this pairing perfectly mimics.
To be a little more proactive, run a spoon with a dropper. I like a 32-inch medium rod with 6-pound-test monofilament for this. I remove the treble from a flashy spoon, like Clam’s Leech Flutter Spoon , and run 6 to 8 inches of 4-pound low-visibility fluorocarbon down to a tiny tungsten jig. The spoon calls fish in from a distance, possibly even firing up the entire school. Meanwhile, the jig more naturally mimics their prey and seals the deal.
Tullibees and whitefish are light biters, so pay attention when marking fish on your flasher. Like trout, they’re also into chasing, so move your bait up and down in the water. Letting your bait fall 20 feet and reeling back up as fast as possible is common when chasing tullies and whiteys. Once they strike, enjoy the ride. They are crazy fighters, darting and thrashing from start to finish.
Destinations : The most notable whitefish spot is Wisconsin’s Green Bay, though Lake Superior has good numbers of big fish, too. Tullibees are found in most healthy, deep lakes in the Upper Midwest.This article was featured in the December-January issue of Game & Fish magazine. Click to subscribe .
