Bluegill Fishing

Fished a small lake in Bridge Water with Doug E. and his friend Jack. We went out for the evening fish and fished until a little after dark. Temperature when we started to fish was 45 Degrees and when we quit fishing it was 35 Degrees. The wind was out of the southwest about 10 knots and the sun was out, which made for a beautiful evening of fishing. The ice is about 20 inches thick and there is very little snow on it, which makes for easy walking. We fished anywhere from 10 feet of water to 16 feet of water. The fishing started out very slow. After the first 2 hours we only had 6 perch on the ice that were caught in the shallow water. Both Doug and Jack had their fish finders with them and they were marking very few fish. Right around 7:00 PM, the fish finders started to light up and the fishing got hot. For the next 1 1/2 hours the catching was almost non stop. When it was all said and done we kept 76 fish. All but the perch were caught in 16 feet of water. 61 Bluegill, 9 Crappie and 6 Perch. We used mostly wax worms on small jigs until after dark, when Doug and Jack went with plastic on jigs. It was ice fishing at it's finest!

Thames River

The end of ice fishing is almost here so I decided to try the Thames River one more time. I went further up river towards Chatham, Ontario and fished by the monument. When I arrived there were about a dozen guys fishing so that was a little encouraging. Temperature when I started fishing was 15 Degrees and when I quit fishing it was 9 Degrees. There was just a little breeze and the sun was out so it felt pretty good on the ice. Once on the river I headed down stream about 1/4 mile and set up in 12 ft. of water.. The river looks just like the land, it has a frozen sheen of ice on top of the snow, pretty cool looking. Anyway, the ice is about 18 inches thick and the current is very light. I spent the evening jigging a #5 Rapala tipped with a minnow and a purple hair jig tipped a minnow on the dead stick. Watching the fish finder I never marked a fish and I never had a bite. This makes the third time fishing the Thames River and not having a bite. Heard of one walleye caught down river from me and that was it for all the guys fishing in this area. I had a couple of guys inquire about my ice auger laying on the ice, so I gave them a demonstration on how easy it works. Let one of the guys try it and he was amazed at how fast it can drill a hole through that much ice. If I had some of the Ice Master Drill Adapters with me I could have sold them all!