Home Forums Fishing Freshwater Anybody else itchin for ice fishing

Well 2 of them are pretty well started, one was my wife and the other my bud's, but we did have their 4 year old Mariah with us. The little gal is practically freeze proof, been fishing with us at -10 and still wanted to play in the snow instead of sit in the shanty next to the heater. She's gotten to where she wants to eat every fish that comes out of the hole though, and she's really hard to tell no she's so darn cute, but her dad has put the kibosh on that lately. A man can only eat so many trout you know!

I don't have a camera but did pick up a Marcum flasher the other week. Wow, what a game changer. No more going in blind. It will read through 3 feet of clear ice they claim so I have gotten to where I won't even drill a hole if I ain't showing fish, just move along and try another spot. Pretty cool.

I have a Marcum Showdown Troller, and it REALLY cuts down on drilling. Carry a bottle of water with you, scrape down to bare ice and then pour a small puddle (an ounce or so) to set the transducer on. (You can't have any air between the 'ducer and the ice.) If the ice is mostly clear, you'll get a fully usable look at the water column. If no fish are showing, move.

I have a vexilar, and it does change how one fishes. If you don't see something in the hole, you can move. The other advantage is that it tells you if something is in the hole and doesn't bite - then you need to change presentation - be it the type of jigging, the type/color of bait, or something. Just wish there was a device to tell you what to change to!

Little help for the ignorant here.
Do the fish taste any different taken from under the ice?

I don't know Louis, I throw about everything I catch back. The only fish I've eaten that I've caught through the ice are pike and burbot. Pike tasted just like they do in the summer and burbot I've never caught except through the ice. I'm not a big fan of trout or char so they all go back down the hole after I take their picture.

I'd say, the fish mostly taste the same.

IIf they freeze on the ice, the hands sure get cold cleaning them.
With the short daylight hours, and cold outside, cleaning them in the kitchen is a bit messy.

Fresh fish caught on the ice are better than those caught during the summer and frozen - especially if they were eaten weeks ago! ;-)

I like thick ice too. Early one season on a local lake we had not quite two feet of really clear ice, you could drive a tank on it. The ice was growing fast and creaking and groaning and cracking like a sumbitch. Every time I was looking away from the truck and the noise peaked I had visions of the old Exploder slowly sinking. Chickened out and picked up an old ATV to putt-putt across the ice. Actually more fun, I like starting by drilling lots of holes and now I can hole-hop without getting off the ATV and if I find a hot hole the fish trap is right behind me. Ultimate in lazy ice fishing.

Kid, you gotta know your lake too. There's one here that's notorious for swallowing vehicles. In a number of places it's springy and that's where the trucks fall through while the rest of the lake has three or so feet of good ice.

Went out on the ice today since I wasn't working. Had a good day by my lonesome, managed to ice 5 nice rainbows and missed 4 more. They wouldn't bite anything but raw shrimp and if you jigged the rod they wouldn't even look at it, picky today.

Caught and released this monster, even hooked him through the mouth!


Here is a nicer fish, had some shoulders on him and stripped line out of my little baitcaster while we did battle. I guessed him around 2 pounds give or take a few ounces.

All of them went back down to fight another day.

The small fish catch happens to the best of us.
The last looks like a good one.