Early ice is such a coveted time of year for ice anglers. Perhaps there is some anticipation and excitement for a new winter. Fishing can peak on many small lakes in particular right away at early ice and then decline as the winter prolongs. My reasoning is that these fish simply get concentrated over basins or secondary basins each winter and the first people at these locations simply experience some of the best fishing where the biggest fish are caught, and these locations simply don’t recharge over the winter. Small well-known lakes with prominent and predictable patterns are notorious for peaking at early ice. Another advantage to early ice is the shortness of the days. The peak windows are closer together.
Unlike late ice, however, when you might be in a sweatshirt while geese and swans are flying overhead, the weather to create ice can also make the conditions on top of the ice much harsher. The most effective anglers have developed a system for fishing outside when the wind and temperatures are often brutal. While the fishing can often be good or even great, early ice is not always easy.
One of the toughest situations at early ice involves extremes in water clarity. Extremely clear water with just a handful of inches of clear ice can create one of the toughest situations for finding fish. Every move you make, every step and every hole drilled can push fish away from you. You simply cannot walk up to a spot and immediately catch a fish right below you.
We have long had assumptions of this when dealing with a little bit of clear ice over clear water. With forward-facing sonar, we can now see what is happening and confirm our assumptions. When you can see through the ice and see the bottom in eight feet of water, you need to adjust your strategy.
There are two things in particular from a noise standpoint that really seem to send fish running. Dragging something on the ice like a sled or fish house and walking with ice cleats. Unfortunate, because something to haul your gear and something to keep from slipping or falling are some important items to have. Realistically, you are more likely to slip and fall where you hurt yourself really bad than fall through the ice if you use common sense. You need to have ice cleats, and you need to bring some equipment, so not having these items isn’t practical. When you get to locations that you want to fish, however, be aware of the noise factor. Take your cleats off when you get to your fishing locations. Leave your sled or flip over shelter in one spot.
Simply slowing down and getting methodical is often necessary at early ice. After you drill your holes and get set up on a location, you often have to give a spot some time for fish to cycle back underneath you. If you get too aggressive and move too much, you can simply keep pushing fish away from you. How methodical do you have to get? You should still see some fish show up within half an hour.
Typically, you might need to grid out the ice right away. Get your holes drilled and let the locations settle down. If you are using forward facing sonar, try to walk and drill holes to push fish you can see towards an angler already set up. Finding fish and then walking an angler over the top of fish, drilling a hole and catching fish can be difficult when fish are spooking with every step you take. We have also seen where we could push fish up against a sharp break and could pin them into a location by using forward facing sonar but use this technology to find fish. Use the Vexilar to catch fish as when fish get spooky in the wintertime, it can be really difficult to keep fish in the beam of forward-facing sonar.
Realistically, the lowest fruit is to simply walk out to a location that you can reach where you caught fish into the fall. Where you put fish to bed in the fall is usually where there will be some fish at early ice. If the fishing was poor or tough through the fall, keep looking because these fall patterns usually carry into early ice. In other words, if the fishing was bad or nonexistent on a lake in late October, the fishing doesn’t miraculously get better at early ice as a rule of thumb.
In environments where you are dealing with clear water and clear ice, low light conditions can be really important. You can struggle during the day but catch almost all species into the dark. Crappies are notorious for firing up after dark but even bluegills can turn on at dark on some lakes. The evening sunset window in particular is really important.
The opposite of extremely clear water is turbid water at early ice. On some wide-open wind-swept lakes, strong winds right at freeze up can make the water extremely dirty. We have seen this phenomena on places like Upper Red Lake and even Lake of the Woods but this can be a common occurrence on the shallow, wind swept lakes of the Dakotas. There are times when the water gets so turbid that you can’t see the bottom of the hole on top of four inches of ice. The water can get that dirty and the colder, denser water holds or suspends the particles in the water for a much longer period of time. Extremely turbid water caused from a strong wind right at freeze up can also make fishing much more difficult.
Loud rattle spoons, short and hard cadences and upping the size on the lure are important adjustments for walleye and perch in these situations. Go bright fluorescent color schemes or black. Gold can be good with bright sun. Dead sticking live minnows below bright jigs that anchor the minnow in one place can also help you scratch more fish.
