Iowa first ice for 2005

Fellow ice anglers.With our cold weather coming in for next week do any of you think you’ll be on the ice by next week-end??? I hope to get out if conditions are safe.

Ryan Hale

I’ll be deer hunting but hope to get out a week from Wed. If It’s safe!!!

im praying to get out and fish soon im goin crazy, i need to stick some bule gill soon!

If any of you find safe ice, please post. I am from central Iowa but I will drive up if you have good ice.

dont worry nick i sure will make a post about safe ice, i cant wait much longer!
-Aaron

Ryan find some thick enough for me!
I’ll be there!

–Whitey

Corneila was covered yesterday. Chad and I went up their with the boat and couldn’t get it on the water. With 3-4 cold nights Morse and Corneila should be about ready.

Todd

FYI the water temp was 39.5 at Brushy yesterday!

Aaron, I love your new pic.
Thanks, Bill

Quote:

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Aaron, I love your new pic.
Thanks, Bill

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Yeah Bill i like it a lot to. i just hope my fish dont turn out like that!

I’m going to check the ponds around Iowa City every day, as it shouldn’t take much for them to freeze over now. Macbride and Pleasant Creek will take a little longer. I am now glad I brought my basic ice gear back from Minnesota with me.

Smiths Bay and Emerson are starting to ice up as of this morning. Little Souix will be soild by morning. 2″ of snow so far today and still coming, lows in the single digits or low teens rest of the week. Its time boys lets drill some holes.

There is skim ice on the smaller ponds in the Iowa City area that don’t have geese using them. If the forecast is right I may be getting out on a couple of them Friday…

3-4″ of powdery snow, and still coming down–that’ll slow down the ice-making process. Monday looks like a more realistic first-ice day down here.

If you get out and find something fishable let me know.
My new otter shack is arriving on Friday and I would love to set up somewhere on Saturday.
I’ll check the pot hole Sat am to see what it looks like.
jc

Two small shallow ponds in the Iowa City area with no current or geese had 2″ of ice as of this morning when I checked them. Yesterday morning they had about .75″ of ice, and the day before it was skim ice. The ice this morning held me up by shore, but it was creaking pretty good. If I were a hundred pounds lighter I might have gone home and grabbed my auger. As it is temps are supposed to stay below freezing all day and tonight, so I think I’ll wait until tomorrow afternoon to drill some holes. The hardwater season is here!

Thanks for the info. I will be out Saturday on the little mudd holes around Palo. I will let you all know how it goes… I am guessing it has 2 – 3 inches on it by the sounds of things. It was skim ice 3 days ago. With current calculations I would like to think a solid 3 inches by Sat am.
jc

About 2.5″ of ice this morning on the IC area ponds I checked. It is good clear ice, and held me up where I walked on it, but just the same I am going to wait a day or two before spending any time on it. The new snow cover is going to slow things down a little bit. But, it arrived just in time for the deer hunters.

Volga L. Had a short3 Sat.Mondayshort4 20ft from shore just did a test hole for hand check.ICE JOHN

The snow is making things complicated around Iowa City. I went out this afternoon thinking I would get some ice-fishing in on the ponds where I found 2″ of ice on Sunday. What I found was an inch of half-frozen slush on top of two inches of ice–a couple blows with the spud bar went right through the ice. If there hadn’t been four inches of snow insulating it there would be 4″ of good ice now, but what are you gonna do? I am hoping with the snow melted into slush and frozen tonight I can hit it Thursday afternoon.

I’m from Mn. but have family it Spirit lake.
Hope to get over there soon.
Is there any walkable ice on Okoboja of Big Spirit.

I have been out on about 4 inches of ice on some lakes over here. One nice walleye and a bunch of crappies the past two nights.

FSHNUT from MN.

fshnut,
Welcome to IDA
Post all you want, and enjoy the info and folks here.
I too have family(son)in Spirit Lake, but am stuck in NE Ia working.

dave