Ultralite plugging.....

I've found with crankbaits, Perch will hunt down lures and like to hit from behind so often a single treble on the back works fine, removing the lower one on small crankbaits doesn't affect the action hardly at all. They do have bucket mouths so you'll either lip hook via a treble as it closers it's mouth down or it'll be inside it's mouth if you're slow. When fishing live baits such as maggot or lobworm, they often suck the bait right in, almost down to their guts so watch that for relatively static baits (small SP etc) anything moving tends to hook in the lip or jaw, single or treble hook. Float or light ledger fishing can be frustrating in detecting mouthing or taking the bait often resulting in striking into nothing. Leave the take to develop a bit more and it's down it's gullet. Hard to tell so worth going barbless or being a dab hand with forceps. As for swapping out trebles for singles? i've never tried it to be honest as most hardware is relatively small anyway and even a 6" Perch will hammer a lure nearly it's own size, greedy buggers. I've had great success on circle hooks though, slowly slowly and they self hook through the scissors every time. Doubt it would work on a moving bait but would work a treat on static softies, must try it myself.

Perch feed best at dawn and dusk, the twilight hours, their eye sight is far superior to other fish. They will feed at night but it's usually the big solitary ones that do and I've never seen anything caught on a lure at night. They take fresh bait or dead baits though.

One other tip, get some red knitting wool. Tie a little strand to the odd lure, they seem to love it.

Oh and thank god you've got no PIKE.

Nick, I do quite a bit of ultra lite stuff but all for sea trout. It is incredibly effective, I fish with plugs that range from 2 to around 7g 12lb eight strand braid and 8lb fluro. It makes so much difference it just ain't funny. Yes you can go out and nail the odd sea trout on a toby but there are a lot more trout there than people think and just like there fresh water brothers as they are in fact exactly the same fish they are smart and shy. Micro plugs and high quality fluro hae increased my catch rate by god knows what percentage. I am just waiting for dec/jan to trail a new batch of micro lures from IMA thta look particularly promising.

To be honest I have poached a lot of information and technique from Japanese fresh water trout fishermen who lure fish for trout a lot on ultra fine gear, megabass and smith particularly make some outstanding kit.

The main obstacle I have found has always been the rod that will suit this type of fishing best and afterr checking out a few different pieces of kit I have gone back to a luck craft esg 2, I had the esg and sold it but just got nick from bass lures to drop me off another one, the action on these rods is just right. You need it fast enough to work the plugs but slow enough to cast them so having looked around I find myself back where i started.