High winds break up the lake….

Here on Mille Lacs last night we experienced wind gusts up to 47 mph. I had a difficult time sleeping with all the noise……The strong SW,NW winds moved the ice around causing some large ice piles out in the main lake ares. North of the Agate Bay/Flamingo reef area there is a large ice pile that maybe a land mark there all winter! Today there are pockets of open water north,west and south…..the westside of Mille Lacs reports white caps with open water.I attached a picture of the ice out in front of our house. I could see that the smooth ice is about 2-3 inches thick and if you look for the dark colored areas in the picture that would be the open water. The cold forecast should help freeze up the remainder of the lake soon.

Some fisherman have been out on Wahkon Bay, no fish reports in yet.

That sure is dangerous looking stuff!!! Looks good for a polar bear though! LOL!

This happend to me once on Grindstone Lake near Hayward, WI some 15 years ago.

I had borrowed a couple of new Polaris sleads to do an early ice TV show. Ron (who was my guest and good fising buddie) and I stopped into Leon Pastika’s Bait Shop and heard from an area guide the ice in one bay was just good enough to support snowmobiles on Grindstone. Lake map in hand, we headed out to a rock pile noted on the map by the guide. Hand drilling a hole took only seconds as the ice was only a few inches thick!

I sat up the portable and took care not to let the snowmobiles too close togeather… for the combined weight.

The wind came up after dark… wind so strong that I had to tie the portable to the sleads to keep it from blowing off. The ice house would move if we were not in it. Oh, we were pounding the fish… but the crashing sound of the main lake ice breaking up, made us do a fast retreat! Frightening noise when you are on the ice and experience the sound of ice breaking and water “lapping” and waves splashing. I jumped on the snowmobile and yanked the portable back to the shoreline, with the portable still set up. On the way in, I hit a fresh heave that caught on the wooden floor of the portable. It busted the base wide open and ripped off the hinges. With the wind blowing as it was… I had equipment that went flying across the lake on the glare ice. Lost a few tip ups that night! Lucky I did not loose a couple of snowmobiles…. and my life. We stayed in the motor home that night. The next morning the bay we had been in looked like your photo.

I have mellowed out these days in my old age… I wait till I get good ice before I venture out. Now too, there is not Kaluha and vodka in my coffee thrermous .

Dave Hoggard

Wow Dave, pretty spooky.

Not to story tell here but……….
A few years back we heard that some ice shifted and blew into the northshore (Lake Superior) and appeared that it was there to stay with the forecasted wind directions for the next couple of days. My brother called me at 10:00pm that evening and told me to get my stuff because were going to hit the splake bite out on Superior. Being a fishing junkie I got up at 2:00am the next morning to get up there before daybreak with portables in tow. We got there and walked out about 3/4 of a mile and setup and starting puching several holes. Needless to say the bite was really good as we iced several splake within the first couple hours, and the biggest just under 9lbs. The wind took a unpredictable switch and we began to feel a very strange sensation looking down at our ice holes as we could see our line moving off to the side at an angle. We looked at each and both decided to get the heck out of there immediatley. Luckily, 2 hours after we got to shore, the ice was several hundred feet off shore already and heading back out in to the lake. Funny thing was, as we got to shore we noticed several locals making their way back to the shore with small jon boats being towed behind them. Hmmmmm……

Did we learn anything on that trip? Absolutely, bring a floatable device of somekind to get back to shore!!

Just kidding..be safe out there.

Thanks for the reminder to be safe guys. My mother works at one of hydro dams on the Missouri. Each spring the rangers end up chasing down some crazy who used a 2×6 to cross open water to get out to the ice. The ice breaks loose with the increased current, and they are trolling.