I've been on the fence about ice fishing but this past weekend a neighbor said he'd like to give it a try as well. That was probably all the motivation I need to do it, so now comes equipment buying time. What would be the ideal rod strength for multi-species ice fishing? Likely the main target would be perch, but if I had the stuff anyway, I'd give walleye, whitefish and lakers a try at some point too. Throw in the occasional pike while perching and it gets better. I'd guess a medium action rod -same as soft water, or would a medium -light suffice, or do perch on an ultra light (love that in the summer) and med-heavy for lakers. Thanks in advance
I picked up a number of generic rods on Kijiji last year in Ottawa. If your on the fence and don't know what you want keep your eyes on kijiji and see if some generic stuff comes up. It tends to sell at a good discount. Might let you save some money until you figure out what you want.
Depends...(oh boy)
Often, it is dependent on the presentation or the biting habit of the fish.
MA and I like to use L to ML action rods for deep jigging Lake Whitefish on Lake Simcoe. For the smaller Lake Whitefish elsewhere, we use UL to L rods. In these cases, the often (but not always) soft biting Lake Whitefish dictates light action rods, especially if we are presenting smaller lures. Lake Whitefish average 4lbs on Simcoe, but often they do not fight too hard.
For Walleye, which I have only done a limited amount of it, L to ML rods are good again. Walleye bite can be subtle as well, both on lures or live shiner on a jig, so you want a soft tip to detect the bite.
For jigging Lake Trout under 5lbs, you can use a ML rod. Between 5-10lbs you would want at least a M rod, or you risk overplaying the fish and decrease its post-release survival. Anything over 10lbs and a MH rod is best. It could take a while to land a 10lb+ Lake Trout on a ML rod. In this case, the strength of the fish factors more than the presentation, since a lot of times you are fishing larger and heavier spoons, jigs or crankbaits for the Lake Trout, and you are working the lures more aggressively. They also tend to hit pretty aggressively, so bite detection is not usually an issue.
For Pike, I usually fish them by deadsticking a bait. But the odd times I was jigging for them, either with jigs or spoons, I tend to like a ML rod for any pike under 5lbs. And that trend for heavier rod is similar to the trend for Lake Trout above.
If you are deadsticking a minnow for Lake Trout or Pike, the sensitivity of the rod doesn't matter all too much...unless the bite is very tentative...at which point you may want to consider adding some kind of bite detection (float, spring bobber, slack + tip up flag...etc). These are all ways to add a little bit of slack to the line as the fish grabs the bait, yet it will allow you to read the bite.
So...after all that...what would I suggest?
Evaluate the size of the fish in the lake (or lakes) you intended to fish, and get the appropriate rod.
For you list of species, I would suggest ML for Walleye, Whitefish, Lake Trout up to maybe 6lbs and Pike up to 6lbs as well. Saying that, there are some big fish that can be caught on little rods...if you play them out patiently...and do the circle dance.
I wouldn't worry too much about ice this season