I think you guys have given up way too soon on Strawberry…Buddy and I fished about 4.5 hours today, 10:00 to 2:30, and iced nearly a dozen beautiful cutts..1-13", the rest 17 to 21"…and we didn’t even need ATV or snowmobiles…the weather was pretty much awful, blowing all the time, and low clouds with lite snow most of the time…good fishing weather IMO…Eskimo tent cut the wind, nice and comfy inside…fish seen often on the screen, and of course they don’t bite all the time, but enough to call it a good fishing day for us…ice is still 18" and no slush…we only saw 1 snowmobiler leave from the Marina while we were there, and one other solo guy 300 yds from us…one truck when we arrived at 9:30, and no other vehicles in the lot when we left…amazing having the lake to ourselves! (at least by the Marina) I’m ready for some soft water too, but this is still alot of fun…
Congrats on the good day!!! I haven’t given up yet, I need at least one more ice day there.
Glad to hear some positive reports from Strawberry. Seems pretty common that people start to have a love/hate relationship with Strawberry this time of year.
We’ve been ice fishing it until the end of March out of the marina since 2014 when we found out that the ice there (and at Fish Lake) is STILL a solid foot or more and the edges allowed the use of wheelers/snowmobiles into April sometime. Fully plan on at least a couple more trips up there this year as well. My best day in March last year was 36 fish iced in 5 hours.
I have had great and poor days ice fishing Strawberry early, middle, and late into the season. I have yet to figure out a consistent pattern as to why some days are so much better/worse than other days.
Thanks for the report. I’m planning on at least one more trip to the berry this winter.
Glad you had a good trip Joe. The wife and I spent Friday and Sat up there, the weather was beautiful & warm both days, a little windy in the afternoon but not bad. We caught some nice slot cuts and a couple rainbow, we were fishing near Rainbow Point and fishing in water from 10 to 20 feet. We used mainly Maniac lures on their Vertigo glow jigs tipped with a couple waxies and added a little bit of gulp juice to spice it up. The bite was very light but the “Titanium Tip Sticks” by Beaver Dam worked great to detect the bites, I love those rods they worked well at Cascade on the perch as well as the Pineview crappie. Good luck to you guys on your next trip, starting to think walleye now and… NO NOT IN THE DAMN CHANNEL. Real fisherman can catch them legally [:P]
My limited, unscientific, ‘on the job’ experience from this season is telling me the low barom. pressure, cloudy, snowy days are producing many more hits than the sunny, high barom. pressure days…My first 2 trips (28 Feb. and 4 Mar.) produced fair and poor results for 2 of us fishing about 6 hours (total 5 cutts iced each trip)…those days were sunny and warm, very windy one day…My last 2 trips (9 Mar. and 15 Mar.) I aimed at a ‘bad weather’ day, and they were both cloudy, lite snow, and windy days…and 2 of us did much better on these last 2 trips, more than doubling our total bite count each day…This is late season, and just my results…Maybe T.D. or someone else with some piscatology background can tell more for sure…Guluk…
**Best time to go fishing is whenever you can. And because fish move around and are active when they wanna be…for their own reasons…you can have good or bad days on any trip. And you can formulate your own theories…which will likely be as good as those from anybody else.
I long ago gave up planning trips according to the so-looney tables, moon phases, sun coming up in the west or whatever. After a while you can profile almost any weather or barometric phenomenon against good or bad trips and come up with your own translation. But just about the time you think you really got it figured out the fish will laugh and deal you some smackdown…or bite like crazy when they “ain’t supposed to”.
One thing tournament fishing has shown us is that on any given water…on any given day…there will be some folks who crush it while others get crushed. Those who score big chalk it up to skill. Those who suck blame it on everything except skill.
And as we are seeing on Willard and other waters already this year, there will almost always be SOME fish biting SOMEWHERE…for somebody. To avoid going fishing because you don’t think it will be any good is grounds for losing your angler card. Just go prepared for a variety of situations and keep moving and trying different things until you find someplace and something that works. If you still don’t score just chalk it up to running out of time before you ran out of options.
All that being said, it DOES pay to learn your fave waters well…throughout a full season…and under a variety of conditions. That will at least help you exclude a few things that are less likely to work and to more quickly come up with the pattern of the day. It’s like I say about sonar…it may not always find fish but it helps you avoid fishing where they ain’t. The downside is when you find fish that won’t bite. Then the finger of failure gotta point back at you.
Ain’t it fun?
**
Tks TD for your input and insight…I ‘preciate it…I’m sure there’s been different thoughts on " what days and ways" starting from the caveman times, regarding which spear to chuck…all part of the fun and intrigue of hunting and fishing…I certainly won’t turn down (almost) any trip, but if I think I can put the weather in my favor for a hunt or a fishing trip, that’s what I’ll try to target…in the meantime "Hey Smitty, let’s Fishin’"…(Ice Fish Baby)…
Zoom in on Brenda’s picture and look at the hand holding the fish’s mouth. Subliminal message? or am I getting my hand signals mixed up.
starting to think walleye now and… NO NOT IN THE DAMN CHANNEL. Real fisherman can catch them legally [:p]Oh come on Pete; let’s sneak down there about 11:00 PM tomorrow night and give it a go. Should be a blast! [;)]
That’s funny, I noticed that as well when I posted the picture. I probably shouldn’t tell her that she was unknowingly giving me
(us) the bird:sunglasses:
Think I’ll pass I had that option nearly 40 years ago when the channel was open and opted to fish the West dike…funny not much pressure out there in those days and I could usually catch a nice mess of walleyes fishing along the dike.
When you walk out from the Marina, what is the best general area to try, and how deep?
Thanks, heading up tomorrow morning and will report back.
Justin
Fished it yesterday 3-18. 3 of us caught 3 fish. Tough fishing. Great ice conditions and travel anywhere you want to go.
I was also up there yesterday. I was by myself, and I didn’t get the early start I was hoping for, but I did catch 12 fish in 4 hours. Not fast by any means, but a good day. One 20 inch cuttie, and the rest were bows.
Hey Catfish – sent you a PM…Guluk