[30inthabucket]

Hit north fork before daylight on sat. Fish were there but it was one of those days. Landed 2 keepers and a short but dropped 3 at the hole, broke off a 5 +, and prob missed 8 or 10. Prob still could have limited but had to leave at 1030 to go do family stuff. Left em biting   Back out on Sunday early. Went to the same place but they had moved on. Caught 2 shorts and very few marks. Went over to long island and caught panfish for a couple hours, then back after eyes. Got on em right away and had a hell of an evening. Caught close to a dozen. Kept my 6. All 16 to 19 inches. Vibes, tingler spoons, and pimples all caught fish.
Now for the bad news. Ice is not faring well after the rain fri night and a couple days of above freezing temps.I am not optimistic what is gonna look like after today. Hopefully we save enough that round one isn't over. We will see. Careful if you venture out.

[Just reeleyez]

Nice catch bud! We fished close to where you and g fished on Fri. Landed 4 keeps biggest was 22" and missed a lot lol. Kicking myself for not getting back up SAT. Fingers crossed it gets cold again!!

[davidhoheisel]

Thanks for the great post! What lure was working the best for you?

[30inthabucket]

Yeah Josh that's where I was sat and sun morning. Had to move to get on em sun evening. David my most consistent bait so far this year has been vibe in clown or pink but last night it was a #3 chrome/orange pimple. They wouldn't hit the vibe yesterday.

[g]

Great job guys. Wish I wouldn't have had to go to S. Carolina over x-mas. Thurs. night wet my whistle, caught 5 eyes, 13, 14, 15 1/4, 18 and 20 inchers. Glad you guys caught fish. Hope the ice thickens again soon.

[snowcone]

nice guys    man I hope it locks up quick I want to get up there and catch some fish , so when round 2 fires up give me a shout  ,, what depth were ya in ? where can I booger out from..its a long drive for me , so timing is the thing..

[g]

I caught all my fish in 5 ft of water. Caught 4 on a 3/16 oz silver vibe and 1 on a #2 blue/chrome jigging rap. A lot of lookers on the rap but only the 1 taker and it hit it on the bottom. The other fish hammered the vibe. The 20 incher had 4 3 inch shad in its belly.

[ICE COLD]

5 of us tried to get on the ice at Long Island this morning. They checked before I got there and said their spud bars went in after one or two hits. This was off of the barge away from the edges. The edges had open water. I would think IF you could get away from the bank you could get on the ice but we didn't try it. I would bet some guys did get on after we left but no one was on it while we were there. Then we tried Aschesons and it looked bad. Again one hit with the spud bar through the ice. Next went to Blackhawk. One side had a little open water by the docks. So we went on the other side. Ice was around 3" clear hard ice. We only went out about 50 yards from the edge. Ice would crack as you walked. We stayed about an hour and only 1 eye and 1 crappie. Marked a lot of fish but not many takers. They could have been shad. Lot of small shad froze in the ice. It will be a week or two before I drive an hour to try to get on Indian again.

[30inthabucket]

Well I'm glad you guys didn't get wet. After seeing it Sunday I knew it would be bad after Monday. It was hard to stay home the last two days since I was off work but no fish is worth going through for me. At least we didn't lose all the ice. It's early yet guys. There will be more ice and more chances to fish. As for me I'll be making up some hours at work since I was "sick" a couple days last week, and I'm sure I'll get "sick" again once we have more ice,  and maybe dock fishing or deer hunting. Stay safe.

[Downthehole]

Do you think it could re freeze by Saturday?

[30inthabucket]

I doubt I will try this weekend. Doesn't look like temps will be cold enough to make much ice. Supposed to get some weather this weekend then colder temps next week. If the forecast holds I think the next weekend would be a possibility. But that's just a guess Andy.

[Downthehole]

Yeah, maybe so...I keep looking at the forecasts and although the highs get into the 40's the temps are above freezing for 5-6hrs....the rest of the time the lake should be producing ice....

[Basshawk1]

I was scouting conditions today and didn't like what I saw. There is still alot of ice left and it's 2.5 inches in alot of places but it's total garbage, full of tiny air bubbles and very weak. I walked to the end of the barge by long island bridge, hit the ice with a 2×4 and it easily went through 3 inches with 1 good strike.

[30inthabucket]

Thanks for the ice report basshawk. Thats what I was afraid of. Gonna need some real cold weather before we can get back on. I appreciate you guys keeping us informed about what's going on. I'm over an hour away and can't always get up to check for myself.

[Downthehole]

I was scouting conditions today and didn't like what I saw. There is still alot of ice left and it's 2.5 inches in alot of places but it's total garbage, full of tiny air bubbles and very weak. I walked to the end of the barge by long island bridge, hit the ice with a 2×4 and it easily went through 3 inches with 1 good strike.

Thanks for this report.....appreciated...