NumenOn the Water
Date: 2-15-16
Date: 2-15-16
Body of Water: McEwen Lake
Boat: None, Ice fishing
With: Alone
Target: Crappies
Time: 1 PM - 5 PM
Conditions: Overcast with snow flurries, about 25 F with southerly winds; about 6 inches of solid ice with an inch of snow cover. Several other groups on the ice targeting both shallow pike and basin panfish.
This year's version of the Polar Vortex just skirted Michigan on its way to the East Coast. It brought cold, but not super-cold conditions to West Michigan for this past weekend. This glancing blow made it easy to stay inside, tie more hair jigs, and wait for more amenable conditions on President's Day.
Conditions on Monday were more amenable, just less so than predicted. It was still quite fishable, local ice conditions had finally firmed up, and light snow cover made moving on the ice easy. But it was cold enough to make the pursuit of comfort a task, and not a given.
Once again I targeted suspended crappies, and I encountered similar, although diminished, conditions. The fish were there*, but in lesser numbers. They were feeding less and refusing more. The ones I did catch** were generally smaller (two crappies in the double digits among the eight assorted crappies and bluegills I landed.) It was usually just one from each hole, and each fish took some effort to coax into biting. All in all, it felt like mid- to late-winter; as I guess it actually is.
This year's version of the Polar Vortex just skirted Michigan on its way to the East Coast. It brought cold, but not super-cold conditions to West Michigan for this past weekend. This glancing blow made it easy to stay inside, tie more hair jigs, and wait for more amenable conditions on President's Day.
Conditions on Monday were more amenable, just less so than predicted. It was still quite fishable, local ice conditions had finally firmed up, and light snow cover made moving on the ice easy. But it was cold enough to make the pursuit of comfort a task, and not a given.
Once again I targeted suspended crappies, and I encountered similar, although diminished, conditions. The fish were there*, but in lesser numbers. They were feeding less and refusing more. The ones I did catch** were generally smaller (two crappies in the double digits among the eight assorted crappies and bluegills I landed.) It was usually just one from each hole, and each fish took some effort to coax into biting. All in all, it felt like mid- to late-winter; as I guess it actually is.
What do I have to say about this?
Black/White or Yes/No are too simplistic notions for fishing, and so I tend to think at least in trinary terms. Here I think the individual legs for my functional 3-legged stool are Comfort, Ease and Efficiency. I tend to seek easy and efficient ice fishing opportunities (at least for panfish; I can work or suffer for trout and pike), but let's face it, these factors are enabled or limited by comfort. In this case, I chose to maximize ease and efficiency by traveling light, that is without the portable shanty. It just turned out to be too darned cold for this strategy to work out. The cold diminished my enjoyment out there and sapped my sonar's battery such that I was getting off the ice just as Prime Time was settling in. This was probably no big loss (the bite was hardly ramping up when the sonar finally quit), it just left the trip something short of perfection. This is what I'll remember the trip for; leaving early had a bigger impact on me than hunting the fish successfully.
Of course, lugging the shelter up from the basement, fitting it into the truck and dragging it across the ice and from hole to hole would have diminished my ease and efficiency; it's all work and it all takes time.
I'll just have to continue to seek my Personal Balance with every trip.
Meanwhile, Facebook reminds me that two years ago I had AmyBaby22 parked in our temporary back yard, I was making bait with ease and my biggest problem was hooking up with toothy predators. (Of course, anchor and wind issues had not yet arisen as part of that trip.)
* I fished in the deepest part of the main lake basin, and generally from 35 to 40 feet of water.
** All my fish succumbed to a small, plain gold Swedish Pimple tipped with maggots. More aggressive and less aggressive baits were consistently ignored. The bait was usually just hanging there after a small lift. Generally the highest fish in the column would be the biter.
Black/White or Yes/No are too simplistic notions for fishing, and so I tend to think at least in trinary terms. Here I think the individual legs for my functional 3-legged stool are Comfort, Ease and Efficiency. I tend to seek easy and efficient ice fishing opportunities (at least for panfish; I can work or suffer for trout and pike), but let's face it, these factors are enabled or limited by comfort. In this case, I chose to maximize ease and efficiency by traveling light, that is without the portable shanty. It just turned out to be too darned cold for this strategy to work out. The cold diminished my enjoyment out there and sapped my sonar's battery such that I was getting off the ice just as Prime Time was settling in. This was probably no big loss (the bite was hardly ramping up when the sonar finally quit), it just left the trip something short of perfection. This is what I'll remember the trip for; leaving early had a bigger impact on me than hunting the fish successfully.
Of course, lugging the shelter up from the basement, fitting it into the truck and dragging it across the ice and from hole to hole would have diminished my ease and efficiency; it's all work and it all takes time.
I'll just have to continue to seek my Personal Balance with every trip.
Meanwhile, Facebook reminds me that two years ago I had AmyBaby22 parked in our temporary back yard, I was making bait with ease and my biggest problem was hooking up with toothy predators. (Of course, anchor and wind issues had not yet arisen as part of that trip.)
* I fished in the deepest part of the main lake basin, and generally from 35 to 40 feet of water.
** All my fish succumbed to a small, plain gold Swedish Pimple tipped with maggots. More aggressive and less aggressive baits were consistently ignored. The bait was usually just hanging there after a small lift. Generally the highest fish in the column would be the biter.
