Perch fishing help!

You have to buy the ones from the Asian market, though. Just boiling shrimp won't make them magic.

I know, I've tried.

    perch also love pile worms...too expensive for me if you can even find em..cheaper substitute is to find some large mussels on the rocks in low tide just be sure to mark your container "bait"
    another thing I use when i fish from the rocks is squid and i make long casts into the surf and troll a whole squid with another smaller hook a couple inches back with small sliver of squid as a trailer.(see illustration below)     this has been productive for me...and agree with previous posts 1 hr before and after high tides,in between swells.
   the fattie rainbow perch pictured below i caught floating 2 mussels without any weight..just letting it drift and the current take it
have fun fishing!
tommy D

Thanks everyone for the great info. im going to head out this weekend if the surf lays down and try again and hopefully have a little better luck. I will do an update and hopefully its a good one!

Hey I live in arcata and get back into town this weekend if you wanna go get some fish pm me

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I wanna go perch fishin now might go take the yak out to monterey county an get some

    perch also love pile worms...too expensive for me if you can even find em..cheaper substitute is to find some large mussels on the rocks in low tide just be sure to mark your container "bait"

Why do you have to mark your container bait????

So u dont eat rotten mussels? Lol

I agree with Clayman's post 100%.  Pile worms are the #1 bait for perch IMO.  I like to use my sonar to find the "trough" (the flat spot where the jetty meets the actual bottom).  The Surf Perch will cruise that trough.  Drop down a #6 or #8 (I like to size down for surf perch since their mouth can be very small) with a chunk, like no more than 1/4" - 1/2", of pile worm on the hook and slow jig it off the bottom.  If the waters moving you should hook up easily.

My family likes Surf Perch as its #1 source of fish tacos.  #2 striped bass.  #3 rock fish.

Good luck!

+1 - I have experimented by using, small jigheads/soft plasitc, small kastmaster, shrimp, nothing,  all same spot, same day - drop a piece of pile worm down, jig it slowly and perch all over it, leave a length of the worm fluttering, doesn't work as well if you push it on a hook in a "ball".

marking your bait container is a fish and game regulation

marking your bait container is a fish and game regulation

 Not doubting you, I just never heard that one before. Can you please provide the section in the regs where you saw this....you can copy and paste here?

Is there any good surf perch fishing along the Marin or Sonoma coasts.   Which beaches are good?

I agree that pile worm is probably the best bait overall for perch.  There is one beach I used to fish along the central coast where the perch will eat nothing but pile worms.  My first trip out, I tried using everything I had, grass shrimp, raw shrimp from asian market, and sand crabs...nada.  Almost thought there were no fish there.  Then I saw a fellow digging for stuff in the sand, which I later found out he was digging up pile worms.  After I tried using those, fish on every single cast...all fat big barred perch.  Looked like they were all pile worm addicts.   

Also, since they don't eat any of the sand crabs there, I saw some monster sized sand crabs.  Biggest one I found was about 4" long, 2" wide.

hammerhead....might have to eat my words on this....cant find it in the current fishing regs, but i am pretty sure i saw this there a couple years ago(and then made a container for bait mussels which i still have), they even specified the size of the lettering on the container.....anyway i still havent given up on this and have several call in to f and wildlife and will post what i find out
tommyD

Whats a good area to look for pile worms? What do they like?

Whats a good area to look for pile worms? What do they like?

Do a Google Image search for "pile worm" and you'll see them.  Beware: they have a nasty set of pinchers at their head.  They keep them concealed until they want to bite you.

I used to find them at low tide in Humboldt Bay by rolling over rocks around mud flats.  I wouldn't find a ton of them, but enough for bait for a few trips at a time plus I would add them to my shore crab collection (shore crabs work great for pileperch and striped perch).  If you find a few big pile worms, you only need a couple of them since you only use small sections of them as perch bait.