huzzsaba

Thanks Brian! I figured its a one time investment which should pay off in one or 2 seasons.

It worked fine although I took apart the setup I made. was useless and tipping over as you mentioned. i just dropped the transducer down and tried to get it to sit at a good angle. I think most of my earlier troubles was due to the settings. i was able to fine tune the settings to work just right or close enough I think I will invest in an ice transducer and or slightly higher end sonar with flasher for next season. May also invest in a portable hut and auger. Who knows!

Sorry in advance for the no photo thread Got out twice this weekend, Once on Friday with the family since my girls had PA day from school. I don't work Thursdays and Fridays so that means PA day+Day off work+ice on the lake= family ice fishing day .The second time was Sunday for lakers and whitefish. Friday: We went out with Gilford Yellow huts. As usual arrived late ( 3 ladies getting ready) isn't an easy or quick task . got there around 8am (late by my standards and got settled in the hut. Wayne (the guide) gave us the big hut and it was very nice and spacious. He checked up on us regularly in between his busy schedule of moving the huts to a new location. We got into a dozen before 11 am. Most were small and were released unless deep hooked. Then the usual bite shutdown till 2pm. At 2 pm it was still slow until we got a good hit and it was a nice jumbo. He decided to take a swim around our second line and by the time we got him to the hole, the tangle turned out to be a strategically useful for him since he self released at the hole before we could grab him. My little one cried for a good 5 mins saying "we lost the big one!" Wayne came at 3:30 to check up on us and seeing just 4-5 fish in the bag told us to try another hut which was smaller. The girls decided to play out on the ice and me and the wife started fishing. It was non stop action for the last 45 minutes of our trip. My job was to put the minnows on,and her job was to reel them in. We caught probably 12-15 in that 45 mins! The drive home was another adventure. snow the whole way took 2 hours to get back to Mississauga. All in all a great day and service from Gilford Yellow huts was great! Sunday: First time ever going for Lakers and Whitefish. Took the day off work to accompany a friend who was off Sunday. We went out with Bear Point ice huts and were on the ice by 7:30 am. Service was great and huts were the cleanest we have ever used. My only complaint was not being able to meet the man himself, Donnie, and the fact that nobody came to check up on us until 3pm! Fishing was very slow. hardly marked any fish. bottom of the screen was pretty flat the whole time. Tried all the lures and techniques in the dozens of simcoe laker videos I watched, and nothing worked. Had one line that I jigged and reeled up and down for 7 of the 9 hours lol, and 2 lines with live minnows, one on a homemade rig and another on Donnie's spreader and tip up. If you guessed we got skunked, you guessed correct! Talked to a the guys at the end of the day, and found out only 2 huts caught fish, one was a whitefish and one a laker. another few told me that they only marked 2 fish all day. Slow day for everyone and the water was dark. could not see my lure once past 6-8 feet! Drive back was quiet and we joked that my friend's win of roll up the rim (a coffee) was what made the trip worth it! My friend is on a fishless streak of 3 years now ( He doesnt fish much), but was optimistic the next trip out will be better, Will try again before the huts have to come off on a weekday instead of weekend. Weekdays have been better fishing this year for me. Not because of getting skunked but not sure If I should try Bear Point again, or change it up and try Tim Hales. Maybe Adam Goy ice huts. Positives from the trip was getting a feel for variety of lures and learning how to use use Donnie's custom tip up. Also got better acquainted with my fishfinder. Better luck next time! Thanks for reading!

Thanks. I will try that out.

Thanks. I will send you a pm about it.

Great Video as usual! Was out yesterday with the family for some perch fishing on cooks bay and the water was brownish color. Wonder if a glow jig or spoon helps in these conditions?

Thanks. Will keep that in mind.

Not sure how you feel about Volvos, but have a look at a 2004 C70 t5. A bit hard to find, but their drive-train is bulletproof and very fun to drive. Way cheaper to maintain. Very DIY friendly, and not to mention, very safe! https://www.kijiji.ca/v-cars-trucks/oakville-halton-region/2004-volvo-c70-ht/1235836673?enableSearchNavigationFlag=true

got the vibrato and a williams whitefish half silver half gold jigging spoon. Also have tube jigs and jig heads. Plan to have the spreader as my 2nd line which I will buy from Donny. Also, do you guys tie directly or use a snap swivel with these lures?

I spent some time this morning and came up with this setup. Found all the stuff in the garage,so looks pretty ghetto lol. I think the angles are pretty straight. Hopefully it works for us tomorrow! Going out with Bear point Ice huts. Praying to catch my first Laker and whitefish!

thanks for all the replies guys. I picked one up from CT, but plan on also buying the setup from Don from Bear Point ice huts, since we are renting the hut from him. Will report back when we get out!

I was told that a spreader works great for whitefish and or lakers. Are there any particular ones that work better than others? Anyone make their own? I saw canadian tire has some. http://www.canadiantire.ca/en/pdp/sub-zero-ice-fishing-3-way-line-spreader-0788040p.html Thanks

Brian, thanks for the photos. Next time you go, if you don't mind take a photo of the orientation of the transducer when in the water. I am working on making something similar to what you have made. Simple and genius!

Thanks for all the above replies! Big Cliff, next trip is with the family perch fishing, and knowing too many lines in the water cause tangles, will leave the fishing duties for some time to the wife and kiddos while I play around with the settings and the angle of the transducer. Battery in currently on the charger. Hopefully with some tweaking and monitoring the angle of transducer will solve my issues.

I haven't tried it yet a in anything more than 15 feet. I will be perch fishing this friday so I will play around with it some more to get a better feel for it. Btw the battery charger you gave me is coming to good use ?

Chris, I am using the regular transducer. Best way to explain how it sits in the water is like the blade of a hockey stick. I will try to get a photo of it.

I will give it a try at 200 kHz. Thanks

Thanks for all the replies. It's possible it's the battery, however I doubt it is due to the cold since it was nice and toasty in the hut, and the fish finder and battery was sitting on the bench away from the ice Quick question, for laker fishing, should I keep it at 200 kHz or switch it to 83 khz? This is on simcoe btw so I guess the depth is 100 ft plus. First time trying this laker thing lol. Thanks again!

Thanks for your reply Fisherman. The battery was fully charged and I am sure the connections are all good. I will double check though. Last I used it , was in 15 feet of water and I could see my lure on the bottom, so it was well within the zone. Again it may be user error on my part.

I bought a used fishfinder a few years ago. Honestly I haven't used it much. I used it twice this year however for ice fishing. The fishfinder is a low end Lowrance X4. Bought it just to play around with to get a feel of what a fishfinder does. It seems to work fine but I noticed that there may be some lag, and near the end of the ice fishing day, I was able to jig up and down but it never showed anything on the screen. By then I had packed it away thinking maybe the the boat transducer was not meant for the cold waters of ice fishing. Anyways, I am planning to go for Laker fishing next week with Bear Point Ice huts, and was hoping to use it, but feel it may not be useful. maybe its due to the fact that it is a low end unit, or maybe something to do with the setting. Depth and temps it shows fine. I have been using it on the 200 khz setting, and kept the transducer pretty much in the correct position about a foot below the ice. Here is a link to the fishfinder http://www.canadiantire.ca/en/pdp/lowrance-x-4-pro-fish-finder-0793989p.html Any help would be appreciated.

who do you mean by yellow guys? Do you mean gilford yellow huts?

I think that is what happened. better chop them up first, then wash off the slime lol

Thanks. I have got a few fishing buddies but none as patient as this one. We have gone on at least 8-10 trips in the last few years (shore fishing) and poor guy never caught a thing despite doing everything right! Yet he never gives up and even encourages me on the slow days. He caught his first perch that day and the smile on his face was priceless. He was telling me how that first fish was what made the whole trip worth it. He had to take the day off work and I was glad it paid off.

https://ontariofishingcommunity.com/topic/85797-fun-day-on-lake-simcoe-gilford/ Your day sounds almost identical to mine!

Got out for some ice fishing on Thursday with a friend (his first time ever ice fishing). We went out with gilford yellow huts. The bite was decent from the time we reached there until 11 am. We caught on the first drop of the line. 2nd drop caught my PB perch. was around 13 inch jumbo! The bite shut down until 2pm and then slowly picked up. from 3:45 to 4:30 it was non stop action. We couldn't take our eyes off our lines. As soon as we send a fresh minnows down, we would get bite! We felt like string puppeteers lol. Most were smaller size perch but well worth it! During the above mentioned rush hour, I was looking down the hole and saw a grayish looking fish circling around my minnow. It finally took the bait and I reeled in my my first ever Herring! Beautiful fish and very aggressive on the bite. We had a CO visit us as well Good thing I reminded my friend tor renew his license on the drive up to Gilford! First time ever getting a visit from CO on the ice! Was not the most productive day size wise, but indeed a day to remember! I think its safe my friend is sold on ice fishing! in the end we hooked probably 30 fish.