Not a horrible day out on the ice… but not ideal either. Last night, I put in a call to Hunters Point to ask about the roads. The lady that answered said that the wind was blowing pretty good, so they didn’t know what the roads would be like in the morning. Well, I didn’t want to make a trip for nothing and needed to know if I was ATV’ing it or Trucking it out. I waited til morning and gave them a call again at 6am. They hadn’t been out. Waited another hour and checked in with them. Roads were in great shape! left the wheeler at home and headed off.
I got out a little later than I had wanted to. I finally got out on the ice on 2 mile about 10:30 or so. I checked my Lowrance H20C GPS with Lakemaster chip and set up in 26 to 28 FOW. I pounded a couple holes with the Strikemaster Lazer Mag. Unfortunately, since I left the ATV at home, I had to set up near some houses. So, I didn’t pop as many holes as I would normally. I immediately marked fish in a couple holes, so I set up there. Put up my Otter Ice Cabin and went to work. I pulled out my St Croix Premier tipped with a Gold Lindy Rattl’n Flyer Spoon and tipped it with a Fathead head. I had a ton of fish coming for a sniff. I could tell fairly quickly that these were all perch. According to the marks on my MarCum LX5, I could see that they were not all small… but not jumbos worth targeting.
After an hour or so, I swallowed my pride and packed up and went to the other side of the reef. I set up towards the south side in about 20-22 FOW just off of a break. I marked a few fish here and there so I set up a Tip-up with a Shiner and set my cabin back up. I worked the Gold Rattl’n Flyer up until about 4pm. I had 2 takers, one 11 inch walleye that quickly went back, and a eel pout about 11 inches as well. As the sun started to go down, I switched to the Red Rattl’n Flyer Spoon and pulled out the Lindy tazer. As I dropped it down, I had an immediate smack. It may have been the same eel pout as last time as it was about the same size.
Those 3 fish were all I got today. I had about 20 follows and 4 of them were pretty good sized marks. Unfortunately, I got a call from the wife just as prime time was starting that I had to come home and clean the dog kennel (apparently, our lasa-poo had poo problems). Oh well.
Couple side notes to mention. First, a big thanks goes out to George and his crew at Hunters. the roads were really phenomenal. No matter where you go out of, give those guys a big pat on the back. the were plows out there pretty consistently all day.
Another side note. I got a call from a buddy down on the south side of the lake. He got out a little earlier than expected (about 5pm) and told me that there was word someone pulled out a 29 1/2 incher (and kept it). Once I got back into town, I hit the store for some suds and saw a couple other fisherman. They said they just got back from Mille Lacs too and heard about this big fish and that it was brought into Portside. From the sounds of it, someone pulled a pig out today.
Don’t feel bad, I noticed Chip Leer needs one too! (Assuming Chip was in Mn on his “home” waters of beautiful Leech Lake!)
