In this tip, Jason Mitchell demonstrates his favorite ice fishing knots and how he uses them.
A popular knot for Mitchell, especially for panfish and small jigs, is a simple Palomar knot. The reason that the Palomar works well for ice fishing is that it cinches up really tight allowing him to actually change the angle of the jig by simp;y moving the knot around. This is really important for keeping jigs perfectly horizontal.
With really small jigs, size 14 or 12, it can be hard to tie a Palomar knot because the eye isn’t big enough to get the line through and back, this is when he prefers to switch to the snell knot. The disadvantage of the snell knot, however, is the inability to control the angle of the jig as much.
When using larger jigs on a more aggressive panfish bite where it’s more likely to catch bass and pike, he will also often use a loop knot with a heavier fluorocarbon leader to make it more pike-proof. Usually an eight or ten pound fluoro leader will kill the action on a small jig, but a loop knot will still provide good jig action and allow it to hang fairly horizontal. When it comes to a little bit bigger lures such as small spoons and glide baits, he prefers to use a small snap with a swivel or a split ring but he doesn’t like to tie direct to the lure to get better action and bounce.
No matter where you are fishing, one of these knots should suit your needs pretty well. When it comes to panfish especially, the Palomar, snell, and loop knots cover a lot of the bases.
