LUSTY LEECHES: Part Three: STILL AND MOVING WATER SYSTEMS
Since leeches spend most of their life attached to the bottom, plants or other structure, systems that present the bait in these areas clearly work better than open water, mid-depth presentations. Leeches also suit river fishing if used with snaggless sinker rigs like the Gaspen Baitwalker or Lindy Rig.
However, hooking leeches can be a giant pain. Most leeches will -- yuck! -- hang onto your hand with their attachment sucker. Sissies were a glove on the leech hand. Then it's easy to slide a hook across your skin and tip it up through the leeches' sucking mouth. Wimps might want to use a rubber kitchen glove. A couple of finger stalls, like bank tellers used to use when they, not machines, counted bills suit picky types too.
Realize that only hooks through the strong sucker structure stay put. Hooking a leech anywhere else improves the fishery when the leech flies off your hook when cast!. Do expect lots of thrashing as you insert the hook. Not to worry, leeches go back to their sidewinder undulations once in the water.
Boaters might drop a cup of dry sand into a shallow tin and let the sand warm up in the sun. Transfer the leech from the water to the sand. Wait 15 or 20 seconds and, when the leech gets stiff, hook up. Soon as Mr. leech hits the water, he's back to his usual wiggle.
RIGGING LEACHES
As always, less is more when baits are active and fish sulk in warmer than optimum water. Hook a tiger or small ribbon leech lightly through the head with a light wire Size 8 or 10 hook and you've an ideal bait for an ultralight spinning outfit. Both trout and smallmouth bass savage leeches cast to cover in reservoirs, natural lakes and ponds. These can be rigged under bobbers, or with a sliding sinker and a floating jig head instead of a bare hook . The last insures that your leech doesn't latch onto bottom or hide in a hole. Leeches also work well in combination with lures such as in-line or lead-head spinners and spoons.
Tip: On the retrieve, reel half as fast as you think you should, rise the rod tip a foot or two. Pause. Then follow the leech as it swims down towards bottom. If the leech stops moving, gently raise your rod tip until you feel resistance -- it may be a fish! Feel a throb? Set the hook!
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