Thursday ushered in a long awaited spell of day time highs
in the single digit minus Celsius range…it had been reported on the local radio
station that we had basically been suffering from abnormally cold temperatures
since mid-October. Not that I keep a record but from what I remember of the
pond at our hunt camp, it was froze over early October so that would seem to
make sense. I guess Sharon went home just in time.
After suffering through a stomach flu for the bulk of
Christmas and New Year’s, Andrea and I had become caught up in a large amount
of chores to get cleaned up. Right before Christmas her custom pantry had
arrived and I installed that and prepared the trim for her to stain. Between
the packaging for her pantry, her fish tank and various other Christmas
presents my side of the garage was overflowing with cardboard, even broken down
it was an impressive pile. I was backing my truck into her side of the garage
as soon as she left for work Thursday morning and started filling the back of
the truck. It literally filled the back of the truck to overflowing and I was
glad to get that dropped off. There was a pile of other chores that needed
attended too as well so that encompassed my Thursday morning.
After a nice lunch with Andrea, I headed to Morden’s famous
Lake Minnewasta to chase crappies for the afternoon and to trial my new ice
shack if required. I started to fish in 10 FOW (feet of water) and was marking
fish like crazy, there were crappie everywhere on my flasher but I could not
entice a bite no matter what I put in the water, I tried every type of jig,
tail and scent I could muster over the course of several hours and nothing. I
moved to deeper water, 17 FOW, this time and tried again, the fish were not as
plentiful but were active the same as the other depth, they would come in to
the flasher cone as soon as a presentation was dropped into the water and
investigate it, even follow it up the water column for up to five feet and then
take off. No amount of teasing to this point would entice a bite. As dark set
in I packed up and headed home, these crappie have so much natural forage there
is no need for them to take a jig and although I am “trying to match the hatch”
no luck so far. There is a chance that small minnows may work, if I can I will
try some Tuesday. My ice shack had proven to be perfect, although the
temperature had reached -8, there was a stiff wind blowing across the lake and
the new flip helter proved to be the perfect solution, the bulk of the
afternoon I spent just using the flip as a wind break, fishing in a pair of
jeans. I did after the sun started to set take the extra minute and extend the
poles and take complete shelter. It is a rather simple affair to use and
provides a plethora of space for angling, hard to beat that.
Friday morning saw me leaving as Andrea headed to work, I
headed to a place known locally as Patterson Pits, it is known to have very
large Rainbow trout, and also has Asian Carp and suckers. The depth is varied
as can be expected from a working drag line pit but is at least 75 feet at its
deeper portion. I was headed across the ice hauling my new flip sled by hand…not
the easiest through the deep snow but worked really well on the packed snow and
ice. Shortly after drilling holes trying to find the right water depth I had to
setup the shelter as it started to pour freezing rain. After a couple of hours
of freezing rain it quickly switched to wet snow for a few minutes as the sun
struggled to break through. Another day fishing and seeing fish on the flasher
with no bites, oh well it beats sitting around the house.
Andrea and I spent this weekend just hanging around together
and having fun. I am heading to Lockport, North of Winnipeg early Monday
morning to meet up with Rebel, we are going to try and catch something, might
only be sauger but I really need to feel a fish on the end of my line…I have
caught nothing since the trip to Lake Metigoshe, speaking of which I had a note
from Josh today that he went back there yesterday, caught one blue gill a few
perch and pike so not great there either…
Still running a skunk with the new Abu Garcia I got for
Christmas, if we get on some sauger tomorrow I might break it out and see how
much fun those 16 – 20 inch fish are on an ultralight rig with 2lb test in the
heavy current of the Red River…if we get into Walleye it will stay in the rod
case…
So the next report will be about my trip with Rebel…
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