Northern pike (Esox lucius) are eating machines. Highly predatory, they will devour young of their own species and even fish close to their own size, not to mention other game fish, especially perch, walleyes, panfish, and pelagic baitfish like herring and ciscoes. All that considered, the best pike lures are typically outsized, but smaller than you’d fling for muskies, unless, of course, you’re fishing northern Canada or some place in Scandinavia.
These are my go-to baits; before making a choice from this list, I consider water depth, clarity, temperature, the vegetation in the area, and overall weather. I like spoons for cold water, and spinnerbaits slow-rolled. As water temps rise, I’ll fish the same lure, but speed up my retrieve. If I’m fishing around heavy weeds, I reach for the venerable Johnson Silver Minnow with a white or yellow curly-tail grub trailer.
When water temps climb to 65 degrees and higher, causing bigger pike to move deeper, I’ll break out lead-core line and troll deeper, open water with a variety of crankbaits, or just the X-Rap Magnums or large Rat-L-Trap-shaped baits below on braid with a heavy fluorocarbon leader. Then, again in the fall, I like to do a lot of “Iowa Speed Trolling” (2.8 to 3.5 mph) with spoons on weed lines and right over still-green cabbage.
Domestically, certain baits stand out as must-haves, like classic Eppinger Dardevle spoons , in-line bucktail spinners, and Johnson Silver Minnows. But there are other baits you should also include in your northern pike arsenal.
Best Lures for Northern Pike
- Best Spoon — Eppinger Dardevle
- Best In-line Spinner — Mepps Aglia Tandem
- Best Weedless Spoon — Johnson Silver Minnows
- Best Spinnerbait — Northland Fishing Tackle Reed-Runner Magnum Spinnerbait
- Best Jerkbait — Rapala X-Rap Magnum
- Best Swimbait — Berkley Magic Swimmer Saltwater
- Best Chatterbait — Z-Man Big Blade
Eppinger Dardevle Spoons
Whether cast or trolled, it’s hard to beat the historical track record of the classic Eppinger Dardevle, with sizes ranging from small 2/32-ounce “Skeeter” models for trout, to massive 3 1/4-ounce “Huskie” spoons. The best choice will depend on the size of fish you’re chasing and the depth you’ll be fishing. If trolling, consider the 1 1/2 Troll Devle and casting 3/4- or 1-ounce.
If fishing in Canadian provinces or international waters with giant pike, well, you might want to go with a larger spoon. But no matter where you’re fishing for pike, it’s best to have lots of different sizes on hand and in staple colors like red/white, black/white, yellow/red “Five of Diamonds” pattern, something with chartreuse, and plain hammered brass or silver. Make sure to combine it with a wire or heavy fluorocarbon leader to prevent bite-offs — that goes for all of the lures on this list.
In-line Bucktail Spinners
Like spoons, over-sized Mepps and other in-line bucktail spinners are textbook pike lures. While traditional musky lures such as large bucktails can catch big pike in trophy waters, in most waters, medium-sized offerings will do best for you. Brass, gold, silver, or colored blades are the visual attractors here and the vibration of the blade does much to bring toothy critters to the bait. Patterns can run the gamut from natural browns and blacks to chartreuse, reds, and oranges. Many of the baits I own are vintage or hand-built by luremakers who I can no longer recall, but picking up a couple Mepps Aglia Tandem spinners is a good place to start building your own collection.
Johnson Silver Minnow with Curly Grub Trailer
Medium to large Johnson Silver Minnows are the Swiss Army knives of pike fishing. You can throw them in the thickest cabbage, through bulrushes and cattails, openings in lily pads, as well as troll them without picking off weeds every few minutes. The 3.75- or 4-inch, 1 1/8 ounce model is great for pike and available in seven colors, although I’ve only ever used silver or gold.
That’s really all you need. Tip it with a white or chartreuse curly tail grub and you have a super-deadly pike lure that will literally fish anywhere you want, slithering in, around, and over cover like nothing else. There’s a reason they’ve been selling out since 1923. They just plain work and are weedless as the day is long.
Spinnerbaits
Bass spinnerbaits on the larger and heavier size make for great pike baits, evident by the number of errant pike we all seem to catch while bass fishing on pike-filled waters. For whatever reason, willow-blade spinnerbaits seem to be real champs, catching more fish than Colorado- or Indiana-bladed baits, so keep that in mind. Standout colors include black/orange and green/yellow, perch/bluegill hues, although don’t abandon white/gray/silver/gold on waters with tullibees, whitefish, and other larger pike prey.
Add a trailer hook to a rubber-skirted bait with a fluke or curly-tail grub, or find smaller bucktail spinnerbaits with tandem hooks — both are solid bets. A classic go-to in the Upper Midwest is the Northland Fishing Tackle Reed-Runner Magnum Spinnerbait in 3/4- or 1-ounce sizes with additional Sting’r hook, available in nine colors, including a very effective orange/black version called Blackbird.
Rapala X-Rap Magnum
When pike are deep and over open water eating small crappies, baitfish, or young-of-the-year, you need to get down to where they’re at, typically on a troll. It’s really hard to beat the new Rapala X-Rap Magnum, available in 4 3/4-, 4 3/8-, 5 1/2-, 6 1/4-, and 7-inch, with dive curves everywhere from 10 to 40 feet. With 25 colors featuring really cool holographic foil and 3D designs available, the sky’s the limit for playing match-the-hatch.
They’re built with saltwater grade hardware to withstand pike maws and they’re super rugged. What’s really cool is they’re tuned right out the box to run straight and the bait and its lip are designed to withstand trolling speeds up to 15 mph, so if speed trolling (maybe a quarter of that speed) is in your game plan, there’s no way these baits are going to blow-out behind the boat. And the X-Rap Magnum also makes a great bait for flinging from shore off points, jetties, piers, and other places where you have to get down deep to pike from a standstill near the bank.
Berkley Magic Swimmer Saltwater
Before Berkley acquired Sebile, this bait was marketed as both a freshwater and saltwater bait. Now, under the banner of Berkley, it’s listed as a saltwater bait, but don’t let that fool you, it’s a wizard pike and muskie lure.
The Magic Swimmer is a casting bait and it sinks, but slowly, and it kind of slithers in a sideways sine-wave pattern on a slower retrieve, and its three-body segments produce an action unlike any other hardbait out there. The Magic Swimmer Saltwater comes in a bunch of sizes and colors to meet the size of the pike you’re chasing.
Z-Man Big Blade ChatterBait
Like chunking and winding spinnerbaits, how many accidental pike have we all caught working a chatterbait? Yep, lots, especially on northern Midwest and Northeastern waters. To that end, I was very excited to see Z-Man launch an upsized version of the classic chatterbait a couple years ago called the Z-Man Big Blade, available in 1/2-, 3/4-, and 5/8-ounce versions with a large, heavy-duty 6/0 Mustad UltraPoint hook. It also has dual conical keeper barbs on the hook shaft good for securing a fluke, big curly tail grub, or a paddletail on as an added trailer attractor.
The thing about this bait is there’s a direct head-to-blade connection, so the thing vibrates like mad, and it drives pike crazy. Great for casting on heavier bass chatterbait-style rod set-ups. I’ve also experimented with trolling the bait at speeds to get it chopping through and over weed-tops — and when a pike crushes it, that vibration stops and you know it’s game time!
Why more pike anglers aren’t fishing chatterbaits — especially the Big Blade — is anybody’s guess. They catch fish! Definitely a must-add to your pike tackle box.
