Yellow Perch
The dam wall is the winter address. When the reservoir sits at its low holding level, perch bunch into the basin right off the wall and hold over 12 to 15 feet — the same deep water that keeps the pike fed. It's a roadside fishery: park near the dam, walk out, and drill a line of holes from about 8 feet out to 15 to find the band the school has settled on.
← Back to Wildwood Reservoir conditionsHow it fishes
Perch are catchable year-round, but the documented fishery here is the winter one, and it turns on the deepest water left after drawdown. As the reservoir falls toward its roughly 3-metre holding level through fall, the perch retreat to the dam-wall basin and stack over 12 to 15 feet.
Work minnows just off bottom — the schools hold a foot or two up, and a line of holes from 8 out to 15 feet lets you pin the exact depth they've settled on. That same basin doubles as the pike's pantry, so expect the odd northern from the deepest holes on the same rig.
Open water spreads the perch back across the reservoir's flats and weed edges, but no named warm-season structure is documented — winter, on the dam basin, is where the pattern lives.
Structure
The deep water directly off the dam is the documented winter schooling area — a line of ice holes from 8 feet out to 15 found perch concentrated over 12 to 15 feet on minnow rigs, with roadside parking near the dam. (Angler-documented; no bathymetric chart exists for the reservoir.)
Regulations
This is a summary, not the legal regulation — confirm current rules with the official source before fishing.