Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Ice Fishing 2011 - 2012

I would be ecstatic with 4".

Ditto. I've got my whiteboard calendar set up with the projected temps for the next 15 days. Only 7 will stay under 34. A few, though, are very cold with highs in the low 20's from the 13-16. If that pans out, i think my trip on the 19th-22nd should be okay.

However, if you look at the preceding week to that, from the 5th to the 11th we have highs from 40-45. Lame. Uber-lame.

Fortunately the lows each night drop below 30 every night. With short days, I would assume we're spending more time freezing than thawing. Fingers crossed it stays locked up starting on the eighth (right after the warming spell starts to go away on the 7th).

Keep me posted, PeePaw.
-mike

disclaimer: I know that a 15 day forecast can be ridiculously inaccurate. I've been banking on that for weeks, and unfortunately, they have been spot on. It hurts, but looks like accuweather is actually accurate this time.

with a daily average 2 degrees Celsius below freezing (28.4 degrees F), from an open pool of water, it takes roughly 4 days to make 10cm of ice (3.9 inches), assuming that the very bottom-most point of the ice layer is exactly 0 degrees, and the topmost layer maintains -2 degrees on average, and the heat transfer of the water temperature below the bottom-most point of the ice layer relates evenly across the entire body to average observed conductivity of solid state h20 (ice) in its natural, observable form. Meaning, in the next two weeks, you should hope for at least 8 consecutive days where it remains below 25 if you would like to hit 6 inches of ice, assuming the upper control limit of baseline plus (2.5* the standard deviation of temperature fluxes) in the chicagoland area on an average, observable janurary.

So i got a new job where i am surrounded by scientists all the time, and one of them in our milwaukee office who knows my plight of no ice, came back to me with that answer this morning. To all you biologists, chemists, physicists and everyone else out there...i love you for being smart enough to improve our lives....but sheesh....couldn't you have just said "if it averages at 25 for at least a week you'll be okay"?

disclaimer:
I left out the excel chart where he plots average janurary temperatures...without it that equation looks wonky...

I don't know about scientists, but I had an instructor once who was fond of picking on engineers:

"If you asked an engineer to define the process of taking a leak, he or she would come back in an hour with a set of blueprints, a bill of materials, a list of required permits, and a notepad filled with mathematical equations showing you why taking a leak was utterly impossible. Geez, when are these guys gonna' learn that it's not always so difficult!"

My apologies to any engineers present......... kinda! There are days where I can appreciate his sentiments.....

Ice fishing suspended on Bremer Pond. Icey dicey. We are forecast to have a high in the upper 50's Thursday. Maybe set a new record.

Time for snowshoes?

Or a hovercraft fish shack.

Speaking of hovercrafts, there's one for sale about a mile and a half from here. Want the phone #?

Pedal powered?

This thread needs more pictures (and not pictures of JHAP....just heading that off early).

+1 I'll assume another +1.

At the moment, I could give you an open water pic of dad's pond. that's about it.

On a side note, anyone here ever tried the "rubber band trick" with a tip up? I've seen that it is amazingly successful with some trout species, what about LMB?

On a second side note, who's got plans for an easy home-made tip-up? I would really like to catch something on something i have made. I have two that i've put together so far this year waiting for ice, buit am having spooling problems with both of them. One is a hook-set, a spring-loaded arm sets the hook once the line is pulled out. The other is a basic swinging arm. Once i get a few minutes, i'll take pics and maybe you guys can improve my design.
-mike

Dear Weather:
What the hell? So i track you for a few weeks, and it all looks good for the weekend of the 29th, and then, all of a sudden, out of nowhere, contrary to the spreadsheet of projected temps i've been keeping and updating, the WGN forecast says "But hey! If we can make it through this snow, it looks like next week we will have a warmup in the middle of the week again that will have our temps back up into the mid 40's for wednesday and thursday!"

GRRRRAAHAHAAAHAHAHAHAGHGHGHHHAHAHAHAHHGHGHG!

sincerely,
-mike

Sorry man, still thin up here. Supposed to get cold starting tomorrow, I still think you'll be fine. Lot's of backwater holding slabs. Keep the faith....

I feel your pain Skinny. Still waiting here also.

So, in my boredom and frustration waiting for a solid freeze, I started meddling with scrap wood in my basement, out of a desire to catch something on something I built myself. I dunno, call me crazy, but in a Hemingwayesque sort of way, I think that is a pretty cool way to test yourself and your abilities. Furthermore, I think that something like this could apply to the "if the SHTF" thread, and it might help with this issue:
So, after I get through explaining my overly complicated and unlikely to work device, maybe other posters could join in and discuss crazy contraptions they have made. At least it will kill time until we finally get ice.

So here goes nothing.


Thar she blows. Sorry for my grainy image, there isnt too good of light in my work area of my basement. The idea is simple, the line is guided out of the spool by an eye-screw set right in front of the spool, and then goes up to the eyelet on the arm, and down through the eyelet at the base.

Here's another grainy pic of the base, where you can see the eyelets in front of the spool and at the base,


Basically, the contraption takes the path of least resistance. Since the arm moves easier than the spool would when the arm is up, the arm moves first. then, once the eyes line up better when the arm is down, the line spools off pretty smoothly. I need to take that fluoro off and put a spool of braid on, but other than that and some spray paint to pretty it up, It's pretty much done.

Finally, when doing the dry run to make sure i had the spool tight enough on the wood screw (but not too tight), i noted that if the fish were to stop running away from the hole and start circling, or coming back, the arm would drop back down, making it way too easy to gut-hook when you dont see the flag up. So i did this:



The refrigerator magnet holds the arm up easily, and doesnt get in the way of the line moving smoothly between the 3 eyes.

Anyway, i dont think this is a new design by any means, so this might not be any surprise to anybody, but i would love to hear any suggestions on it, and i would happily hear any ideas anyone has for different construction.

Total cost: $0...it is all scrap and hardware i had in my workspace.
Total Time: 2 hours, mainly trying to fidgit with where to put the line guide and find the right length of the arm, tighten the spool properly and whatnot. After initial construction, i built another in the same dimensions in about 20 minutes. Just need a miter saw, drill, and 2 drill bits (thick one for the swinging arm, small one for pilot holes for screws).

Materials:
3 small L brackets, 2 of which are just for the magnet piece.
5 wood screws; 2 for the main construction, one for each magnet L Bracket, one longer one for the spool
3 wide washers, all used to make the spool turn and space it away from the vertical piece
1 machine screw for the swinging arm
1 nut for machine screw
3 washers for machine screw and swinging arm.
3 eye screws
1 1x oak material for base
1 1/2" dowel for swinging arm (long end is 15", dont remember how long the eyelet-end is)
1 2" wide piece of trim for the vertical piece, the scrap i cut off the top was used to reinforce the vertical piece.

And that's it.

Cool.
Dwight, Cecil, and B'ski have formidable competition now....

Nice work but I can tell you need to take a drive and find some hardwater!!

That's awesome Mike! May be a little cumbersome getting it out on the ice, but I love the idea.

the benefit of fishing in my dads back yard

One thing i am worried about is the flag not staying up. If that magnet falls off, or gets knocked off, The flag will only be up if the fish is actively pulling on it.

It's been 2 years of trying to get the bass to grow, and now that I have Walt the 3lb Bass, I'd hate to mistakenly kill him.

Of course, gut-hook a pike, i could care less.

WhooHoo! Bring on the warm weather!
I'd rather have open water than 1" of ice all winter.

I hate you so much right now.

This is me walking up to your computer and leaning on your desk and giving you a stern, menacing look.
('_')
|\\-------

('_')//
. | ___|_|___

And that was me going hulk on you and flipping the desk right over.


Sorry. Sometimes I get a little carried away. ('_')
Let me just straighten that back out --------//|




Disclaimer: I don't actually hate anybody, nor will I be tossing over tables, desks, or other pieces of furniture or computer-holding devices. Furthermore, I am unsure of my ability to look either stern or menacing, any attempt would probably just appear ironically jubilant.

I have Northern Pike that would pull that thing down and eat it. Don't talk about gut hooking NP and not caring. Mean just pain MEAN.

Yeah, maybe not caring is the wrong statement. Im not trying to execute them by cruel and unusual punishment, but the pike are a problem species in dads pond, so we do want to make as many pikecicles as possible.

That brings me to a detail I didn't mention earlier, though, sliding and movement. On the back end of the base of the second one of these I made I put two drywall screws through it so they poke out of the oak base by about a quarter to a half inch. They work as cleats, which should keep the thing from moving around or being tilted into the hole.

So here's the temp chart that my scientist friend made for me. The blue horizontal line is 30.15 degrees, which represents the lower control limit for making an inch of ice per day. It doesn't look so hot from here, with 4 days breaching the line between now and when my trip is scheduled.

Add to that that the temps reported on the longterm forecast have been trending up as they get nearer, and it looks like the ice will be just under the "safe enough for my wife not to worry" line of 5-7 inches. We still might be cool with 4-5 inches, but with all of the warm springs in my dad's pond, looks like i will, at best, spend the day sitting on the dock and only venturing out to chase flags as far out as a safety rope can lead me.


Dear Weather,
GRARRGHHHAGGRAH!
Sincerely,
Mike