I got on the water at 6am and it was snowing sideways. I punched out a weed bed on an inland pond that had held fish the week before and got set up for the day. As soon as the dark started to fade, the panfish started coming out of the weeds. For 45 minutes, the bluegill came as fast as I could get down. They were suspending above the weeds at varying depths depending on how tall the weeds were. It ranged from 6″ to 4 feet below the ice. Once the sun was completely up, the fish slowed but were still cruising in less concentrated corridors. They began to go down into the weeds to settle for the day around 9am. At this point, we began moving around more searching out fish in the weeds. The bite was pretty bad at this point so we made a big move to the other side of the lake after an hour of limited success.
The second spot we hit held larger numbers of fish so we stayed for a few hours. The bluegill were half in the thick weeds and half right at the surface of the weeds waiting for a passing meal. The pumpkinseed seemed to be hanging deeper in the weeds and far less active. It seemed like for the fish that were in the weeds, the harder that I pounded a jig the more fish I caught. They were very active but because of the dense weeds, the fish didn’t come in large pods as they were basically staying put. After struggling to catch fish for too long, I decided to head back over to where we began the morning.
Because I had been fishing this weed bed quite a bit lately, I had a good idea of what holes would produce. I have dropped my Aqua Vu camera down most of the holes at least once now and have identified certain holes that have openings in the weed canopy. As soon as I started fishing, I was catching fish. I caught over 25 fish, mostly pumpkinseed, between the first two holes I kicked open. I called the troops over thinking that I was on a good bite!
I continued to catch decent numbers of fish but not great. For two hours we all made rounds in the holes from the morning session. The fishing was slow and lots of bass were swimming around below us. Around 5pm, there was only two of us that were the only one still motivated to stay in hopes of a night bite. As the group of guys were walking off the ice after calling it quits, the fishing picked up. My buddy and I caught good numbers of fish for another 20 minutes then he had to head out for some family time. I stayed in a cluster of 5 holes until dark and pounded on them. The evening bite has been really good at this spot. The smaller fish disappear for the night and every gill that comes out of the hole seems to be over 8″.
I cant wait to get back on this spot again! The fishing has been top notch!
D & B Ice Adventures 