I was out on badger for 3 straight days right after new year's,meant to post earlier but got caught up with getting back to work! Close to shore I measured 18 inches of ice and a healthy 16 inches at the middle. Everywhere I checked the ice was absolutely clear and the surface perfect enough to skate from tip up to tip up. Sure is an amazing sight when you black out with your shack and can not only see your bait but every fish that swims by it (even in 25 fow)
Over the three days I tried a variety of spots and depths with the same attack pattern, 4 tip ups covering a line across or down a shelf with quick strike rigs, and a shack with a few rods (one on a lipless rattle crank and another with a 1/2 oz Jighead and smelt). We tried smelts minnows and some herring, with the majority of the fish caught on the rattle bait with smelts in close second.
Tried the hump right in the middle surrounded by the deeps with zero luck. Tried north of the boat launch by 400 meters with 8 on the day (biggest 30"). And finally, gave the honey hole to the south (200m from the dyke) a good run and caught 10, biggest was 36". We did see one beast come by but just couldn't seem to get her interested in anything.
Not a bad run, we were aiming for size not quantity so baits might have been too big to bump the numbers up. Big heads up to anyone headed out, there is a huge icedam built up from east to west across the lake just north of center so use caution. I test drilled in about 10 spots along one part where I was crossing and it only got thicker. I always recommend testing on your own before getting too ballsy on the ridges!
Great spot though, excited to try some of the spots I saw other set up, still looking for that 20 lb beast.
Good luck!
Sent from my T06 using Tapatalk
|
Linear Mode
