TOPIC:

what is the best method to fish for whitefish in Indiana waters?

You'll want a pyramid sinker on a sliding snap swivel.

Slide a bead on your line, and then tie on a barrel swivel. Tie an 18 inch leader to the barrel swivel, and a size 10 or 12 octopus hook on the end of the leader

Clip the sinker onto the main line above the bead and barrel swivel. (The bead protects your knot)

As for bait, waxworms, small bits of nightcrawlers, shrimp, etc can work. But the best are single boiled salmon eggs. Or acid-cured salmon eggs. You want a rubbery/bouncy consistency, with some pasty/liquid interior. Like a peanut butter consistency inside.

Scents like herring, anise, and garlic are also good to use on the eggs. Put 2-3 eggs on the hook, and cast out. They bite pretty light, and 90% of them will swallow the bait before you even know you have a bite


mouth of Burns Ditch, East Chicago breakwall pier, Michigan City pier all have catchable whitefish between November and March

Ben, I was told that the whitefish here are a different strain then those from Green Bay that we ice fish for and really enjoy and to not waste
my time because there just not as good? I had looked forward to fishing for them here, any input on this or had you heard this before?
Just wondering what your thoughts on that would be?
Thanks
Tom

They're both lake whitefish. I guess you could say it's a different "strain" but that might be pushing it. There are a few different "genetic stocks" in Lake Michigan, that are not visually different, but have very tiny genetic differences that are only able to be seen in a lab when examining mitochondrial DNA and microsatellite DNA markers. This is basically resulting from something called the "isolation by distance" theory. Whitefish show spawning site fidelity just like trout and salmon, so over time a population using the same complex of spawning reefs would become isolated from another population using a different spawning complex 50 miles away

Green Bay's population is isolated from the southern LM stocks (they don't roam around like salmon), and the populations don't really mix. It's that way for yellow perch too. In fact, the Big Bay De Noc has a different genetic stock from Green Bay, and they are pretty close to each other.

I guarantee you that there's not a significant difference in taste because of some minor genetic differences. Their fecundity, length/weight relationships, etc are all indistinguishable.

I haven't eaten GB whitefish so I can't compare. If there is a taste difference I would guess it would be due to diet. But that's all hypothetical.

All I can tell you is that the whitefish I've eaten from southern LM are very tasty.

There's a lot of factors that go into fish taste, the biggest probably being caring for the fish properly after catching it. Bleeding and putting on ice vs not bleeding and putting on ice is a huge difference. The other big factor would be diet. I don't know enough about Green Bay whitefish diet to say if it's any different than southern LM whitefish diet

Oh we luv the whitefish from Green Bay, guess I'll be fishing them piers soon for some local whitefish sampling.
Thanks Ben appreciate the answers.