Ice conditions and fishing report 12/11/17

Winter is here! This weekend was a busy one for us here at Gene's Sport Shop, and we got a lot of good reports from our customers. We saw a good amount of wheel houses going out getting pulled behind ATV's on Big Pine, Little Pine, Rush, and area lakes. Ice reports on a majority of the lakes were between 4-8 inches of good ice, while certain lakes having a bit more and certain lakes a bit less, and some open water on parts of area lakes. The weather forecast looks promising, with cool temps and minimal snow to help put a few more inches on the area lakes.

Fishing reports were good, with anglers finding success with walleyes, panfish, and dark house spearing. So far the reports for spearing have been good with good visibility and guys having good luck in the dark house. Walleye fisherman have been having the best luck in 12-20 feet of water on shoreline breaks and mid-lake structure on both jigging and dead-sticking tactics. Baits with rattles and glow produced well while being accompanied by a bobber and a glow demon. Golden shiners, silver shiners, suckers and rainbows were the bait of choice, all of which we have a good supply of. Panfishing was also good over the weekend for both sunfish and crappies coming on waxworms or crappie minnows on a small tungeston jig or spoon.

Looking forward it should be a great week of fishing into the weekend, with more and more fisherman coming into the shop with fishing and ice reports. As always, thank you and STAY SAFE

DISCLAIMER: There is no such thing as safe ice. Ice conditions can change from day to day and from spot to spot. Just because someone is driving an ATV or vehicle on the lake does not mean the entire lake has safe, fishable ice. Always use caution on the ice, and make sure to stop and check ice depth and quality to and from your fishing spot. Our ice reports should be taken lightly, as this is just what we have seen and heard. Our ice report does not apply to all lakes and all parts of the lakes.