Five o’clock in the morning couldn’t come soon enough this past weekend. Three hours later the sun was burning down from a cloudless sky as we pulled up next to a large island on Shoal Lake, Ontario. In this particular area, two other groups of ice anglers had arrived before us, so we headed to area between the two groups. Darrin Bohonis quickly drilled a hole to find a depth with me right behind with the Humminbird Ice 55 to check depth. “We need forty five feet of water Darren!”. Lo and behold as the depthfinder powered up, 46.5 registered on the digital readout. “Bingo!” and Darrin then proceeded to drill holes in a line to keep the same depth. After the third hole, something snapped in the power auger and it was done for the day.
FINDING THE RIGHT DEPTH
Fortunately we had one hole each, just enough to allow us to spread out to enjoy a spectacular day of ice fishing for a great sport fish. Out of the hole came a whitefish so fat, it filled the eight inch ice hole on the way up.
As we started to snap photos of this monster, I noticed that my Canon 40D was telling me that I had no flash card inserted. Ouch! I had committed the cardinal mistake of not checking before I left on the trip. Not only that, I didn’t have a backup card in my Pelican case, two rookie mistakes. Luckily Darrin had virtually the same camera so we got lots of great shots on this day. After some photos, I ran over to my pail to get a measuring tape. It registered 26 inches in length with a whopping 15 ½ inch girth. Now that’s what I call a whitefish! As the sun rose in the sky, the fish continued to bite, some on the bottom, some just under the ice but most at around 36 feet on this particular day.
Darrin ended up catching the most. LURE SELECTION: Darren had his most success using a Berkley white power tube jig in the one inch size on a Northlands 1/8 ounce silver eyeball jig. (www.northlandtackle.com) I caught my first eight fish on a 3/16 ounce Blue Fox Lil Foxee Jiggin Minnow (www.rapala.ca/products/bluefox/lfjm.php) in white and sliver tipped with a Berkley one inch white power grub. After that I caught a few more on small Berkley Realistix chartreuse minnow and jig. At the end of the day I scratched out two more fish on a ¼ Rattlin Snakie Jigging spoon tipped with a small Berkley Power Natural earthworm.(www.berkley-fishing.com)
When I dropped this presentation down the first time, a whitefish streaked off the bottom fifteen feet to inhale the bait. This particular fish, though not the biggest of the day, gave me an incredible fight, peeling 10 pound test Berkley Crystal Fireline three times. Each of us that day was also using fluorocarbon lead of two feet with a small swivel to attach to the main line. You also want to use a medium action ice rod with a soft tip for the small baits that we are using. You need decent backbone on the rod though to get good hook sets in deeper water. Anglers Notes: We all forgot sunscreen on this particular day, not a great idea at this time of year. Luckily we each had top of the line, sunglasses.
My Maui Jim dark blue pair saved my eyes from the intense refraction. To see some great photos from the trip, check out Darrin online at http://web.me.com/dbohonis/www.bohonisenterprisesinc.ca. Darrin is a tremendous photographer and can provide some incredible shots for a wide variety of use.