Fish On!
Almost!
January 3, 2003
By: MyBayCity Staff
Andrew Berkobien and the One and Only Keeper!
Heading off to poke a new hole in the ice.
Happy New Year!
Now that the holidays have come and gone we can concentrate on fishing and hunting. . . NOT on shopping and returning gifts!
Santa was quite good to me with a new ice fishing combo and new gear to keep me warm on the ice.
We put the new combo to good use and tried a few different lakes North of Bay County were we found good ice but few fish.
The best Northern we landed is the one in the picture. This 27 inch Northern Pike was caught in 4-6 feet of water on a tip-up with a chub chaser. That was the only fish landed in our first 6 hour stint on the lake. Yes, I said 6 hours.
The next day the wind was blowing and the pike must've been sleeping. There was some action but still only 2 fish landed.Two large mouth bass feeding on our goldies made the morning go by, but the afternoon was uneventful. We had a few flags but nothing at the end of the line.
We did some jigging with wax worms and goldies but had no luck! The fish just were not cooperating!
After all that excitement on the ice, I decided it was time to do some bunny hunting. We actually did quite well going 4 out of 5 on the bunnies.
It was just my luck that the camera froze while we were out chasing rabbits so, I'm sorry to say there aren't any pictures of the bunnies but trust me, they made the meal. The menu for that night was fresh rabbit and deep fried pike. If I do say so myself it was mighty tastey.
Then, mother nature came a long and gave us a blanket of warm weather. A big melt and lots of standing water on the ice was Her way of saying, It's time to go back to work!
When we got back to the area we found the Saginaw River open with a few fisherman on it. We saw about 4 boats and those that I spoke to at the landing weren't having much luck.
We thought about hitchin up the boat and joining them on the river and seeing how far we could get up the Shiawassee but decided it would be better to be safe than sorry with possible ice damage to the boat so we stayed home.
We may try the bay this weekend. Of course, if we do, I'll let you know! Remember, if you have any great outdoors stories
email them to me and I will mention you in my next article along with any pictures you'd like to send.
Stay safe on the ice and good luck!