Deteriorating Ice

[RayL42]

I tried a search on this subject and did not find anything that really answered my questions on ice at the end of the season.

If I understand correct when it warms up even thick ice can be unsafe because it will become “rotten”.

How do you determine the ice is safe at the end of the season?

[Sooner]

Most winters you will still have 3 to 4 ft of ice by the end of march. This year with the weird weather, who knows. Be safe later on and check to see if guys are driving on or just using quads and snowmobiles. If you dont see any, walk out 50 ft and drill a hole. Check the ice condition and thickness. If you think it's good, go another 50 and repeat. Many a time in march at Calling & Slave lake I have had to use the extension on the auger. Good ice looks real solid down the hole, rotten ice comes up in chips and just looks different. Im sure you will get more tips from the regular ice fishers here. Might be a good idea to say if you fish the northern half or southern half of the province. I mostly fish north of edmonton.

[Bush]

After you drill the hole you look down the hole. White ice is bad you only count the clear ice as safe. With experience with your auger you will notice that rotten ice is harder drilling

[anthony5]

At the end of the season the ice will turn black, might be 2 feet thick and is rotten. Rotten ice is honeycombed because of warm weather and water laying on the ice, which eventually seeps through hence the honeycomb. Honeycombed ice is not safe at any thickness:mad0100:

[Drewski Canuck]

If you cut a hole, and seem to "PUSH" through the last few inches, this is obviously bad. If the ice takes on a vertical formation of "candles", this is really bad, as the ice will easily slip down under any weight, and has no lateral cohesion to teh other candles.

IF you walk out late, watch the edges very carefully. Edges will melt out over a day.

A bad sign is a patch of really dark ice. Water is coming into it, and it likely has some spring activity under it.

That having been said, I have done some crazy things fishing late season under the mentoring of a man that proves there are angel guardians.

Marshall Ewasiuk, its a miracle you are still alive.

Drewski

[leeaspell]

If you cut a hole, and seem to "PUSH" through the last few inches, this is obviously bad. If the ice takes on a vertical formation of "candles", this is really bad, as the ice will easily slip down under any weight, and has no lateral cohesion to teh other candles.

IF you walk out late, watch the edges very carefully. Edges will melt out over a day.

A bad sign is a patch of really dark ice. Water is coming into it, and it likely has some spring activity under it.

That having been said, I have done some crazy things fishing late season under the mentoring of a man that proves there are angel guardians.

Marshall Ewasiuk, its a miracle you are still alive.

Drewski

I was camping ay Carson 2 years ago at the beginning of April. It was a super watm weekend so figured get in some early camping. Anyway, at around 7 on Saturday morning this truck pulls up, this old timer gets out, grabs his pail and his auger and off he goes. Will it got up to 18 degrees that day and when i finally seen him heading back the ice had melted out at least 50 feet. He just walked up the edge, sat down and slide off in the water up to his neck and just kept walking. I was watching to make sure he made it. When he got to shore he just said, well I think I'm done ice.fishing for this year. Lol

[Fish-killer]

I would walk on only!

[WayneChristie]

I fish the same lakes all winter, so I notice changes in the ice, cracks and pressure ridges. Was looking at a huge open area on Rolling Hills yesterday, and 1/2 a mile away theres a truck parked on the ice, easily close enough to shore to walk on and fish. not the brightest star in the sky!

[Jwood 456]

With the lakes I fish, I won't even walk out when my boots can sink into an inch or more through the honeycombed ice on top and if I the ice is weak more than a foot away from shore. If I hit one of those springs, there could possibly only be 2" of slush over the spring!

[Stewie]

You can also tell when your drilling a hole in the middle of winter you get nice clean ice shavings… when you start getting close to spring I notice chunks of ice and the water seems a brown colour…

[RayL42]

Thanks for the replies so far just one more question.

When will the ice begin to rot?

For example if we had a week with an average temperature above freezing would the ice begin to rot or is only a few days?

Thanks again.

[anthony5]

RayL42, a few days with +10 or more and a breeze, not freezing over nite, Black ice and no water laying anywhere very good chance it is rotten:thinking-006:

[rabbit-hunter]

This is terrible if the ice were bad but I did not noticed. Espetially inexperienced one like me. Will someone post a sign at the entrance to warn people? May I ask about when it will not be safe driving on gull lake since I normally only fish there.

[anthony5]

Rabbit-hunter, SERIOUSLY, if not sure don't go out, I doubt anyone is going to check it for you, it's up to you to know the ice conditions your going to fish and if it's safe or NOT!!!. Any public access is posted all winter long, private accesses normally are not, that's the situation in Southern AB anyway. If you know of people out fishing your area, ask and that may help you with your decision.

[ice]

Last year I was on utikuma at the end of march we quaded out to the north side of the island, drilled a hole and didn't punch through until the auger was maxxed out barely made it through, this was nice solid ice, that could easily support a large truck, as the day wore on we made our way back to 86 where we accessed the lake and decided to punch a few holes for the last hour or 2 of the trip, well the ice was just as thick but as the holes were drill the ice was slushy with a lot of water coming up with the shaving, terrible ice, having a quad on it was sketchy at best, so you really have to be carefull.
The next weekend one of my buddy's took his quad on and broke threw however they were able to recover it before it was submerged and everything was fine,

Stay safe out there.

Ice