Yellow Perch (Perca flavescens!) are probably the hands down winner for tasty fillets. Firm, crisp and sweet, they really are worth an early season effort.
Usually, this time of year, ice fishermen have enjoyed an easy walk to their favorite fishin' holes for months. This year, with the warm weather and no ice, there will be more good big perch fishing than usual for the early boater or shore fisherman. And big they are on the Cape.
On a good day fishing, a determined and experienced angler ought to be able to catch a five gallon bucket of half to three quarter pound yellow perch in an hour or two. This is enough to keep anyone filleting for another hour after returning home. Then the feast begins for fisher and family!
Lets look at some strategies for early season perch. First, choosing a pond. Almost all Cape ponds have perch. Many are so heavily populated though as to have a high percentage of smaller fish. Consider ponds with the best food supply first. Choose those waters that are on herring runs. They don't have to be deep or big but if they have a population of alewife fry in season, then you'll probably hit the bonanza. Check your atlas for streams and rivers connecting to the sea or ask around for these places and go take a look.
In a string of ponds connected by herring runs, look most critically at the one closest to the ocean. This is usually the pond with the heaviest population of alewives spawning later on and the one with the greatest food supply for perch all season. Look also for ponds with bays or coves that might warm sooner than open bodies of water. This will make it easier to search out concentrations of perch in the mid to shallow depths.
*TIP* Remember where you've seen icefishermen in years gone by, expecially fishermen jigging. Most icefishermen pursue perch and those ponds are a good first bet.
The hardest part of early fishing is finding the fish. Once you've found 'em, the bite can be as fast as putting your line in the water and non-stop until you want to quit.
Having chosen your pond by scouting or the friendly advice of your local tackle store, assemble your gear. A small rowboat or canoe is all you need this time of year but be sure to bring two anchors. Once you're on the fish, you won't want the wind to be swinging you away from your spot. Don't forget the PFD's too, this water is still near 40 degrees and even a shallow dunking could be dangerous. If you are shore fishing, all the following techniques still apply. Just put on the insulated waders and watch your footing!
Where you are looking is in the 4' to 10' deep zone. If you can find a cove with a flat bottom within this depth, all the better. Drift or paddle the cove very slowly working the water to both sides of the boat prospecting. If the pond has no coves but a uniform shoreline slope, circle the pond slowly within the depth zone.
Perch are usually hugging the bottom this early and don't show up well on depth sounders. Besides, you may well find them in water so shallow that they move away from under the boat while you pass over and so wouldn't show up anyway.

Now's the time to decide if you are goin' fishin' or catchin'. If you are "fishing", you can bring the flyrod and some small Wooly Buggers or Hare's Ears or Hornbergs and add a crayfish dropper pattern. A look inside a perch this early will show you tiny 1/16th inch chironomids that are brown and orange. If you are comfortable working flies in the #20 or #22 size, it can help your catch considerably but don't be put off, just tie on that #12 and have it. The other "fly" is a tiny 1/64 or 1/80 oz. jig. It takes a flyrod to cast these more than a few feet and they are "jigged" with little line twitches just like the heavier spinning type. (Sometimes you can find these through mid-west walleye suppliers.)
Fish low and slow and lean toward the brown/orange orange/white patterns. Perch have a definite preference for the yellow end of the spectrum. Long casts aren't necessary, working a confortable 20' to 25' of line is plenty. Leaders of 9' or so are fine, if properly tapered to the size fly you are using. I use floating fly line both because I'm fishing shallow and I'm trying to slow the sink of the fly.
Perch also have a very quick inhale/exhale bite. It can be extremely frustrating feeling tap after tap and rarely getting a hookset. (Try watching a perch take a fly. Sometimes you can't even beat them when you can see them take!)
*TIP* When the Perch are faster than you are, stop your retrieve when you feel the tap and let your fly drop for a ten count. Then lift your rod tip gently for the hookup. It works!
Spinning can also net you a few fish in the spring with the right terminal tackle. Go ultralight, 2-4 lb. test line is enough, for these fish and makes it more exciting when you find the occasional pickeral or bass. Use #0 and #1 spinners in yellow or white (like a Mepps Roostertail or Vibrax). Toss these out and let them sink to the bottom or just above and retrieve as slowly as you can. The trick here is to bring them in just fast enough make the blade turn over. You should be able to feel this through the rod tip and line. This is the reason to go ultralight, heavier lines and rods won't allow you to feel these tiny spinners as you must to know if they are spinning. A shorter rod, 5' or so will also help you to keep in touch with your lure.
*TIP* After you've counted your spinner down to the bottom, give a sharp short strike of the rod tip to start the blade spinning. Then a few quick turns of the reel handle as you reel the tip back to position and then slow down for the rest of the retrieve.
Spoons can also attract a few bites. Try the smaller, 1/8 or 1/16 oz. spoons in yellow or gold. Again, fish low and slow. Use just enough speed to get the spoon wiggling. If there is left over grass or weeds where you are fishing, a single hook changed out for the usual treble may run nearly weedless in this slow wobble style.
Any of these approaches can help you score on some big early season yellow perch. And if you pick a sunny day with a light breeze, this kind of fishing can be a pleasant, relaxing and rewarding way to start another season.

But if you are goin' catchin', I mean goin' for the fillets, there's only one choice. Bait.
Those little angle worms they sell under the name of "Red" or "Trout" worms are just the ticket for a hungry yellow perch. Other things work as well: bits of minnow, crayfish, power bait and such. They just aren't necessary. Getting your worms from under those boards you left on the ground out by the brush line or from under the leaf mulch or from the sport shop will do just fine.
Bring a lot. You may not need them but nothing is worse than running out of bait when you are having the time of your life and this is the time of year for it. Three dozen a person ought to be enough. For bait and for chum. And don't scrimp on the dirt either, it comes in handy later.
Lets look at tackle. A long light rod is preferable with 6 lb. test on the reel. Seven feet is about right. You will be doing more swing casting or "flippin" than overhead casting and the long rod makes this easier. Besides, it helps on the hook set too.
The hook can be any fine wire long shank hook like a Carlisle #6 or #8. Weight will be split shot (lightly crimped so as not to flatten the mono) and whatever is necesssary to balance the bobber. The bobber should be one of those slender "pencil" ones with the color bands near the top. You can use the type with the little spring catch on the bottom or the ones which attach "in line", either one.
Rigging the bobber. It is important to weight the bobber properly so that you can detect bites that pull down AND bites that lift up the bait. Round bobbers can't tell you this but the pencil ones will. By rigging so that the central bulb is below water but showing the middle color band at the top of the stem at water level while fishing, even the slightest bite is recorded by a change in the height of the bobber. Rig your bobber before leaving home so that you aren't messing around out in the boat.
Follow these steps: attach the bobber and the hook to the end of the line about an inch apart, fill a bucket of water in the bathtub, hand pinch on shot until the middle color of the bobber stem is just above water level (about an inch showing), move the bobber up to 3' or so for later adjusting "On The Water", slide the shot up to 18" from the hook and pinch firmly but don't squash.
*TIP* Do this when no one is home if you don't want to hear your spouse telling, "He even fishes in a bucket in the tub." stories at parties.
Searching with this rig is very efficient. On the water, bait up with a small whole worm hooked just three times and set your depth to just above clean bottom or just in the tops of the weeds. Let your boat drift or paddle very slowly with a rod set out to either side. Your long rods are now covering about a 15' wide swath of water. Or anchor in a likely place and cast out 30' or less to each side. Let the bait settle for a minute and turn the reel handle once every half minute. Radiate your casts every five feet until you have covered the entire circle. Move sixty feet and start over.
In the early spring, I find yellow perch in groups about five feet wide. Find a perch and cast back to that exact spot for another. If you miss by a few feet you can miss the bite entirely. But if you hit it right on, the strike may be instantaneous. Anchor so that you can repeatedly cast to that place without boat swing and without fishing behind your back.
The more you catch, the more you will catch. This sounds wrong but yellow perch are attracted by scent and activity. Repeatedly returning your baited hook to one location draws perch by the replenished scent and continuing activity to that place. After awhile, drawing hooked fish toward the boat will lay down a scent trail toward you. Within a half hour or sooner, the bite is often right beside the boat!
You will find after a few fish that it is not necessary to bait up big. Rather, remembering that these fish are eating very small chironomids this time of year, just a quarter inch of worm more closely imitates what they have been visually cueing on. If the bite slows after ten or twenty fish near the boat, let yourself bait up fresh but with small pieces. This often stimulates a new bite of the biggest (oldest, most habituated) fish.
Remember those "extra" worms and dirt. Well, you know there are fish in the area because you've been catching. If the bite slows you may be able to foster a "new" bite by occasional chumming. Take a couple of worms and some dirt and rub them together between your hands then toss this out in a new direction. Throw overhand trying to make a line of dirt going away from you. You are creating a path for the fish to follow back to you. Pause a few minutes and do it again. Do this three times in the same line before tossing your bait to the far end of the line. Retrieve slowly just like the earlier prospecting.

Troubleshooting.
Problem: You have paddled around the whole pond without a bite. Answer: You probably went too fast and your bait has been riding up too high. Pick a place with 5' of depth, anchor and cast around the circle while laying in a line of chum described above in the fishiest direction. Cast to the chum line last.
Problem: You caught a few small perch but no concentration appears to exist. Answer: Possibly you are fishing too shallow below the bobber (the bigger ones stay down) or not returning to the same spot each cast. Set your line a foot deeper and use two anchors to stop boat swing. Keep setting deeper every half dozen casts until you see the pencil bobber tilting flatter because the hook is resting on the bottom then come up half a foot.
Problem: You are catching bluegills but not perch. Answer: Don't cast back to the bluegill place. They don't compete this time of year and are not swimming together. If something is stealing your bait, its bluegills. Also, bluegills are usually a bit shallower than the perch, fish water a foot deeper.
Problem: You can't keep two baited rods going because one always has a bite. Answer: Put one away or give it to the skeptic who came along for the ride.
Problem: You had such a good time catchin' these big beautiful yellow perch that now you are back home with about three dozen fish to fillet. Answer: Sharpen the knives, clear the picnic table and get to it because you didn't have the forsight to instill the joys of filleting in your children while they were growing up and didn't think to include the "I catch it, you clean it" clause in your marriage vows way back when.

Cooking the catch.
Now you've got six dozen of these wonderful four to six inch long strips of boneless perch and an appetite to match. Do not rinse them off! You've got some choices to make: freeze some, broil some "as is" (clean, simple, healthy) and/or fry 'em up in batter. I encourage you to go with plan "C".
Plan "C". Stop, call everyone you owe a favor to and invite them over for fresh fish in fifteen minutes. Then, take a plastic bag or mixing bowl and add these ingredients: mix three scoops of flour and twice the amount of salt you would put on a big meal. In a second mixing bowl: fork whip two whole eggs, then add a cup of milk and whip a little more. Clear some counter space for an assembly line. Put on your biggest skillet, turn the heat up to one below hottest (for a start) and add olive oil.
Line up: fillets, batter, flour, plate and skillet in that order. When the oil is hot but not smoking, take ten dry fillets and drop them in batter. Then remove them and roll them in flour and put them in the skillet. Do the next ten and put them on the plate. Watch the fillets in the skillet. When the top of the edges turns white, turn 'em over (they are about a minute from done). When light golden brown on both sides, take them out and put in the next ten.
When they are cool enough to touch take some for yourself first (you earned 'em) and give the rest to your company. Watch your supplies and heat and it will all go smoothly. They cook quite quickly (just a couple of minutes) so don't overcook. In fact, try to undercook to get it just right.
There may be nothing from the water that is lighter and crisper of taste than this, except maybe crappie. But that's another story. Enjoy.

I hope you liked the article, it was my first published in On The Water, March, 1998. mge

Check the fishing reports for up to the minute info and ask at the local tackle shops.

Hiring a charter guide to find blues is always a cinch. This year you might even find a record.