Twin Valley/Pine Coulee/Clear Lake Report/S
 

Decided to create a sub thread, for fishers to these lakes. Add reports if you want but please make separate thread on fishing adventures.

Twin Valley is 2 thru 3 inches at two distant locations checked, Ice formation looks decent but personally won't be hitting the ice till the 19th. snow atop is maybe 1/4 inch and that's being generous. though with the above day time temps plus wind coming up conditions might degrade or level out ice rapidly. Overnights will grow maybe 1/2 inch.

Pine Coulee is frozen all but the SE leg of the lake, so if you know how to access or are willing to walk a long long way, you might be able to fish from shore. rest of the lake has what I'd call sketchy grey ice, bubbly with signs of flood ice freezing atop. I personally wouldn't chance pcr for walk on until at least the 25th or further. Bridge area completely frozen for those thinking it might be open for casting. Frozen at boat launch too but sketchy.

Was going to check Clear and with what I gathered from TVR/PCR and the vegetation in Clear, I'd put it in the later part of November for comfy ice trudging.

So for the heavier less nimble over dressed ice fishers, November 25th should be walkable. for the gutsier ice shufflers, pack light and wear flotation or rope off a tinner and report back.

[edit: just checked long term forecast for area and for comfy ice, I'm going to bump the date up to December 1st. Overnights will grow ice but daytimes will degrade with wind and above temps.]

Thanks a lot. Appreciate the effort you went through to get this report to us.:sHa_shakeshout:

Was hoping to try this weekend but I dont think I will chance it based on this report and the current weather. Thanks for the report and good idea breaking this into an individual post. Maybe next weekend.

Get out there folks!!!!4" at chesterslough

The forecast has changed dramatically since my original post. Looking at the forecast now, I would give next Sunday a go pending snowfall,, for twin and clear though. Pine coulee is an interesting body of water so I'd still give it sometime before comfy ice.

I would say twin is good to go, though I'd hold out on using skidoos or quads for at least another two weeks. No noticeable heaves or ice sweats [dark wetted patches]. About a half inch of snow. Wanted to add that twin is notorious for thinner ice especially below steep embankments due to subterranean melt, so if those are spots you're focusing on do a few test holes as you go.

Did you catch anything?

wasn't planning on heading out there while running errands then decided to go for an afternoon drive. have everything in my car always but hadn't loaded the auger, so argh no. chipped a hole but didn't make it through and had I made it through I wouldn't have made it wide enough to fish.

the last two years at this time it was open water and it was hen heaven.

tomorrow is forecast for heavy wind, might head back on wednesday

ice degrading rapidly with these higher temps and rain, fishable but soupy. was at a central alberta lake yesterday and ice was fine except for a very large area of the bad black ice that deteriorated through the day. forecasters are getting the weather wrong more often than not over many websites, and now they're saying below temps for southern alberta to get cold again from November 29th onward. exercise caution especially as ground snow thaws and makes its way atop and under the ice in spots.

Decided to take a bud out for drive, threw a couple of rods in, hand auger, bait and off we went.

Twin Valley is open for the majority of the southern leg of the lake. what ice there is, is about an inch and it's moving, so if you're an idiot wanting to fish an inch of ice, you may get on and do it, but, you will likely find yourself somewhere different than where you started on the lake, you could put a boat in from the east side.

So we had to cast with little ice rods from shore and today ranked as one of the best fishing days this year. If you fly fish for pike, I'd opt for a white and silver pattern slow slow fast slow slow fast on retrieve or short short long short short long. Water crystal clear. One of the fish my bud caught jumped twice, crazy fun on tiny rods.

1/4 inch thru 1/2 inch on twin all over (though temps for the next week will degrade quickly).

pine coulee open under bridge and a bit by shore. open all over by the boat launch, and open at the south end. pike fishing was great, caught a 5 and 9 pound

Twin warning
 

copy/paste this number to google maps 50.252278, -113.446104
it will show a pin of where gas bubbles come up and have melted the ice open. For about a meter from the open hole about an inch thick, if you go through the ice it's about 3 feet deep but on a slope, wanted to mark it but flagging tape in different tackle box. All other ice in the area was 3 thru 4 inches nice black ice. with the snow tomorrow thru Wednesday, it might be harder to spot. it's directly below the bluff and almost looks like an auger hole but bigger.

Ice at the launch can be odd too with the constant run off on north side of parking lot, so proceed with caution onto ice from there or just walk the shore to the main lake.

north end has 6 inches of solid clear great ice, though a bit thinner near shore as a heave is forming.

be safe, fishing good

good info.Thanks

Thank you for this detailed report. Could save someones life!!:happy0034: