Winter sports

A traditional activity, ice fishing can discourage even the most experienced fishermen. Imagine a beautiful winter day, windy, with terrible cold outside and there, an immobile fisherman, sitting, watching his pull-up. Many  fishermen use a linen shelter with a coal or a petroleum stove. The most organized have real houses with  all possible comforts, an open floor to be able to fish from a warm house, with beer and a favorite TV programme, why not !

To fish under ice is an activity that has a certain risk. You must know exactly the lake or the river because many things can influence the ice thickness. Thick ice may be broken by a flowing spring, an important fish bed can also make the ice thinner. Near the bank, ice can also be more fragile, especially in the spring season.  In some bays of great lakes such as Lake Ontario for example, at the beginning of the winter, there are big populations of walleyes under the still thin ice. To avoid a fatal ice break, the more unconscious fishermen go on the barely frozen surface by creeping on boards ! At the same place, it has already happened, in the winter time, when the ice was solid enough  to fish on without any risk, that a huge ice block broke off the bank and drifted with some hundred fishermen onto. They had to be rescued by helicopters ! Anyway, young ice is   more resistant than old ice and you must always be careful. In some places, the pressure makes fissures and raise blocks of ice which overlap. Avoid these places because there may be free water areas of unstable ice. Don't go on the ice without asking local people about conditions and test the thickness of the ice by hitting far away from you with a well sharpen ice scissor. If the ice fissures or if the ice scissor goes through return to the shore.  Ideally, follow the paths already marked out by the people who know the place. The trappers don't go on the ice without a long wood pole that they carry horizontally like a tightrope walker. If the ice breaks and they fall in the frozen water, they can use the pole to pull themselves out the water. The two ends of the pole are on the ice. In the Pontiac region, there are many ice fishing specialists who know the river and the lakes perfectly and can give you some advice about the best and more secure places for ice fishing. Ice fishing is a real and powerful experience which will give you some interesting memories.

To stop the cold, the best strategy is to wear many layers of clothes like an onion skin. A good polar fur suit and a skiing or a snowmobile suit can be the best as traditional clothes. They give both lightness and ease of movement. The biggest loss of energy is from the head, that's why you must wear a good hat which protects the ears as well as the face. Don't forget insulated snow boots and warm gloves. To handle the lines and the baits, you must take off your gloves and will get wet hands. You must have something to dry your hands, a towel for example, because wet fingers are frozen quickly...

To walk without falling, you can fix some removable steel studs to your shoes. If the ice is broken and you fall in the water, and you have two ice picks you can drive a pick into the ice and that way pull yourself out of the water.

To bore the ice depending on its thickness, you have a choice of tools. Ice scissors are used to cut through an average thickness of ice and to maintain and open out the hole. Manual bores are used to dig a hole in thick ice. Bores with thermic motors are useful for thick ice and if you have many holes to dig. Of course, the blade must be sharpened.

Many fishermen build a hand-made bench which looks like a box in which there is a petroleum or a naphtha heating system. Some drawers and other storage spaces are useful. A little carpet is put on the floor to insulate your feet from the frosty cold.

The pull-up is an ingenious device made of a support which is on the ice above the hole, a reel with, either, a submerged or an on the air line bobbin, and a spring-loaded mechanism which will hold up a little red flag when the fish is biting. There are numerous models of pull-up systems, each more ingenious than the next. Lines are generally made of Dacron and have between 20 and 30 pounds of resistance. The pull-up systems are generally baited with worms, little fish, alive or dead, where this is legal, also liver is used.

75 to 90 cm long, the ice fishing rod has an average to rigid action. The rings are big so ice doesn't block them easily. A protected reel will be used by choice. The rod is used generally with animated artificial bait. Even if you use jigs or spoon bait, it is better to use special baits for this sort of fishing. You  have a big choice :   lateral plane, swimming fish, spoon baits, airplane ice and ice flies.
The lateral plane can plane under the ice laterally and allow the exploration of vast areas.  They are good for pike, walleye, marigane and trouts.
The swimming fish lure is cylindrical, it looks like a fish with a head and a tail and has a hook at each end, the attaching ring is in the middle of the back.
The spoon looks like the one used in the summer but are smaller.
The airplane ice has a head equipped with two wings which allows to swim by creating large circles.  You can raise its attraction by putting on a natural bait, like a little fish, for example.
The ice flies are intended for catching small fish. It is generally a hook, size 8 to 12 with a leaden body covered with hair, feathers, supple plastic or rubber. Their effectiveness is increased by putting on a bait like larva or worm.

To carry all your material and the fish that you will catch you need a sledge. Some plastic models have raised sides, they are useful because they have an important storage capacity.

When it is cold, the ice forms again quickly at the surface of the hole. To keep the hole operational, you must regularly pass a skimmer to remove the forming ice.

Ingenious handymen had the idea to fill a metallic round box  with a coil which draws cold water in at the base of the box which is full of barning charcoal. The heat boils the water in the coil and the warm water is ejected in the hole, that way, the ice can not form again !  Made with some copper and a 975 gr. coffee box, it is really cheap and it works. A more primitive process is to dig a hole of some centimeters next to the fishing hole and to link them with a channel. In the other hole, you put a box full of embers, as the ice melts, it flows out in the channel into the fishing hole and prevents it freezing. 

To avoid the baits freezing in the ice when you take up the line and to facilitate the exit of the fish out of the water, it is easy bevel the ice like a reversed funnel with the ice scissors.

It is in spring season when the still thick ice becomes crumbly and cracks that Yellow Perch ice fishing is the best around rocks and not really deep water. In winter, the fish is found in between six and twelve meters deep water.  Maggots, worms, liver, little fishes and all sort of artificial baits attracting even the most indifferent perch. The fishermen often leave the first caught fish on the line, dig a hole next to it and try to catch the other fish. The first victim attracts the others. One particular method is used with success it seems. You take a 25 cm long copper pipe and flatten the two ends. The flat ends are pierced and there are rings : on one side, the body of the line is attached, on the other, the bottom of the line has a hook, number 6, with a little fish on it. The line is put in the hole until it reaches the bottom. The pipe strikes the sediment of the bottom and creates a mud cloud which attracts the curious perch. You must simply regularly pull up the line to see if a perch is on the end. I have my own trusty technique : the dandinette.

To have further information, visit the website Brennan's Recreational Farm

Le Cycloparc PPJ accueil - The Cyclopark PPJ home
Skating | Ice fishing | Snowshoeing | Downhill skiing | Cross-country skiing | Snowmobile
Mise à jour : 15-04-2005 / Updated : 04.15.2005   
  CLD du Pontiac  webmestre
602, route 301 - CP 580 - Campbell's Bay, Québec - JOX 1KO
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Réalisé par  Voillemont - Deiber