I think the end is in sight.

The end of fishable ice in the Central Minnesota area anyway. Looking at the current 14 day forecast for the St Cloud area there is 6 50’s and 7 40’s forecasted for highs. With the lack of snow cover and the lack of current ice thinkness, I think if the forecast is correct there will not be much fishable ice remaining in this area.

I’m ready to be in the boat on the lakes chasing crappies. Bye bye ice.

Bearcat89 wrote:

I’m ready to be in the boat on the lakes chasing crappies. Bye bye ice.

Me as well. I think there is going to be a lot of records set this year for early ice out dates. Personally the older I get the less I like ice fishing, so I have no problem with the winter we had.

fishthumper wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Bearcat89 wrote:</div>
I’m ready to be in the boat on the lakes chasing crappies. Bye bye ice.

Me as well. I think there is going to be a lot of records set this year for early ice out dates. Personally the older I get the less I like ice fishing, so I have no problem with the winter we had.

That’s just silly talk.

I agree, I could appreciate more winters like this. I really enjoyed the late fall and early spring.

Bearcat89 wrote:

I’m ready to be in the boat on the lakes chasing crappies. Bye bye ice.

Hell w this weather we still might be in season for everything else too!

Bonkers, here’s to hoping

Open water-bring it!

I’m removing my snow tires tomorrow. I’m done wasting tread.

I mentioned it before but I sure hate to see water temps on opener alot higher than normal. The bait fish will have come in shallow, spawned and moved out… that’s a big one fer the bait shops in our area.

I am ready for open water.
Going to go get the boat from my dads shop this weekend and the first trip to chamberlain is hopefully in a week and a half.

Wabasha marina will be open by the end of next week. I couldn’t find over 3” of ice and found spots with 1” tonight when I went poking around to measure for the town’s festival coordinators taking place this weekend.

Pepin is going to probably break the ice out record of February 29th with a lot of it already being open. Last year spots on Pepin were over 24” on this same weekend.

Swimjiggin wrote:

I mentioned it before but I sure hate to see water temps on opener alot higher than normal. The bait fish will have come in shallow, spawned and moved out… that’s a big one fer the bait shops in our area.

Things will definitely be different.

I’ve got distant family that pulls multiple boats up from Missouri to fish the river (generally trolling) for a long weekend and I do my best to keep them on fish. I told them to stay flexible as who knows what water temps and patterns will do with this crazy weather.

Yeah I am thinking of pulling the boat out this weekend and getting it dailed in for first water lol.

Had a bunch of boats pass me on the road today and saw one fishing a stream near Black River Falls… or Tomah… I forget.

I’m definitely ready to get the boat wet… didn’t get out past July last summer! I’m jonesin’!

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LOTW is still operating as normal from reports but yeah the majority of southern and central MN is close to being done. Part of me wants to make one last run up north, but eh I’m pretty over it at this point.

Was on a lake by Nisswa yesterday, still 9 inches of good ice, had the 4 wheeler out after checking the ice depth. Hopefully can still fish a couple weeks yet…..

After making it out ice fishing a total of one time, I plan on doing a lot more spring fishing this year. Water levels are up from last year, let’s go. I have the itch in the worst way.

4″ of soft stuff just north of the metro-saw a guy on a 4 wheeler, shoreline was sketchy. Think I’m done.

Just 3″ of crap ice in northern Pine County today, I never would have guessed that.

It “looked like plenty” and we were on foot, I about crapped my pants when I popped the first hole in 10′ of water.

It was legit sketchy walking off in the warm afternoon. A 350 pound man or an ATV would have easily broken through.

I’m done.

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Just got off the lake in the Brainerd area. Had over 12” last Sunday. Today there was 4.5” of crap ice with a spot that had open water on the lake. Could likely be the last time out for me.

7.5 inches of ok ice yesterday in BLA on my home ice. I’m done since walleye is closed. Was still hoping to trout fish but that probably won’t happen.

Spent the weekend up in the otter tail lake area. Fished 2 different lakes. One still has about 13” of ice. The other has around 12”. Both were still locked solid to the shore. I think that area probably has another 2 weeks of possible ice fishing remaining. I was a bit surprised to find this much ice still remaining and the ice still locked tight to shore.

Highbanks on Winnie is shutting down as of noon today due to unfavorable ice conditions. Geigers on bowstring is recommending only side by sides.

Was in Park Rapids this weekend and had 18 inches of ice on a few of the lakes i fished. All solid nothing soft yet. Fishing was still good and pretty much all day.

After a brief dip in temps midweek, the forecast later this week into next weekend looks VERY warm. I am seeing 65 degrees next Sunday.

I had to run a 8×14’ garden shed to a guy up by Hastings and drove up one side of the river and back the WI side on Sunday.

I’m not sure who officially declares ice out on Pool 4, but it won’t be long. For the MN side it’s wide open from Lake City up except for a maybe 20 acre chunk by the Hok si La landing. There was more on the WI side from about Stockholm down, but you could see broken pieces everywhere and random wide open spots a few acres in size.

Thursday would be the record for ice out. I’m predicting it goes “out” Friday or Saturday.

The river in Sartell will be reopening again soon. The Rice bridge was essentially open Saturday with big chunks of ice floating, but its basically open.

fishthumper wrote:

Spent the weekend up in the otter tail lake area. Fished 2 different lakes. One still has about 13” of ice. The other has around 12”. Both were still locked solid to the shore. I think that area probably has another 2 weeks of possible <strong class=”ido-tag-strong”>ice fishing remaining. I was a bit surprised to find this much ice still remaining and the ice still locked tight to shore.

This is good to know, thank you for posting this! I’m supposed to head up there to fish Friday and Saturday and was pretty nervous there wouldn’t be ice. Looks like Tuesday/Wednesday will be cold enough to firm things up a bit and then it should last through the weekend.

Did you have good luck up there? We’re going to likely just walk out on some smaller lakes in the area.

I fished the Ottertail region as well this weekend. 0″ of ice fishing open water on the river that was frozen two weeks ago. One large slough (big enough to be called a lake just no fish) I went past on the way to fish had open water around the shore and clean white Ice in the middle. On the way back the Ice was black and holes were appearing, and the whole sheet of ice was heaving in the wind. High winds expected the whole week after Monday.