Home Forums Fishing Freshwater Fishing through the ice.

I could call it ice fishing, but I want to catch fish, not ice.
We touched on augers.
Want to go into all of it?
Tip ups?
Baits?

Everything?

Pictures of past glories?

Devils Lake took 3 days of drilling hundreds of holes finally got into them!!!

my fav ice fishing photo set:

The great thing about ice fishing is that it can be as simple or high tech as you want it to be. I grew up ice fishing nearly every weekend in the winter. We had a crappy Jiffy auger, wooden sticks with a couple screws to wrap line around, an ice scoop, five gallon pail to sit on and that's it. We caught a lot of fish and had a lot of fun.

Now I am able to put a bit more into the sport, so my equipment is better. I run a Strikemaster Mag 2000 auger, Eskimo Quickfish 6i popup tent, HT ice fishing rods and reels, a few Frabil tip ups, Marcum VS485C with Aqua-Vu Mo-Pod 2, and a Mr Heater Buddy heater. I also have a smaller 2 person tent that gets used when it's just me as it's easier to keep warm.

Here's a picture of one day's "keepers" from last winter.



We caught about 4 times that number but released most of them.


SS

ND,

That picture sequence is awesome!

SS

Thanks Sam. You are very right, that's the way we used to do it too. Stick rigs with fixed bobbers, actually our lures haven't changed a whole lot over the years. I stick with some of the classics such as the jem n eye. But wow yeah, we would sit on a bucket in a home made "portable" house, usually made of plywood and tarps. Sometimes a wood fired stove but mostly propane heaters. No electronics (I still don't use them, lol) and I used to take those catch of the day photos like you show above

I have piles of those sorts of photos going way back to our days of fewer kids. This one was probably 5 years ago, I have them going back more than 20 years though, lol!

No one know, but a tough old-timer for sure.

Oh, nice perch nodak

Dave, can you explain the "fixed bobber" technique, please ?

We just use a jig head & live minnow !

No lures either.

What I mean is a non slip bobber. Clip on bobbers that lock onto the line rather than a bobber that allows the line to slip through and uses a "bobber stop" either of the string knot style or the rubber grip bead style.

We also just use jig heads, I guess we use quite a variety but they all are considered jig style hooks. My oldest boy fishes with electronics, uses some flying lures tipped with a minnow head. He does really well with it.

We now use all slip bobbers with short fishing rods that have small spinning reels with drags.

The slip bobber allows the line to be dawn through it and collected on the spinning reel. The "Bobber stop" passes through the rod eyelets no problem and is wound up with the fishing line on the spool.

when you let the line back out, the bobber stop will not pass through the slip bobber, the "stop" grips the fishing line and stops the line at the bobber. The lure is then suspends off the bottom at the depth you choose with the bobber stop.

We typically fish 3 to 12 inches off the bottom for walleye.



The old black and white photo above is how we used to do it. No fishing reel. It's hand line fishing, he's just using the stick to jig the line.

I have no idea what his landing net is for though, lol.

Net wont fit down that hole and it's kind of pointless once you have the fish above the ice.

I use a variety of jigging rods from ultralight to heavy action according to where and for what I'm fishing. I've had good luck with Clam brand rods, specifically the Jason Mitchell series. One thing I have done that I don't see many guys doing is to put baitcast reels on my ice rods. I find that I have less trouble with cold Mono on small levelwind reels than spinning gear. My light rods have tiny bass fishing baitcasters loaded with 8lb line and the big rod I use for Northerns, burbot, and lakers wears a Shimano Calcutta loaded with 20lb. I also use the heavy rig to work my spearing decoy.

I've had popups from Eskimo and still have a 2 man. They've been pretty decent but I've broken some of the poles putting them up when it gets really cold. I just bought a brand new Frabill 2 man this week and plan to try it out on Saturday. Funny story actually, our local sporting goods wholesaler had this one squirreled away in the warehouse and forgot about it. They no longer carry ice fishing gear and found this shelter they've had in inventory for 8 years last week. Their cost was $272 and retail was $479, when the rep offered it to me for $40 I nearly caught my wallet on fire trying to get it out and open!

Started spearing Northerns last year, had a ball with a homemade spear I cooked up. Can't wait to stick some this time around.

I have a battery of Beaver Dam tipups, tried a bunch and don't think these have any equal.
Haul all my gear to the back country lakes with a 1996 Arctic Cat Bearcat 440. It's slow and doesn't ride great, but it's reliable as heck and about as unstickable as a sled can be. Old gal pulls like a bulldozer too. Need to go blow the cobwebs out of her and get ready as I have a date with my first Laker at the end of a trail this winter.

Couple pics from past trips 4ish lb Arctic char.

Rainbow!


Nother fatty rainbow
spearing victim

Hit the ice today for a couple hours until my heater ran out of propane. Caught 18 landlock salmon, 4 blackfish, 2 small rainbows, and 2 char one of which was pretty nice probably 2.5 lbs. Also had 2 muskrats come up through the hole into the popup with me, talk about a surprise!

Where you be fishen at there KID. Just curios and jealous.Going to be awhile for me.

I'm in Alaska. We didn't have safe ice early again this year due to a warm fall. But the 10 days preceding this weekend had temps in the single digits during the day and zero or below at night. That coupled with little to no snow cover let us build 6"-8" of clear hard ice pretty fast.

We got enough snow over the last 3 or so days to make running a SnoGo an option so I'm hoping to get out to a more remote lake thats chock full of Northerns to do some spearing here pretty soon.

Cool Alaska ice fishing.I think i would like to try that someday.

When those fillets are fried up over a fire in that cold air, and enjoyed ever so fresh---!

Thanks Dave,

Going to have to give the bobbers a try this winter.

Does it work in "the open", or only in the heated enclosures ?

Typically, we sit in a heated ice hut, eating & drinking & the holes are drilled outside in an appropriate sized area for the amount of fisherpersons. Once somebody sees a flag drop, or rod go down, then it's much like a football game to see who can get there first.

Any pictures of lake trout?

Hey there 99, I don't think I answered your question. Just saw it now.

Yes, slip bobbers work out in the open but any outside fishing needs constant effort in clearing ice out of the fishing hole and melting ice off the line.

The old Thill style slip bobber are my fav because they are so classy (as far as a fishing bobber goes). But they require extra effort when outside fishing because the fishing line threads all the way through the bobber from top to bottom. a little ice bead will form at the top of the bobber and through it's center which can freeze your line inside the bobber. When this happens, you no longer have a slip bobber, it's locked onto the line. then it becomes a hand over hand line because you cant reel it in once the bobber hits the first eyelet on the fishing rod.

another kind of slip bobber that works better than others outside fishing is one like this:



See, that's a clip on style, it just glides and slides on the line. You keep your bobber stop above the bobber at the depth you wish to fish. These are made of open cell foam that is inserted into a little plastic clip end. They really are nice because you can trim the foam float length with a pocket knife or even just pinch it off with your fingers. I like to do that so I have a float that barely floats my jig and bait. the fish feel way less resistance that way when they bite.

The reason these work nice outside is because the slip slot stays under water while you fish, this greatly reduces line freeze to the float. also when ice does build up on the float itself you just give it a squeeze with your fingers and the ice crumbles off because the float is soft.

Yes that is a weeny dog wearing an orange cape. Don't try to pretend you've never seen this sort of thing before.

Nice fish -- with a little ham on the left!

John

Went with some guys in Colorado once that did it right. Wait till April, sunny day in the 40's or warmer, pull the keg out with you on a toboggan, pack plenty of sunscreen.

I just broke out my auger for the first time in 5 years since I moved out here. I sure miss me some ice fishing! we've had a cold enough winter that we actually have 6" of ice from the reports I've heard. I plan on going out a day here this weekend and see about getting me some crappies through the ice. I made the mistake of giving away all my short rods when I figured I wasn't going to get on hard water ever again. So last weekend I swung through Scheels and picked up 4 new rods (13.99 each) they came with reels and everything! couple cheap rattle reels that clip to a bucket and I was set. I made me some "airplane" tipups with the kids a cold day a week or so back so when I bring the family out we all can fish. out here we can use 4 lines a piece and I figure on doing just that!

I had much work to do on the auger from rebuilding the rewind to retapping a bolt hole that got buggered years ago and replacing with the correct bolt and put new gas in. Just when I thought I had it perfect I pulled and pulled and nothing was happening. I checked the fuel line, it was good. So I pulled some more, choked it, then moved it to half way after a few pulls and nothing. I was getting frustrated thinking the spark plug was bad until I looked at the on off switch and somehow I must have flipped it off. I put it back to on and with one pull she sprang to life. I gave her a little reving and she was humming along like a tune. I threw the auger bottom back on it and watched it spin a few times to make sure all was well. now I just need to break away from work long enough to get out on the ice. anyone have any tips for fishing small deep water reservoirs for crappies?

Cheers Dave,

All understood.

Even the daushing Einer !

You guys got any decent ice yet ?

Ours sucks baboon a$$ & don't get me stated on the slush, on top !

Good luck Ryan !

Hope you have a ball, with the family.

Paul, Our ice is coming along ok now, about a month or at least 3 weeks behind normal schedule but it's getting decent now.

If we can make it through the rest of this week without snowfall, we will be set as we are supposed to go sub zero for temps starting Saturday.



Good luck Ryan!

Oh thats a dog! I though it was a slip bobber for BIG fish

he's a service dog, trained to bite all fish that come up through those holes in the floor.

Nice! If you could just get him to unhook eelpout!

6" on the trout pond just outside of town. they call it a "reservoir" but the name seems overkill to a 38 acre pond, even if it does get to 50' deep.

didn't catch a thing but I did get to teach my boy about Ice conditions and how to check it safely starting at shore. drilling holes, skimming, setting up a portable and he showed me what happens to the lantern when you just drop it next to the truck and it tips over. the trip only cost us 1/8th of a tank of fuel, 2 mantles and a globe.

he loved it even though we didn't get a nibble

fishing with son, priceless!

Bucket list. Dave, the third pic down is priceless. I would love to get into those perch.