Iowa Ice, and Open Water Fishing Report 2-05-2010

We have been mixing it up a bit here in Iowa. Turns out that my “love it or leave it” theory should have stayed with love it, instead of leaving it, and heading to leech a week ago.

I love trying new water, and the potential for icing a 30″ walleye will about make me willing to drive anywhere. But the conditions we ran into were the worst I have experienced.

We started off the trip on a bad leg as it began, we didn’t arrive at our cabin until three am, and we decided to just go out and fish, with no sleep. Well, we fished hard until 11 Am, and didn’t have anything to show for our efforts, except an inch of freezing rain on every piece of gear we owned. We fished the main lake humps and then walker bay, and really only caught eater size walleyes. Plus we were catching them over 40+ FOW and no matter how slow we reeled them up, each fish blew their air bladder. We opted to not continue fishing this deep, in case we were to hook a slot, or trophy walleye.
The second day, it rained all day, and the third day, it was the 40mph winds, that caused the big accident on I35, which stranded us at cabelas until closing time, and then a hotel until the morning. I don’t think I have ever studied the fish tank as much as I did that night. There wasn’t a sole in the store! The second and third day, Marshal and Mitch got really sick, so we weren’t fishing very hard either.

So back to Iowa we went!

The bluegill and crappie fishing has still been fantastic even though this is the mid winter slow down. I have been upsizing my baits for the crappies from diamond jigs and ratsos to the blue/silver foil lightning spoons in 1/8 and 1/4 for the crappies and jigging very aggressively and making them chase the spoon.

For the bluegills I have been using my stand by gill pill in size ten, referred to as the zebra or black/white with orange underbody.

Marshal had the itch to get the ranger out, So Dad, him and I took it out wednesday. We hit muscatine and new boston with very little to show for our efforts. It was about two degrees below zero when we launched, and we had to use the front end of the duramax to bust out the ice on the ramp. THATS dedication/determination!! But the company and joking is always a great time! What was the score the first day Marshal?!?!? I had a blast vertical jigging with my thorne bros laker ice rod! I actually prefer this rod for vertical jigging over any other rod. It reduces arm fatigue by an unbelievable amount after jigging for two days straight with a one ounce jig!!

Then thursday we decided to hit the davenport pool with Cam and Mitch, and did a little better there. Vertical jigging by the rollers, produced some eater size saugers. We caught nicer fish trolling further down river using bottom bouncers and floating rapalas.

Until next time stay safe, and we’ll see you on the water!