Sunday, January 31, 2010

Today was our second winter ice fishing rodeo of the season. Those in attendance for while it lasted were the following:

• Ed
• Travis
• Kevin + Girlfriend
• Chuck from Chitown.com
• Bill + Brother
• Dan
• Brian
• Jake

Others were supposed to show up such as members of the Trout Mafia (mplant and co.) and Dyers, but the clutch on Mike’s Civic blew out, and Dyers did a blow-off and never showed up.

The morning began at 8am as we gathered at Oakhurst Forest Preserve located in Aurora, Illinois. We made this be our venue due to Ed’s recommendation, so we all agreed to it. It was a mega-bust as nothing was caught. Our plan of attack was to fish everywhere and that we did. We had dozens of shiners ready to meet their deaths under our colony of tip-ups with hopes that 5-pound Largemouth Bass would smash them. Likewise, our jig rods were prepared to massacre the panfish.

Unfortunately nothing happened out there today. By the time we concluded fishing at the lake, it was close to 1pm. Not a single fish was caught. By then, everyone else had left.

However, the day was still young and my day of fishing was still far from being finished.

Dan and Brian also didn’t want to call it a day early so we elected to stop someplace on our way home. Lake-X, a 20-acre forest preserve lake, was the venue and we stayed until sunset.

At this point we just wanted to catch something, so that was the plan.

In two and a half hours, we were able to cover the entire north half of the lake. A total of 40 holes were drilled, covering depths from the weedy 3-4-5-6 foot levels all the way down to the barren 8-9-10-11-12-13-14-15 foot levels going down into the bowl-like basin of the lake.

With the jig rods and colony of tip-ups we had set, I was able to ice up only two Bluegills.

Meanwhile on the tip-ups, the only biters was the lone Largemouth iced up by Dan. We shot a video of him bringing it up. Here it is:

Other than that, it was a pathetic day of fishing for all parties involved. In 8 hours of being on the ice, a total of four fish were witnessed being caught out of a couple dozen anglers. Fish were being seen on the screen of my locator but everything was in a negative and totally inactive mood.

Despite our troubles, I am actually very glad that not everyone came out and joined us today because of the lack of fish. But for those who came out, it was fun to BS around again with fun discussion as usual. And to the newcomers of the site, Bill and brother, it was nice to meet you two. We’ll definitely fish again!

As of right now, I believe our next scheduled event, and final formal outing of the season, will be held in southeastern Wisconsin at one of the Lake Michigan harbors. The Legendary Trout Mafia will be coordinating this event for everyone’s enjoyment. This will be scheduled for the third or fourth weekend of February. According to the Mafia, late ice is the best for trout on the ice.

Since nothing was caught today, and thanks to Kevin, we still have close to 4-dozen minnows swimming around in a large electrically-aerated bucket in my cold garage. This is a sign that we need to hit the ice again somewhere next weekend.