Pond Boss Forums FISH & FISHING Show off your catch They're alive, they're alive..

This makes me feel better!!!

Looking good!!

Alright! let's hear the details!

Pretty simple.. This guy came over with some live bait and FISH ON!!!




All kidding aside, having a Super Bowl party and asked my cousins husband to bring his ice fishing gear.. Only took a couple of hole before we were on fish.. Didn't want to drill in the ice I have been keeping clear for skating, so go as close to it as possible in about 9' of water..

Wish we would have brought his shanty...

Great looking skating/hockey rink. Do you have a way of flooding it regularly -- or do you hire a local Zamboni Service to keep it looking like that?

It looks like you have a good mess of fish for fantastic appetizers or a full meal. I don't think I'd have worried about the shanty if you were able to pull that many in, in a reasonable amount of time.

I am curious about what kind of "live bait" he was using.

In any case, I'm seriously jealous of your skating rink and of the fish catch! But, thanks for sharing.

Ken

One of the better ones..



Boys playing on the skating area.. Spent two hours snow blowing slushy snow off last night..10 to 13 inches of clear ice most of this area...

Like mentioned in my last post, we had rain and 40° temps yesterday.. I spent two plus hours snow blowing and hand scooping to save my ice.. Had a skiff again this morning so I hand scooped then used my 2.5 gallon hand sprayer and about 20 trips to smooth the ice.. Poor mans Zamboni!!!

The live bait was nothing but good old bees moths..

Poor man zamboni. --
I made a 2x4 rectangle about 15"x48" with a bed sheet stapled to the bottom. I place a 5 gallon jug of hot water with the tap open about 1 gpm dumping into the frame. It fills the frame about 1/4 inch deep as you pull it along with a rope. The water slowly wicks out the bed sheet and leaves a really nice job. I can do flood an area 3000sqft with 5 gallons. Yours looks like it does a really nice job though.

Blair - that sounds like a great way of grooming the ice. If we don't get too much snow tonight and tomorrow, I'm going to try that. We've got at least 10 inches of ice on both ponds. Unfortunately, it is above freezing currently and lightly raining. But, in the next couple of hours it is again supposed to go well below freezing, and they are predicting 8-12 inches of snow by tomorrow afternoon.

Harold (cousins husband) was amazed at how green the water still was... Being color deficient I just see murky water.. Guessing visibility is maybe 36" right now.. Hard to tell with a little worm looking down a 6" hole.. No sight fishing for me..

He was also very surprised at the depth I was catching fish.. I was fishing about 9' of water but my best bite was about 6' deep?

Glad to hear your worrying was for naught. Green water is good. The phtoplankton is making oxygen! I think your clear ice is your savior. Good work!

Hi,
I'm always looking for a better, easier to operate poor-man's zamboni. We have worked hard to keep our ice open for skating and even had help from family with snow blowers, shovels etc.

My brother at one point had made a plywood box and put a connector for a garden hose that leads to a pvc tube with a row of holes the length of the box. It has a rubber edge all around 3 sides of the bottom of the box to 'squeegee' the ice. You hook up the hose, pull the box slowly and try to get the correct speed to not outrun the sheen of water that is coming under the squeegee, yet you have issues with slush/melting snow building up in the box and having to be cleared out from time to time.

I see some very ingenious plans on youtube, usually involving larger tanks and a motorized machine (small garden tractor or once even an electric golf cart). I'm trying to keep it simple.

I do have access to water by the pond so that saves in making multiple trips for water or wating for the water tank to refill. But pulling around 200' of hose with our squeegee box isn't so easy either.

I'm curious, this hot water bottle that you use, you say it has a tap on it and you can keep the tap open? Can you describe this bottle better? Is it like the ones used when camping with a 90 degree angle spout at the bottom?

Does the 5 gallon water bottle sit up on the frame some how or does it sit right on the bed sheet?

Is the time it takes to do the resurfacing limited by the size of the water tank or some other factor? I certainly could try to get a bigger tank is that was the issue.

Also if there is bumpy ice or some 'snags' on the ice, does the sheet hold up or would I be better off building it out of a thicker material? Say black landscape mesh, a stronger turkish towel, or if it is important for water to flow through quickly, maybe burlap?

thanks!

I use the camping style jug with the valve on it. The jug sits on top of the wooden frame. My skating surface can be flooded easily with just 2 jugs so I find its a reasonable size jug to do the job. My friends used to use a 30 gal barrel if you have a way to fill it and move it around. The black landscape fabric would work well. I think the water control valve is the limiting factor in my system and not the fabric.

Ha!!!! I guess we made the front page of our local paper.. There is a picture of Harold and I ice fishing and a picture of my oldest son and Harold's twin boys pulling each other in a sled on our little Ski-doo mini z snowmobile...

Congrats!

Thought is was weird when cleaning the fish that a few of the females still had eggs in them...Harold said that he had read that it is not that uncommon and their body would absorb them?..

Also noticed that my catch ratio is still way more males than females?..

How do you know they aren't eggs that are starting to develop for this year?

More males is good. That's one of the reasons hybrids are pushed. It won't take many females to keep the line going. I think one bluegill can produce 20,000 eggs per year.

Hmmmm, never thought of that...LOL