Flags/day and hook %

I was fishing with a friend and my boy for two days recently.  I felt like we had two exceptional days and they were some of the best I’ve had tip up fishing.

It got me wondering:

1. What do you consider a good number of flags per tip up per day?  Let’s assume 6 hours of fishing = a day and please answer it on a per/tip up basis.

2.  What do you consider a good hookup %, ie how often does a flag result in a fish?  

We averaged about 3 flags/tip up/6 hour day and we landed fish on just under 50% of the flags, all northern.  Would you consider that good, bad, or average?

Great question! It totally depends on the lake for me. 

But, if I'm out with my son for example, and we have 6 tip ups out....in 6 hours I'd say 10 flags is a  good day. 5 fish landed would be solid. Some flags are just drops and really not much you can do about it. That's kind of what I consider a good day on a lake where I can hope to catch a few nice sized pike which the chance at a bigger one.

And, yes, there are lakes where you can get a flag every 20 minutes with 6 tip ups out, and there's nothing wrong with those lakes, but certainly that usually means small pike in my experience and a low hook up rate. 

I once knew a Super good pike fisherman, and he said he thought one pike an hour is what he does in open water and ice. 

thats a pretty good day- what you said. If you want to increase your hook up percentage give the fish a little more time on the run and use larger circle hooks. Don't jerk your hand/ arm when setting the hook. Just pull back in a slow motion and the circle will do the rest. Do not pull back fast and hard with a circle hook, you will lose fish if you do that. Ive had 30 flag days with 24 pike caught. With walleye ive had 20 flag nights with 12-14 fish caught. That's not too shabby at all.

It depends on who, what & where. I've done a flag every 10 min. with 3 other guys in the UP and 80% landed, nice fish, small lake.  I've fished Pettenwell all day for Large, couple of 38+ in one day, released, 100% hook up.  Not a trophy, won't eat them from there.

I personally dont like to mess around catching all them small pike. I fish very large bait and rather catch less and go for Quality. I try and target 36"+ size pike. Even though I use large bait due to the northens aggresive behaviors we will still get a few of the smaller ones. I have fished a couple lakes in centeral WI when looking for pickling fish where its not abnormal to put 20 to 30 pike on the ice in the right conditions. [6 tip ups] 2 people for all the haters. I actually found that using a smaller size trebble increased my hook up ratio. Way less drops.

That is an epic day, Suspended Musky! I will prolly only see a day like that in my dreams. Even a 25 flag day is amazing to me. The best 3 person day I ever had was 24 flags, but I only ice fish SE WI 

Wow SM!  That sounds like an absolute blast!

So day one you averaged a flag every 10 minutes and day two was under 8 minutes.

Day 1: 9 tip-ups (shiners, small single treble hooks) - 43 flags, 34 pike caught (4.8 flags/tip-up, 79% hook up).

Day 2: 9 tip-ups - 54 flags, 42 pike caught (6 flags/tip-up, 78% hook-up).  On this day we had 4 flags up at the same time twice during the day.

The 76 pike we caught ranged from 20" to 42".  We released everything. While I have had a number of 25+ flag days since then, I personally have never been able to duplicate the numbers above.

I feel like when fishing with shiners, a lot of the misses are bass.  I've seen Youtube videos of guys that record their shiners on a tip up that seems to at least make my theory plausible.  In one video I watched, bass tripped the flag several times by gently grabbing the shiners, moving a couple feet, dropping it and swimming away.  It seems like a lot of the "misses" the line marker is out a foot or two and the bait is intact.  

Hook ups on tip ups using live shiners I would guess we average about 50%. One day you go 2 for 7 and you go back the next day and have an 8 for 10.  That's been my experiences for many years fishing northern Wi lakes w/ lots of pike.

It’s interesting to read about the percentages that you guys come up with.

 I tip-up fish for Pike with the Arctic Warriors and primarily use dead bait. With that being said I don’t get false flags.

The drops that you talk about probably come from the resistance felt when the fish takes your bait or the size of the hook. The Warriors using a balanced rod and a open bail offers almost zero resistance. I also changed from treble hooks to a single Octopus hook which doesn’t allow the fish to feel the hook.

As far as hooking percentage I think that the Octopus hooks eliminated much of that. The hookset is a simple lift (not jerk) and 99% of the fish are hooked in the corner of the mouth.

I’m doing the math here...hmm....9 tip ups, 3 flags  per, so 54 flags on a 2 day trip! That’s crazy good, actually. Congratulations on that! The 50% rate of landing fish really should be better tho. Around 65 to 70% is average for my groups of occasional fishermen. If I’m out with someone with lots of experience like fishNdude or n.pike, we typically land fish on 80 to 90% of our flags. Edit: our hookup rate is less when using large live suckers or large dead baits. Those rates are for using shiners on  lakes with populations of good size pike. An action lake with lots of smaller pike will have more drops and stolen minnows, but’s I stay away from those kinds of lakes