You must be able to tap dance your bait along bottom, making noise and rustling the basin, to trigger bites within a limited fish zone. If in doubt, go heavier, not lighter, for efficiency. If the boat is moving downcurrent too quickly to maintain control, use an upstream thrust of your outboard or electric to slow its downstream passage, enhancing your ability to tap the bottom .
Lighter lures are easily presented on spinning gear with 8-pound-test line; heavier setups may require moderate casting gear with 10- or 12-pound test to withstand the strain of lift-dropping the heavy weight while kerplunking the bottom. Note any change in feel that might indicate a strike. In deep powerful current, subtle strikes sometimes go undetected.
Southern anglers commonly tip jigheads with plastic tails—curly grubs, tubes, or others—to catch loads of sauger. Northern anglers typically tip the jig with a 2-inch minnow, hooked up through the jaw and out the top of the head, to add scent, taste, profile, and action. No reason you can’t do both, varying the look and appeal until you hit on a winning combination. Be aware, however, that added bulk creates water resistance. You may have to increase jig weight to keep your lure combo on bottom.
Bladebaits like the Silver Buddy or Sonar also are popular in the South, fished with a more pronounced rip and flutter, creating flash and vibration to trigger strikes. Always use a small snap to attach the line to a hole punched into the back of the bladebait. Heavy jigging spoons also are good sauger candidates, if they can be controlled to keep them positioned near bottom.
In northern waters, anglers trolling three-way rigs for walleyes often catch sauger in the main river basin. Setups range from floating jigheads tipped with minnows, to plain hooks tipped with minnows, to minnow-imitating crankbaits trolled upstream against the current. If you choose a three-way, keep both the dropper and leader short to position the lure near bottom. Sauger won’t rise far to take a bait above their heads.
Where current is fairly strong, try pulling heavy 3/4- to 1-ounce thumper jigs or Dubuque Rigs upstream into the current. (A Dubuque Rig substitutes a heavy jig for the bell sinker in a three-way rig, in effect, simultaneously presenting two lures or baits at slightly different depths.) Use your bowmount electric to move slowly upstream at a walking pace, sweeping the rod tip forward a foot, then lowering it back until you feel the jig thump bottom. Repeat. This provides a different appearance to your jig, and thus a different triggering mechanism, when everyone else is drifting downstream. Once you determine the productive depth, try some of each: drifting downstream, pulling back up, particularly when sauger move up into spawning areas shallower than 12 feet.
Tap Dancing Sauger—A Contact Sport
Winter’s here: prime time to tap the potential of big-water sauger with a bottom-banging presentation. Sauger hug bottom, thus your lures must, too. Be it a jig, Dubuque Rig, spoon, bladebait, crankbait, or three-way rig, send it down and tap-tap-tap your way along bottom, rooting and rustling the shy-light zone. Sooner or later, one good commotion leads to another. No well-presented lure goes unbit when concentrations of sauger prowl scour holes below dams and deep midriver structure during winter and early prespawn migrations.
