Ice Fishing 2022-23

[lanyard]

FIL nailed them Saturday on Devil's, no bueno on Sunday.

[Nershi]

Felon, the WI comment is kind of a running joke among our group of friends that started way back in my college days in wi. Those sconies just love their tip ups. They’ll set out tip ups before even dropping a ducer. Many don’t even bring rods. I started jazzing them and it just kept snowballing. I get a kick out of it because it holds true all too often.

Good to hear about the Mille lacs perch. I was hoping that big year class had some survivors. I’d love for the perch fishing to come back in Mille lacs. It’s one those bites I hear so much about but never got in on.

Red lake was good early ice walleye fishing as usual this past weekend with a few bonus crappies and moon eye thrown in. Center bar was on fire when we headed out there Saturday until some dudes showed up with the rap music bumping. Look bro, I love me some Eminem too but not when fishing in 12 feet of water on ice. Fish were being super negative to jigging spoons all weekend. Did some bait swapping right away and figured out they wanted some new to me plastics. Same plastics I’ve been using for lakers just the micro version. No meat needed. I’ve mostly gone away from using meat on jig sticks for panfish and lakers and it looks like walleyes may be next. I think they’ll work fine on splake, browns and hohos too. Some of the plastics released in the past few years have been killer.

Found 4-16 inches of ice. The 4 of crap ice was kind of scary considering we rolled up with three machines and seven guys.

[maplelakeduckslayer]

Geez that's quite the variance. I'm not an early ice guy because of that lol

[Fish Felon]

Was slow a couple nights ago....

Picked up last night....caught a bunch....

Including some that went 13"

[Fish Felon]

Caught a decent pike (for the lake I'm on) the other day....

[Bullet21XD]

I get now get why waterfowl hunting is a dead pastime. We represent the last generation for it.

I don't know, man...this savage 12 y/o chick would probably disagree!



Yeah...I actually took a kid hunting.

[Drunk_Dynasty]

We’ll see if she survives the “sorry I only let me in laws out there” stage of waterfowl hunting. It’s enough to chill even the hottest blood for waterfowling. I’m really not enthused about the future of duck hunting.


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[Nershi]

Looks like a slow day for the mercs. I thought you stacked them up this time of year. I guess green heads are an okay second.

[Nershi]

Nice work felon. What’s the biggest crappie you’ve pulled out of there?

[Fish Felon]

Nice work felon. What’s the biggest crappie you’ve pulled out of there?

13.5"

We'd never caught one bigger than 12.5" until three or four years ago. I told guys that too....they'd mention catching 13" slabs and I'd tell them to put a tape to any big one they caught and it'd be 12.5 or under. Brother-in-law didn't believe me until every "big" one he brother in measured was no shit....12.5." He actually found it pretty funny....every time he got a real nice one he thought, "that's gotta be 13," and sure as shit...it'd be 12.5"

I've cleaned a lot of 7" Nokomis crappies....literally thousands....never gave a phuck about the limit....not throwing a 7" crappie back into the same stunted lake it came from....and when I stay stunted I mean in the sense that I'd catch over a hundred and the biggest one would be 7.5" maybe.....none of them would come within a half inch of 8." You get good at cleaning fish when you're cleaning a lot....and especially a lot of small fish. You'd be surprised by how many meals for how many people I fried up of nothing but 7" crappie filets; "fish nuggets."

So the fatty, thick 8.5" "basement size crappie" in the lake I'm on aren't slabs, but they're plentiful and good eating. Unlike Nokomis they aren't the only size.....I'd say have the ones I clean are 8.5-9" and the other half 9" to 11." Anything above 12" for sure gets thrown back, but a fair amount of 11" to 12" get cleaned by siblings or buddies and I don't care.....not going to be a nazi about since it isn't a big deal and probably doesn't matter anyways. It's a small but fairly deep, very clear lake in East Central MN......doubt we'll ever see 15"s like other parts of the state (bigger lakes that are usually shallower and murkier....West metro, SE river backwaters and large slough lake shit in Ottertail and NW).

13"s started showing up 3-4 years ago a few years after zebes arrive. All panfish & perch now grow bigger.....not sure where the ceiling is but 10" sunfish and 13" crappies didn't exist until zebes and although they're not prevalent yet....they're not uncommon either.