I had an interesting thought. The other day I was fishing with a buddy and we were in shallow water going for Walleyes. The lake was very clear and we could see the bottom in HD during the day. The ice being 7″ and clear as could be the lights in our house had to be beam of light right under the ice after dark. My question is does the light benefit or does it scare the fish. Any thoughts?
I go dark in shallow clear water with clear ice. Lights on only when necessary. Noise to a bare minimum too.
If possible, I like to find areas of cloudy ice or a snow patch to set up on when I’m fishing shallow, night or day. Like others said, keep the lights to a minimum.
I guide bowfishing trips and bowfish a lot! Lights don’t seem to affect carp or other fish in any real dramatic ways! They just keep doing what they’re doing however they move because of noise and seeing us driving around shooting arrows at them! All said and done I honestly don’t think that they care about lights! Also it gives a little presentation advantage to your jig 
A heavenly light coming down to your jig just asking to be bitten!
My question is does the light benefit or does it scare the fish. Any thoughts?
In some areas, during the open water season, lights are actually put under water to enhance the fish bite for night fishing. In MN such underwater lights are illegal to use. Any light for above the waters surface is perfectly ok as far as being legal.
As far as improving the fish bite, if it works for open water it may well work during the winter on ice. That said, I have seen fish scatter from shadows cast over the water. So if your moving around and have a light on in your shack, you may be scaring fish with your shadow.
Personally I like to set up over cloudy ice to minimize my shadow, rather than the actual light itself.
I’ve always been impressed with how aware fish are of their surrounding. I subscribe to the concept of keeping it natural,…which means dark. I absolutely killed a good panfish bite by dropping in a flashlight that wouldn’t quit (a good time to not have the Ever Ready battery in your light). We had to fish in the portable 50′ away to get the action going again.
I like to try to keep the environment the same as always whether it be fishing or hunting.
Deer walks along and catches a whiff of a ‘different than normal’ scent – it’s on high alert. It doesn’t need to smell your armpits, it just needs to smell something different than normal to be on alert.
Same goes with fish. If the rest of the lake is dark and quiet; i don’t want to be bright and noisy. It’s just different than the natural surrounding. I’d rather simply present a lure in the natural surrounding.
Can be hard to run/gun in shallow clear ice conditions.
Back in the day while I was at school at Stout, we used to fish ultra shallow. It was off the ice, no lights unless there was snow cover, even no ice cleats!!!
We have an early ice spot in N. WI where lights are allowed most of the time because we rarely have ice without snow, but we maintain the same no ice cleats and quiet ice procedures during that shallow water fishing. Before the snow melds into the ice giving a person good traction, drilling holes and walking to flags can be very interesting!!!
Mark
Somebody recently suggested when fishing on clear ice, find the small patches of snow. These kind of act like a dock or patch of weeds, and give the fish a false sense of security. Haven’t tried it yet, but it makes sense……
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