Freshwater Fishing Tips

It’s ice fishing time. Grab your ice auger and your ice fishing gear and head for the frozen lake where the fish are biting. Just make sure the ice is safe before you drive on it, whether with 4 wheeler, snowmobile or vehicle. Most places recommend 12 inches of ice before you drive your car or pickup on the ice.

This year started out pretty good and they were catching some decent fish. For some reason you can sit in your fish house for a long time now as they haven’t bit well for about 9 days now. Of course it’s been cold with lots of fronts. That upsets ice fishing as much as it does summer fishing.

Now I don’t know about you but I definitely want some sort of ice fish shelter. Whether it be a clam ice fishing shack or a full blown permanent fish house. MOF I prefer the permanent house because it’s lots more comfortable. Nothing like having a fish house with carpeting, 3 burner cook stove, carpeting, 3 bunks, furnace and electric lights.

I got spoiled with my permie up on Mille Lacs. It’s nice to have 6 holes that don’t freeze up and to be able to walk around comfortably in your socks. It’s hard to do that in a clam.

The peacefulness of ice fishing is what appeals to me the most. I’ve never been one to fish with the crowd as I think they disturb the fish unless the bite is really hot. I’m more than likely off on a good spot that I found and never told anyone else about.

For such a simple sport the amount of ice fishing gear you can accumulate is staggering. Some people can’t fish with out their depth finder, fish camera and GPS units. Naturally you have to have an ice auger and if you live up north where the ice can get to 3 feet thick you probably need an extension too. Of course you need a heater.

Then you have all your rod choices. I had about 10 ice fishing rods and never less than 6. Most of the time they all came along because they were all rigged for different types of fishing and with some heavy line down to 2 pound test line. Plus you need some tips ups and a styrofoam bait bucket with a net for bait, better have an ice skimmer too so you can clean out the hole and keep it clean and ice free..

Then, unless you have a permie like mine you also need some really warm clothes and some decent gloves. If your outside and catching fish your hands are going to get very cold. Hopefully the fish are biting fast enough so you don’t notice.

At least, when it comes to fishing gear you don’t need a huge tackle box to lug along. Lol, I’d have 3 tackle boxes for open water fishing and a really small one for ice fishing. There are lots of specialized ice fishing lures and jigs but there are a handful that almost always work and those are the ones you want to start with.

Now you’re ready to head for the lake and do some fishing. Oops, wait a minute, better call the bait shop or some fishing buddies to find out what fish are biting, where and on what. If you’re headed to a strange lake it’s not a bad idea to pick up a lake map if there’s one available. Some fishing maps have structure marked with GPS numbers so you can find them easily. Depth is always nice to have on a fishing map, too.

So now you’re ready to head to the lake and catch your limit. Ice fishing is fun and you really can get by with little in the way of fishing gear if you want to. Ice fishing doesn’t have to cost an arm and a leg so take your kids and go have some frozen water fishing fun. You’ll be glad you did.