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| Species | Today | Tomorrow | Sunday | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dawn9° | Mid9° | Eve9° | Night8° | Dawn8° | Mid9° | Eve8° | Night8° | Dawn7° | Mid11° | Eve10° | Night7° | |
| ★Perch | 59 | 57 | 52 | 40 | 56 | 56 | 59 | 40 | 57 | 57 | 41 | 22 |
| ★Pike | 61 | 59 | 54 | 43 | 58 | 59 | 62 | 43 | 58 | 59 | 44 | 24 |
| ★Crappie | 8 | – | – | – | – | – | 8 | – | – | 5 | – | – |
Northeast shoreline is your first stop. Wind-pushed baitfish and stable pressure have perch stacking on that wind-push shore right now. Work 10–20ft first light, then slide to 20–35ft as the morning brightens. Find a hard bottom transition, gravel to sand edge, and you've found your school.
Small jig-and-plastic combo is the top-percentage play. A 1/8oz round ball jig head paired with a 2–3" grub or paddle tail in perch/goby patterns. Light drizzle flattens the surface and cuts glare, natural colours work, but keep a chartreuse or orange option ready if the bite goes cold. Drop to bottom, lift 6 inches, pause 2–3 seconds, repeat. That pause is where most fish commit. Once you mark a school, stay on them, perch pod tight this time of year.
Work it aggressive first, then finesse. Snap the jig hard 2–3 times on the initial drop to draw fish in from distance. Fall perch are feeding actively before freeze-up and will chase. If the aggressive cadence stalls, cut your lift to 3 inches and extend your pause to 4–5 seconds. Light drizzle and stable 1009 hPa pressure is a good setup, these fish aren't lock-jawed. Light line, 4–6lb, is your edge in 10–20ft of clear Simcoe water.
Watch your limits, Yellow Perch season is open. Check your licence class before keeping fish. This is prime table fare and locals know it, so there's likely company on that northeast bank. Respect the school, work it, don't hammer it, and it'll keep producing through the morning.
Northeast shoreline is your first stop. Wind-driven baitfish are stacking there right now, pike follow the food. Work the dying weed edges in 4–10ft, targeting the outside edge where vegetation transitions to open bottom. Points and current seams along that shore are secondary targets. Light drizzle and stable pressure at 1009 hPa means active, feeding fish, not lock-jaw pike.
Lead with a large spinnerbait or magnum inline spinner in a chartreuse or white/silver combo, 3/4–1oz. Cast parallel to the weed edge and retrieve fast, 2–3 cranks per second. Cool water pike are still chasing hard in November on Simcoe, and a reaction strike is your highest-percentage play. Cover water fast to locate fish, then slow down only if the aggressive approach draws short strikes.
Secondary presentation: a large glide bait or paddle-tail swimbait, 6–8 inches, white or perch pattern, worked on a steady medium-fast retrieve at 6–10ft depth. Let it run just above the weed tops. If fast retrieves aren't connecting after 20 minutes, slow to one crank per second with a 2-second pause every few feet, pressured fish sometimes need a moment to commit. Big spoons wobbled through the same zone are a proven third option when pike are tracking but not eating.
Pike season is open and fish are fat right now, Cooks Bay's forage base means these fish are going into winter well-fed and aggressive. The pre-freeze feeding window is short. November pike on Simcoe are some of the biggest of the year, so size your hooks and wire leaders accordingly. 30-lb single-strand or 20-lb 7-strand wire is non-negotiable, no fluorocarbon on pike.
Crappie are schooled tight right now, light drizzle and stable pressure with an overcast sky puts them in active feeding mode all day, not just at the edges. Northeast shoreline is your first stop; wind push is stacking baitfish and crappie behind any available structure, docks, submerged brush, dock cribs, any hard edge you can find. Target 8–12ft first, slide to 14ft if the shallows go quiet.
Tiny tube bait or 2" paddle tail on a 1/16oz jig head is your highest-percentage presentation. White, pale pink, or light chartreuse in this stained, low-light drizzle condition. Drop it to the bottom and work it back up in 6-inch lifts with 2-second pauses, crappie are sluggish in cooling water and they want a slow, deliberate fall. Keep the jig at mid-column once you mark fish; crappie suspend and rarely chase down.
Soft mouth is the critical warning. Set the hook with a smooth lift, not a snap. Keep constant tension on the retrieve, a slack line means a lost fish, every time. Use light line, 4–6lb, so the light jig has a natural fall and your hookset translates cleanly to the fish.
Regulations are open for Black Crappie. Work the northeast bank systematically, 50ft of dock edge, then move. If you mark a school on sonar, hover over it and don't spook it with heavy anchoring. Light drizzle kills surface glare, crappie are comfortable shallow, and stable pressure means the school won't be blowing up and down the water column. This is a solid day.
Air temp is sitting right at 10°C, largemouth are on the edge of shutdown. This is a finesse game today, not a power fishing day.
Hit the northeast shoreline first. Wind push has been stacking baitfish against that shore all morning. Work 4–8ft of water over submerged vegetation edges, dock pilings, and any hard-bottom transition you can find. These fish won't roam, they're tight to structure, slow-moving, and looking for an easy meal that comes to them.
Your best percentage play is a finesse jig, 3–4" chunk or craw-style plastic in natural green pumpkin or brown, on a 3/16–1/4oz head. Hop it once, let it sit 4–6 seconds, hop again. Dead-slow. Retrieve over 2 minutes for a 20ft cast. Cold water largemouth key on the pause, not the action. If you want a search tool, a suspending jerkbait worked 3 pulls, 5-second pause, 3 pulls in the 4–8ft zone will trigger neutral fish, but expect fewer grabs than in warmer conditions.
Stable pressure and light drizzle are low-stress conditions, fish won't be buried deep in cover. That's slightly in your favour. But below 10°C air with cooling water means reaction bites are uncommon. Don't burn through spots, give each one 10–15 minutes of slow methodical coverage before moving.
Season is open, so fish legally and check your local FMZ limits before keeping anything. Largemouth are cold and slow right now, handle them quickly and get them back in the water fast.
| Species | Today | Tomorrow | Sunday | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dawn9° | Mid9° | Eve8° | Night8° | Dawn8° | Mid9° | Eve8° | Night7° | Dawn6° | Mid11° | Eve10° | Night7° | |
| Perch | 57 | 54 | 52 | 39 | 55 | 55 | 57 | 39 | 52 | 55 | 40 | 8 |
| Pike | 55 | 51 | 49 | 39 | 52 | 52 | 55 | 39 | 52 | 53 | 40 | 13 |
| Species | Today | Tomorrow | Sunday | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dawn9° | Mid9° | Eve9° | Night8° | Dawn8° | Mid9° | Eve8° | Night8° | Dawn7° | Mid11° | Eve10° | Night7° | |
| ★Perch | 59 | 57 | 52 | 40 | 56 | 56 | 59 | 40 | 64 | 57 | 41 | 22 |
| Pike | 54 | 52 | 48 | 38 | 51 | 51 | 54 | 38 | 58 | 52 | 39 | 21 |
Northeast shoreline is your first stop. That 8.6 km/h push is stacking smallmouth against it right now. Work the rocky points and reefs in 15–21 ft, that's where late-fall fish are holding tight to bottom. Light drizzle and stable-to-rising pressure is a solid combo; fish feed confidently through drizzle, and a rising barometer often triggers a short feeding window. Hit it fast and efficiently.
Football-head jig, 1/4 oz, with a 3–4" craw-style soft plastic in green pumpkin or brown. Drag it dead slow through rock rubble, we're talking 6–8 inches per pull with a 3-second pause. Cold water kills reaction bites; they want it sitting in their face. Match the hook at 1/0–2/0 to your plastic size. In this clear Simcoe water, stay natural: goby patterns, brown, or green pumpkin outperform bright colours significantly.
Deep-diving crankbait is your second play. A wide-wobble, diving-lip crankbait that reaches 12–18 ft on a long cast, shad or goby colour, dragged slowly along rock transitions. Count to 5 between cranks. These fish are pre-ice maximum weight, coldwater hard-fighters, but their metabolism is slow. Speed is the enemy. If you're retrieving faster than a slow walk, slow down.
Dawn target zone is 9–21 ft, start shallow at dawn, go deep by mid-morning. Bass push shallower in low light, then drop back as the sun climbs. By 9 AM, focus on the deeper end of that range. Strawberry Island's main-basin rocky shoals are built for this exact pattern.
Northeast shoreline is your first stop. Wind push is stacking perch there right now. Target 15–22ft, that's where fall schools are condensing as water cools toward freeze-up. Look for hard bottom transitions, rock-to-sand edges, or any subtle depth change. That's where the school anchors.
Small jigging spoons and blade baits are the highest-percentage play. Drop to bottom, rip it 12–18 inches, let it flutter back down on a 2–3 second pause. That aggressive snap attracts the school. Once bites slow, switch to a 2–3" paddle tail on a 1/8oz round ball jig head in white or perch-pattern, slow roll it just off bottom at near-crawl speed. Rising barometer favors active feeding; don't be afraid to stay aggressive longer than you think.
Work the drizzle to your advantage. Overcast low-light conditions reduce surface glare and push perch shallower on the edge of that 11–17ft zone. If you're not marking fish at 20ft, run shallower toward the 12–15ft shelf before moving locations. Fall perch school tight, if you find one, you've found fifty. Keep your presentations small: 1–2" spoons, 2–3" plastics. Bigger isn't better for perch, especially at this water temp.
Check your licence limits before you keep fish. Perch season is open and fall fish are table-perfect right now, this is when locals load up for good reason. But confirm your daily limit (Sports vs. Conservation licence) and don't exceed it. Drizzle and 8 km/h wind is fishable, but afternoon squalls can build fast on Simcoe with no warning, watch the northwest horizon and head in early if the sky darkens.