Where do I begin? I am still shaking from the fishing experience I just encountered. I was working at the shop this afternoon, close to Lake Macbride, and I decided that I would try my luck with the walleyes tonight. I got on the lake around 3:15 PM. What I would encounter in the next hour would be unbelievable.
I began punching holes in search of some underwater rock flats. I punched about 20 holes, checking the depth of the ice in each hole. There was only about 3″. I am always very hesitant to fish Macbride during early ice, because I don’t fish the community spots, so I am usually one of the first to go out on the main lake. That’s either stupid, or smart depending on how you look at it! Today would be no different, there were no footprints in the snow as far as the eye could see. It is a little eery out there especially with all of the snow cover on the lake. Each first ice on macbride you can run into variable ice conditions on different parts of the lake. Some areas will have five good inches of ice, and you got twenty yards in any direction and the ice can become life threatening thin. This is where I would like to emphasize, if you are going to go onto the main lake- BE careful, the ice is very thin in areas.
So after I punched some holes, I found the rock flat I was looking for and began fishing. I was targeting walleyes, so I was using my new 36″ thorne walleye rod. If you haven’t felt this rod yet, it is built for flatheads. I was marking fish, but I assumed they were blue-gills as they wouldn’t hit my spoon. I checked all of the holes in the area, and didn’t like what I was seeing. So I decided to pack up and move to the next flat. I began punching holes again, only this time I wanted to concentrate on deeper water, so I ventured even further out into the main lake.
I dropped the transducer in the hole, and the bottom of the screen was lit up like a Christmas tree. I thought oh great, more blue gills. I decided what the heck, and dropped the spoon down again. I mean, those could have been walleyes right? Wrong! As the spoon was free falling I saw about four or five returns absolutely go screaming kamikaze style up to my lure. One fish got to it first and absolutely destroyed it. At this point, I am thinking I have a HUGE walleye on, the fight lasted about ten minutes and I never saw the fish, the treble got hooked in the bottom of the hole, and the fish got off.
As I sat there, I was so angry, because I thought I had a monster walleye just get off at the hole. Then I gathered myself, and dropped back down again, same story, the fish absolutely crushed my spoon. This one I landed, and it was a 20″+ whitebass. These fish fought so hard, and had such a great attitude. They were giving my new rod all the work it could handle.
I was using the new lightning spoon from custom jigs and spins for the majority of these fish, tipped with no bait. These fish weren’t concerned about bait. The color was black/silver foil. After I mistakenly caught these fish, I began fishing for them- and had an absolute blast for about one hour.
Key to staying on these roaming machines was to stay with the shad. The LX-5 played a tremendous role in helping me stay on these fish. As I would hole hop, and mark shad, I would begin jigging below them. They would vanish off of the screen, and no more than two seconds later I would get hammered. I believe the way I was presenting the baits, these fish thought they were getting a wounded shad that couldn’t get away as quick as the others. Having a high quality flasher makes this type of fishing fun and easy. Also, leaving the flasher in the wide beam transducer allowed me to find bigger populations of shad.
About the first photo- I had a jigging rap on my perch rod- I broke off my spoon on a big fish- So instead of retying, I opted to drop the other bait down. And I kid you not, I caught both of those fish on one bait. One was hooked on the front hook, and the other on the back. Try getting those fish through one hole for fun sometime.
If you have never experienced a white bass bite through the ice- I would recommend it highly. I would go as far as to say that this type of fishing is even more exhilarating than fishing for huge walleyes. These fish never gave up, and I will also say that this was my best ice fishing experience to date, I am still shaking!!
I know where I will be all day tomorrow!!
All fish were released!
Good luck, stay safe, and we’ll see you on the hard water!
Wow, been a long time since I caught white bass through the ice. I’m sure it was a blast! Great report Luke!
That had to be way cool Luke
I know the feeling of being the first one making tracks and as you said, it can make a guy jumpy with changing ice conditions, great job
Them White’s had to be a total blast to hook up on while ice fishing. I’m sure it made for some great tug of war
Very cool
Those are some awesome whites!!
Ted
Nice Fish Luke!! I see how you work, we go out to the Thin ice rivers and a couple of Bluegill hot spots, meanwhile you’ve got a Huge Striped Bass Honey Hole saved in your back pocket!!! I promise if you take me to the best spots I’ll let you catch the biggest fish!!!
Just Kidding , awesome fish, great job! If anyone can sniff out big fish it’s you..
Oh my god!!! I am not jealous at all and was very happy to be at work until 7:30…. Nice friggin fish man
Very cool Luke. I have heard about the big white bass in McBride but never got into them-that is just awesome!
–Whitey
Nice job Luke looks like fun.
Wow!!
Nice fish Luke! I tried to find a stocking report for that lake and couldn’t find one. Reason I did that is I believe them are wipers that you caught. I went back and looked at a bunch of pics from Nebraska that I have and they look exactly like yours. Either way, them are some great fish to land on hard water. We had a couple 100+ wiper days last year in KS.
Great Job!!!!!!!
There are hybrids and whites in that lake. I caught one over 7 this fall, that was definitely not a white bass. Good job on smokin em through the ice.
nice fish indeed. the state record for white bass is a 20″
3lb 14oz one caught out of the IGL’s. so if they were whites rather than wipers you may have had state record on your hands
Luke,did you get a tape on that largest white,what do you think it went?
Well, in the double photo, the one on the left was 20″ all I had was a 20″ cheap toy tape measure. I know I caught one that was pushing 10 lbs. It was a monster and would not fit through the hole for about five minutes.
I am not sure if they are whites or hybrids. But I guarantee they are the hardest fighting fish under the ice in my area.
they are hybrids. we got some from oklahoma and some from another state in a trade for leftover walleyes. there are a bunch of the big hybrids in there now. We were into them in october for about a week and the biggest i got was 27″ and about 10-11lbs.
Great report Luke. Nice looking whites.
Next time you get into them Luke, check the inside of there mouth for ID. A white bass has 1 patch on its tounge(sp) and a wiper(hybrid) has 2. This is really critical if you have different creel limits for each. Here in Nebraska, you can have 15 whites and only 2 wipers. Very easy to get mixed up if you don’t look.
Anyway it was still a great day!!!!!!!
Excellent report Luke!! I’d love to see that LX-5 in person some time. I’m forecasting some rediculously cold weather coming up Sunday through Tuesday, along with high winds. If we can get by without too much snow Sat-Sun, that should make for better ice. On the other hand, deep snow’s possible too, so cross those frigid fingers! Cheers.
Do whatever you can to keep that snow outta here!! I will take all the cold you can deliver!! Just name your price-
Shoot me an e-mail anytime, we’ll fish, and I have an extra lx-5 you can test out for yourself!
Nice report Luke. We used to catch them in the open water when I lived down there. Those are Hybrids I believe, we called them Wipers back then. They get really big, just not as big as Stipers. Fun through the ice I bet
Great Report, Luke!!!
Very cool report
that had to be fun catching those beasts threw the ice
Way to go!
Well the fish are still there…these fish fight like no other fish under the ice!!
Luke,
I’ve got a Holiday Sing along at Daughters school @ 2:00 and then I’ll be heading straight for the ice. I’m not going to miss this bite, make sure you save me some, don’t wear all their mouths out before I get there.
” You bring the lures, I’ll catch the fish…”
See you tomorrow-
NICE fish Luke!!!