The Tullibee or Northern Cisco is a streamlined, silvery fish with grayish fins and 36–50 gill rakers (usually 43).

 The Tullibee, also known as northern cisco or lake herring, is the most common species of whitefish in our area. They occur in many of the deep, cold lakes of the north, as well as in the Great Lakes. They are often targeted in the wintertime, by fishing over mud flats with flashers and waxworms. Tullibees form an important part of the diet of all large predators wherever they are found. And as for taste, smoked tullibees cannot be beat.

Wintertime is the best time to go after tullibees and the other ciscos. They are true pelagics, staying deep throughout the year. Vast schools of them roam the depths, feeding on insects larvae, small crustaceans, and zooplankton. Deep, silty mud flats are good places to look for them. On an ice-fishing sonar, they stick out like a sore thumb, travelling well above the bottom where they are easily marked. Tie a hookless spoon (called a flasher) about a foot up from a dropper (a fly or tiny jig) tipped with a waxworm. Once a cisco is hooked, others are sure to be nearby, so a sneaky tactic to increase your cisco catch is to keep jigging as the hooked one is fighting on your second line. You can often reel in a double this way, if you don't lose your rod down the hole! Ice-fishing for ciscos is really fun, and the action can be very fast as a school moves through and everyone hooks up. The trick is moving around until you find the ciscos, then sticking with that spot, moving only when the action stops completely. Ciscos up to 4 pounds have been caught, but most of the fish you'll catch will be about a pound in weight and 14-16 inches long.