Riparian

at one time I searched around for months looking for a cheap sled to pull my gear in, couldnt really find the appropriate piece of plastic so I just went and bought one designed for ice fishing. Its an Otter, It was well worth the 60 bucks.

Oh man thats a rip in the pants. Hope she gives you a few more years.

ok, so you will have a bucket of minnows with you. Send them down on a small jig and wait for the bite. If they arent biting, downsize your jig. If that dosent work, try tipping a spoon with a minnow or minnow head.

What kind of tackle have you got? Id bring some really small ice fishing jigs, a small spoon and a jigging rap. are you fishing from a hut or are you mobile?

I dont think you will have a problem with the transducer getting too cold.

I use my cuda 168 portable on the ice and it works fine. the drawbacks are you have to build a mount for the skimmer transducer, you have to drill a seperate hole for it, and the lcd display does not work very well in super cold temperatures. Other than that it does the trick, but its not as nice as a flasher.

do you consider checking trans fluid levels "transmission work"?

I think the nicknaming thing started with the baby boomers and everyone else felt left out, so we started coming up with "generation x" and "the silent generation" The term "baby boomer" has meaning behind it. The others do not.

Carl for the win.

I am seeing more hawks on our farm this year than ever before. Since the winter set in ive been seeing one on average every couple of days. I always assumed they were red tail hawks, but after reading this thread im not so sure. The hawks ive been seeing looked more like a juvenile coopers hawk but I really cant be sure. In the fall I had a dozen or so layer chickens outside free ranging. I came around the shed in time to see a really small hawk nail one of my full grown hens dead on. He then nonchalantly circled around and sat on a tree watching the chicken run for its life uninjured. Must have been a lack of experience on the hawks part. Funniest thing was when my rooster came running in full tilt kill mode. He would have met that hawk on the ground if he could. Still makes me laugh just to think about it.

Did you check your transmission fluid levels? If you have none you could be in trouble.

You dont put the bones in your mouth, You take the meat off the bone with a fork. Sometimes I cook trout this way in the oven, but with the skin on. When you serve it you just take chunks of meat off and since the ribcage is still attached to the spine, it lifts off bone free.

The ribcage remains, but the point is there is no wasted meat. The meat can be pulled of the bones on the plate with your fork. Its a great way to diversify the way you cook perch. These bodies can be a part of a tray bake with veggies or broiled under a broiler. The body cavities can be stuffed with herbs and lemon and but on a screaming hot bbq.

Ive been meaning to get one of those...

There was alot of slush. The ice was about 8 inches thick but there was well over a foot of snow on it. When I drilled the holes water rushed up from it a little bit. I assume its from the weight of the snow on the ice.

I headed out to find some pike on a small pond near my place today. I arrived around 2pm, and only fished for around 2 hrs. The snow was about a foot and a half deep and there was no walking paths so travel was difficult. Ive never caught a pike on a tip-up before, but I have tried a few times with no sucess. Today was the day i got my first one. I went to the deepest part of the pond, which was only about 6 ft deep and drilled my holes for my gear. Set up my tipup with a quickstrike rig my friend gave me (thanks Beats) I set up my sonar and my jigging hole about 15 ft from the tip up, and tried to catch some small fish that were showing up on the graph. I assume they were tiny perch. I was bouncing a lindy jig tipped with some berkley maggots but even that seemed to big for them as they would only knock it around down there. So the windchill is about -25 so im sitting in my portable out of the wind. About an hour goes by and Ive totally forgotten about the tipup, which is what usually happens. Suddenly I hear this sound, Ticktickticktick. My first instict was "what the hell was that" and I start looking out the windows of the hut. Suddenly I remember the tip up and I run over to it to find this fella on the end of the line. Strange feeling bringing in a big pike hand over hand. I love this method of fishing, but it takes great patience. Once he was out he stiffened up immediatly since it was so cold, it would have been nice to have a buddy to help get him unhooked. I did it though after not too much time, and he was released to be caught another day.

december 26th.

nice fish Beats!

good luck!

Why the hurt feelings? Very few people here are willing to give someone the ok to drive an vehicle on the ice. Its risky under any circumstance. Even Hawg Hunter, who has given you some really good info has not said it. youve got some really good answers to your question... Ice thickness from an member in the area and even some spots to try. Were saying the rest is up to you. Good luck!

He never said the ice was safe... he just answered the question. Its up to you to determine if the ice is safe or not.

Try really large deadbaits hooked with a quickstrike under a tip up.

Id say thats pretty steep

Is there a Josh that works at Angling outfitters? I think its Jos, short for Joslyn.

there are many lodges available. I cant recomend any that I havent been to but my advice to you is to use google earth. Choose an area that is in your travel zone and start googleing the nearest city or town with the keywords lodge, fishing, cabin, etc. You will find what you need. There are few poor ones out there. Most lodge owners value your business and will treat you well, but no lodge operator can guarantee you fish. Good luck!