limeyangler

nice one ........i cant take it anymore....aaaarrrrghhhhh! but seriously...lol....great stuff , looks like you had a blast!

Hi all, The ice finally started to give way on the lakes round here on the 23rd of April, and i have been busy taking pics of the ice retreating as a kind of record to look back on in years to come, keeping a close eye on how the weather/wind/temps etc.. affect the ice. I fished a lot later last year, even though the ice was probably safer for longer this year, just had other stuff going on....so the first opportunity i had to cast a line was not soon enough....lol...i would have cast into a puddle by the side of the road if i could have. I did not intend this report to be so long...but i kept putting off writting it up.....but now i'm at work (boring night shift) and have some time on my hands...lol...at work and have time....at home...not so much...ironic. Anyway....here's a few pics of Lake wabiggoon the week of 21st april, showing the gradual retreat of the ice...AT LAST! I think it was around thursday 30th April that i noticed that there was a large enough area at Olsen's landing to cast for some Pike, so i dropped by at Lew's place and we arranged to go that afternoon. We skunked, Lew sliced his thumb open opening a new lure packet, but felt great to cast a line again and lew got to try out some of his homemade lures. LEW TESTING HIS HOMEMADE LURES I had been talking to OFNer Brkygtr about getting a lake we had skunked on in jan/febfor some ice out specks, he called me Friday night and we arranged to meet the next day...neither of us knew whether the ice was actually out yet on the lake...but we were gonna chance it....we arrived to perfect conditions. half the lake was still covered in ice....more slush really, with a slight breeze clearing the ice slowly but visibly........ PERFECT CONDITIONS GREETED US WE WERE IN BRKYGTR'S 12' WITH HIS NEW TROLLING MOTOR. Its not a very big lake...almost a pond....lol....so we covered a fair bit of water, and having ice fished it knew the structure/layout pretty well, after trying shallow, then deep we headed over to the retreating ice to fish the ice shelf.... we were casting various mepps and blue fox spinners, split shot rigged worms(nightcrawler) i even tried thew slip bobber .....nothing! TROLLING THE ICE SHELF I had stupidly underestimated the weather, and had not brought warm enough clothing , so when the wind picked up Dale took pity on me and we found the most sheltered shoreline and breaked for a cast and a bite to eat......dale had brought some moose smokies he had someone make up from a bull the got some time in the fall.....damn good smokies! FOUND SOME SHELTERED SHORE FOR A CAST AWESOME LUNCH...THANKS DALE! After lunch we headed back the the ice shelf, this time we were trolling what i think are called 'gang troller' rigs....i.e. 4 or five large in line spinner/flasher blades with a hook at one end, we had nightcrawlers on the hooks. After freezing our cojones off in ever increasing winds with no fish taking, we decided to get back to the landing while we still had juice in the battery, as paddling against whitecaps was not on our list of things we most wanted to do.... TROLLING THE ICE SHELF AGAIN we got back to the vacinity of the landing and started to cast again, i tied on a little cleo to give me a better casting distance if nothing else, and started to cast at the submerged boulders along the shore. that produced the only action of the day, a large swirl, and a fast follow , but no strike. this encouraged us to try a bit longer but at around 2pm after 6 hours trying we decided to try a splake lake further up the road........ WENT UP THE ROAD FOR SPLAKE....UNFORTUNATELY THE NW WIND HAD BLOWN THE ICE TO THE WRONG SIDE OF THE LAKE MAKING ACCESS EVEN FOR CASTING FROM SHORE IMPOSSIBLE After that we called it a day and i made the 2 hour jouney back home to Dryden. On the way back i noticed that one of my favourite lakes for bass(sm) had open water, and stopped to cast a few lures, nothing taking......probably a bit too cold still. THIS LAKE IS RIGHT BY THE HIGHWAY AND HARDLY EVER FISHED BUT HOLDS THOUSANDS OF BIG SMALLIES...I WILL RETURN....lol. I was greeted by a welcome sight on Sunday morning (3rd may)...OPEN WATER AT THE BOTTOM OF OUR YARD!.......I had a few things/chores to sort out so got busy with the intention of getting my first big ice out pike later in the afternoon...man was i psyched up....... YAY...OPEN WATER! By 5pm i had done the chores list and got some big sucker minnows for bait.....only to see that whilst in town running around the wind had changed direction and blown the ice back into shore.....DOH! No fishing today...lol...but got some nice pics anyway as the sun went down. DOH...WHERE"D ALL THE ICE COME FROM NICE SUNSET PIC OPPORTUNITIES THOUGH I was working the next day, but was back by 7pm and had to give it another go, the strong SW winds during the day having cleared a good swathe of ice from our shore......The sucker minnows were still lively, so i made the short trek down the lawn, full of anticipation on a beautiful evening.... A FISH!.....but a small one That was it...not another bite....wow...this time last year it was non stop 30"+ pike one after the other, mind you the water was warmer last year at this time. Anyhoo, i took some more susnset pics as i was waiting for the fish to bite........ MORE SUNSET PICS I did not get out on the 5th of may....but coming off the night shift on the morning of the 6th i gave it another go out the front....no fish again........but it was a beautiful misty morning ...soooo...lol....took some more pics as the mist cleared.....hopefully i can be posting some fish pics again soon....... NICE MISTY MORNING , BUT STILL NO FISH I'll keep trying....cant be long now before i get some fishies...till then...tight lines all!

top stuff old man (could not resist) The water looks soooo calm.......i might be down London way in september.....any room in that boat?

Great report...thanks for sharing that.

congrats on the firsts....and that is a hell of a walter for a first one!!!!

Great report! What a great way to start the new season! I was given a book with pictures and descriptions of freshwater fish when i was about 10 years old, there were pictures of grayling in it, and ever since that day i have wanted to catch them....some day......... Thanks for posting.

Lol...i almost couldn't read this whole post...and i felt a little sick by the end of it...jealousy sucks!!!! Awesome stuff guys, i cant wait to get the boat in...its killing me. Thnks for reducing me to a jibbering mess

Great pics Jedi I have never snagged one of those...i aint complaining though Did you catch the carp on the yellow twisty tail?

HOLY crap...i mean carp....lol Nice fish. I know a few guys back in England who would pay lots of money to catch carp like that. Thanks for sharing.

HURRY UP WITH THE PICS MAN! Great report, to get into that many fish at the first attempt is awesome...hats off to ya

Great report Superdad! Those BOQ walters are amazing...they are always big....seen lots of amazing icefishing reports from that body of water too....superb fishery.......almost as good as Lac Seul up here Anyway...thanks for the post, really got me chompin at the bit now, but our opener is still 2 weeks away......the ice is still on some of the lakes...but will be gone by then no doubt. YOU ONLY FISH ONCE A YEAR????????????????? what about the rest of 2009? Thanks for an excellent report Limey.

great stuff HD! that jump pic is a classic.

Congrats on the new 'toy'....like someone else said , those 4-stroke yammies are sweet. Quick question for ya....how do you fish for whities on the softwater....i'd like to ry that this year....i.e. bait/tackle/ ?

freekin awesome looking food. You see so many 'celebrity know it all chefs making money from preaching about fresh, local foods....like they friggin' invented it....lol (ooooops....was i ranting.......?) top stuff Tinbanger Bon appetite

Great stuff, absolutely loving those pictures....specially the last one for me too. Thanks for sharing.

Great stuff Bigugli.....looks like the perfect day out!

awesome guys....lol...brkygtr and myself were out today for specks, 7hrs of trying and nothing!

Lol....i'm already on it....just need to istall my new trolling motor before i do though...so its not banging on poor bubas head up the front deck....lol.

Welcome to the board Pierre

Good stuff Garry, i'm as green as that new weed growth with envy...lol...far too much ice up here still!

Hi All, Well, it sees like ages but its only just over 2 weeks since i was fishing, ice out on our lake was not complete untill May 10 last year.....but like they say "a watched pot never boils" or should i say A watched lake never melts....lol. Its pretty good though now, although its been pretty cold here the last week....was snowing last 3 days....wind and temps are due to be up these nextfew days and that means i reckon i'll have enough water to shore fish for some big pike by monday. ITS GOING!!!!! I've still got work to do getting the boat ready, parts ordered etc...etc...so its kinda good the ice is there....otherwise the temptation to set sail before i was shipshape would be too great. I'm even preping the wee lad for his maiden voyage....got him a mini PFD yesterday, lol....he was not too sure at first...but he had a goofy grin on his face by the end of the fitting BORN TO FISH!

WTG.....very cute baby.

WTG Mr.Eh I just did exactly the same thing this morning, ordered my new Minn Kota Terrova 55lb thrust, Autopilot and Universal Sonar with the Co- pilot remote control....cant wait to get my boat out n the water , still at least a foot of ice out there though Anyway, after checking out the prices everywhere from Ebay to Bass Pro( who did not even stock the model i wanted) i found this unit cheapest by some C$300 than everywhere else at Cabelas in Winnipeg.

AWESOME.... Great stuff Raf....jealousy does not even come close to the emotion i feel right now....lol They seek him here...they seek him there....that freekin' Benbeattie dude is every bloody where!

I am....lol....my wife....not so much.....as long as my (man) breasts dont begin to lactate it should continue so for a while too.....lol The ice is taking its own precious time this year...its been kinda unsafe for at least a week now. It snowed yesterday...and keeps etting below zerto at night despite being an average 9 degrees C during the days.....might get out next week...might have to go and find a puddle somewhere tomorrow and cast out....i'm beginning to shake violently from fishing withdrawals....lol