late report

[RIBill]

sorry for the delayed report... got out with Rockfisherman and my 6 yr old, Ian, over the weekend in South County. Not fast action by any means, but still a couple of noteworthy fish. The pictures tell the story better than I can. Suffice to say that the R'man was pleased to get the salmo monkey off his back. Oh, by the way, we couldn't "buy" a perch or a crappie, and if we do get a perch, it's full of worms. How's a man supposed to feed his family?

cheers all. hope the winter is being kind to ya.

[mansfieldsign]

Nice fish... & pics :)

[Bob Parsons]

(#$120) Quality time with the kid.

[ChuckD]

but I like the brownie better. thanks for the pix

[rockfisherman]

The winter days are too short for adequate ice fishing time. So, RIBill attempted to duplicate the feat of Maui and lengthen the days. I could be wrong, but I think it is working. The days DO seem like they are getting longer.

"Maui figures as a powerful god in the legends of many Polynesians. But the Maoris and the Hawaiians probably make the biggest claim to him.

Maui's mother Hina complained that the sun traveled too fast across the sky. She barely had time each short day, to attend to the myriad of chores required by island living. So Maui hid behind a rock on the highest peak of the island, and when the sun sped by, Maui lassooed it with a rope and only let it go when the sun promised to change its habits. And so, on the island that now bears Maui's name, the mountain is called Haleakala, House Of The Sun, and the days on that island are always long and bright."

"Maui." Encyclopedia Mythica from Encyclopedia Mythica Online.
<http://www.pantheon.org/articles/m/maui.html>
[Accessed February 04, 2004].

[ruge13]

Sweet fish, the state of RI still needs to take away your liscences to cut stocking costs!


Just curious, how are you fishing your shiners (assuming you are using shinners)?
Just under the ice or on the bottom?

[rockfisherman]

Sweet fish, the state of RI still needs to take away your liscences to cut stocking costs!

Just curious, how are you fishing your shiners (assuming you are using shinners)?
Just under the ice or on the bottom?

Just under the ice for salmon. On the bottom for everything else.

[ruge13]

Sweet, now with the GPS locations I got form the bug I put in your jacket at the show, and your techniques, I might see a salmon!! :brow

[RIBill]

Shaun: we're talking about a fairly shallow impoundment, and with 14" of ice there is effectively 3-4' or so of fishable water. We had some shiners in the top 1 foot of water, some in the bottom 1', and others splitting the difference. I'm assuming that Paul's salmon-set was high in the water. Elsewhere, in deeper water, we fish the shiners in the top couple feet of water for salmonids and otherwise on the bottom.

Its the perch/crappie bite on the jig rods that we haven't been able to break into. Seems that we haven't lucked into roving schools or schools on structure. A bit frustrating when you have a fish-fry in mind.

Final note... Paul's been carrying all the weight this winter in terms of the hardwater tailgate party (actually, I've been kicking in the Harp's Lager, but with the icy temps, our thirst has been diminished). He's the one lugging the gear, prepping the food and doing all the cooking. I finally finished a chuckbox so that I can now start pulling my weight again. So far we've had the usual kielbasa; sausage and peppers, but also now, barbecued meatballs. all tasty as usual!

[RIBill]

And Paul... yes, you nailed it... I had the legend of Maui in mind...
--125-3


and the days are getting longer, and this little thaw is a tease... but, I dare say we have plenty of hardwater ahead of us...

[Slappy]

What are you jigging for the perch/crappie that are so elusive? It seems like in those depths you should be finding the fish. You might try down-sizing the jigs and tipping them with mousies. The mousies are moderately effective...they should increase your count by a factor of 10.

[RIBill]

Slappy: I'm with you 100%! we're using small teardrops tipped with mousies... a panfish/perch dream offering... plus a dropper. we should be getting bluegills and everything else!... we should be going gangbusters!!!! The only real payoff has been a nice big brown on a Genz worm w/ mousie fished deep (11' of depth - different pond)... go figure! :confused:

[Slappy]

Sounds like you are doing the right stuff. My solution to it would be to drill more holes! People start looking at me funny when I have 50 holes drilled, but how else do you find the fish? Plus it seems like every few years the crappie population busts in a pond--it may be that year. It is good to hear that there are other serious jiggers out there--I never see them where I fish.

What are you jigging? You might check out customjigsandspins.com for some good additions to your arsenal. Their 1/100 ratso can be a great soft plastic that seems to wake fish from the dead. Tough to fish in water over 8 feet though. Their #8 toadie has been my teardrop for the deeper water--I picked up a 4.6 lb pickerel on it last week. I have been fishing a lot deeper this year--I don't know if it is the cold or lack of weeds. Another favorite is the pimple with the treble removed and the chain from a rapala pilkki with a single hook added on. This is killer with the mousies--not great for crappies, but the perch, bass and pickerel love them.
Where are you getting your jigs?

[bdowning]

Hmmm, I've found jigging shallow water under 5 feet deep tends to be slow, even with a lot of holes. I figured the proximity of the light coming through the hole to the bottom may spook the fish. The jigging always seems to improve when I get over 10-20 feet of water. A friend of mine uses an LCD fishfinder with a transducer pointed down the hole to locate schools of fish and then jigs from bottom to top. If there are perch, you either catch one after another or they completely ignore your lure, even when the fishfinder indicates big schools below. Kinda weird. :confused:

-bd

[Slappy]

I think the 5 foot bite depends on where you fish. The Charles has probably the best panfish bite and I usually jig in 3-5 feet there. I never fish in less than 20 feet on lakes like Winnepesaukee. My theory on panfish is fish them in the winter in the same places you would get them in the summer and it seems to work well.
I do the fish finder too, my sled has electronics and rocket launchers (no tip ups for me!). It is pretty useless in the shallows because the beam is so narrow. Mine is a LCD which aren't great for ice fishing because you don't get the target separation with the fish on the bottom, but the fish alarm does pick them up. I have found that many times those perch on the bottom that refust to bite the perch jigs are sunfish that hit the tiny stuff. Of course the perch always show up when you get the sunfish going. Chumming with crushed shiner helps too.
I do find that the deeper water bites are more come and go, but the chum keeps the fish around longer and amps up the inactive fish.
What about other people are you jigging deep or shallow?