I’ve been loving the new sled! It’s made thing so much easier setting up and tearing down, or when I just want to go light. Now that I’ve been fishing the coves on the Ct River every day, I’ve been spending a lot of time jigging crappie. They’ve been pretty thick on the log cribs and brush piles. Once you find them, you are usually pretty busy. I was never happy with my hand held GPS. It had way too much lag time and didn’t zoom in far enough whichmade it impossible to get right on the tructure you were looking for. Wel… I fixed that…

I took my Humminbird 1197  and mounted it to the sled. I bought an extra set of cables and transducer along with a ram mount. It has made things so much easier to locate the cribs ad brush piles. The GPS is dead nuts on and I’ve found some smaller piles by sticking the side imaging transducer in the hole and rotating it slowly. The 1197 made all the difference today… I jigged for a few hours andhammered the crappie, bluegill and sunnies. I had so much fun, I’ll be back out tonight after 6.

A last minute decision was made at the shop to fish the cove for the night bite last night. I was really hoping to find a walleye or two. We know they are ther but no one has spent any time targeting them. Now I know where NOT to set up… Overall, it was pretty slow and steady. We set up in 11-14 feet of water near some brush piles I had found in the fall. We all jigged and set up tip ups. Everybody caught, but I was hoping for better. Mike and Gary stayed in their shanties jigging and did well, I stayed outside and moved around a lot with the Humminbird and rod. I didn’t catch as many but was happy with the size. The group caught perch, bass, crappie, bluegill and pondies.

I hit White Oaks again this morning for a few hours before the storm. Set out the usual 5 tip ups for pike but the real goal was to find some brush piles and jig some crappie. I mounted my 1197 to the sled and was able to power it off of my Ice 45 battery. It sure is nice having a GPS that is so accurate… I fished the closest pile to where I parked. It was a good sized brush pile tha measures roughly 10 x 7 and is close to 3 feet high in places. It was a slow pick there but I managed a few bass, perch and crappie.

The wind started picking up and the skies got dark, I figured I was running out of time before the storm hit so I picked up and moved to a pile in deeper water. I walked about 5 mintes straigt to a way point I had created in the boat over a brush pile. I stopped where the Humminbird said the pile would be and drilled a hole. to check. Ther it was, in 20 feet of water. One hole and I was right on top of it and was marking fish. As soon as I dropped down, I was on fish. I stayed there for the better part of an hour and had close to 2 dozen crappie. None were more than 11″ though. I’m not sure where all the big ones went that we caught on November, I suspect they are spread out and suspended over the deeper water. No pike on the tip ups but the jigging made for a great morning… If I can get out of my driveway in the morning, I’ll be looking again tomorrow… Here is a quick video I took from the hot hole today:

 

With safe ice on all the coves, I decided I was way overdue for a trip to my favorite cove on the river. I was drilling holes by 6:30. I set up 5 Heritage tip ups with big dead baits I had jigged up last Sunday. I put them along the shoreline in 5 to 10 feet of water. As always, I jigged as I waited for a flag to pop. I drilled a line and then checked each hole with the Humminbird Ice 45. When I marked a fish, I jigged. I caught a few quick perch this way. As I moved all around, I stumbled across a brush pile. Sure enough, there were fish on it. I dropped down and instantly caught a huge bluegill. I peppered the imedite area with holes and marked the holes that had brush under them. The pile ended up being close to 10′ x 10′ and was 4 feet high in areas. I spent the rest of the morning on that pile jigging sunnies, crappie, bass, and perch.  All of the fish came o a Lindy Rattlin’ Flyer tipped with spikes.  I was tempted to call the shop and tell them I would be late… Oh well… The pile will be there when I go back. Not a single flag all morning, but that’s pike fishing with big baits. A lot of waiting but incredibly rewarding when your name is fiinally called!  Here are a few pics:

I had a couple of hours to kill Wednesday morning so Mike and I hit Wethersfield cove. We fished just south of the barn There was a around 3″ everywhere we checked. I set out 2 dead baits and 2 suckers on the Heritage tip ups in about 10 feet of water and then set to jigging. Between the 2 of use, we drilled close to 75 holes. We moved all around and jigged when we marked fish on the Humminbird. Jigging was slow. I marked a ton of fish and had a few hits but they weren’t interested in what I had. With about 20 minutes left in the trip, I finally changed over to a Lindy Rattlin’ Flyer and instantly had fish coming in to check the lure out. Turns out most of what I had been marking were pesky spot tails. Once I found out what they wanted, I brought them up left and right. Had a couple of bluegills and a crappie in the mix. All fish were caught in 14-16 feet of water…  The road block and closed sign have been removed! 

Mike, TJ and I hit Quaddick in hopes of pike today. I had never fished there before but we came up with what we felt was a likely spot and set out across the ice at 7. We set up on middle res and had a solid 3 1/2″ of crystal clear ice, areas west of the islands had a minimum of 5″. We set up with big pondies that I caught yesterday and sat back to wait for the first flag. It took 2 hours, but one of mine finally popped. Turned out to be a massive pickerel. I’m guessing 6 pounds at least. It barely fit through a 6″ hole.
That was it for excitement. Mike had a small pickerel and managed to jig up a micro perch. We pulled the gear around 3 and headed home. I’ll be back again…

We played around with the video cameras and got some pretty cool stuff… Check out the  underwater video:

Right up until I slipped and smacked my head on the ice. I have NEVER fallen that hard before. It layed there for a while to gather myself. Once I could see straight again, I slowly picked my gear up and headed home. The ice was a good 4″ thick yet my head had no problem cracking it upon impact… Not sure why but I even took a pic of the cracks.

Prior to that, I had a great morning of jigging on a small CT River cove. The river had fallen back to near normal levels after last weekends heavy rains. You can see in the pictere here just how high the water had been when it finally started to refreeze… I brought tip ups with me but set my first one and then found a pile of fish with the Humminbird and decided to jig instead. This spot has a ton of  big pond shiners in it so I decided to fish real small jigs tipped with spikes.

I picked away at some pretty good sized bluegills for a while. Once things slowed, I rigged a couple of other rods and dead sticked them. The bluegills showed back up and all of a sudden so did the pondies. For a half hour, it was non stop action on the three rods.

I had a chance to play with my new Pentax underwater camera. It was tough holding the fish and also take the pictures at the same time, but a couple of them came out OK…

Not sure how many panfish I got but between perch, bass, crappie and gills, I had to have iced 50 fish. I ended up with 38 big pond shiners. They’ll be coming with me tomorrow to Quaddick.

We finally have fishable ice througout much of the state. It looks like it will be a great weekend..

I had been playing around with some ideas of modifying my sled to better suit my fishing when we travle light. I solicited  the help of  good friend that runs a countertop business, Dan Luisi. With his tools and experience, it took no time at all to make. He got all the pieces cut and I took it home to paint and slapped it together. This morning was the maiden voyage. I gotta say, I’m loving it so far!

Mike, Steven,Josh and I all met up at Connecticut Outfitters a 6 for bait and headed down Rt 2 to Mono Pond. There was a solid 4 1/2″ everywhere. 3 Nils augers made quick work of the early ice and we were set up in no time flat. Flags started popping before sunrise. Josh didn’t bother with the tip ups and went straight to jigging.  I think I was setting up my second flag when he scored on crappie.  I finished setting up and broke out my Humminbird flasher and started jigging. I found a few crappie in 6 feet of water. Certainly not big for around here, but it was fun teasing them up on the Lindy Frostees.

It stayed pretty busy for the entire time we were there. Lots of small bass and crappie. I had to get to the shop for 10. The guys stayed a bit longer and left to check ice condition in some other areas. Here are a few pics from the morning:

 

The sled worked out great. It allows me to travel light while still having everything I need for setting up in the morning. It holds 6 Heritage tip ups and 5 jigging rods. The Frabill bucket sits snug in the middle. There is plenty of room for my tackle box and a shelf for my flasher to sit on. Very mobile with a low center of gravity for hauling through the woods. I have a couple of other ideas but want to see how thi version works out for now…

 

Well, it’s finally here. We kicked off the 2010/2011 ice seasn today… Mike and I met at CT Outfitters at 4 this morning for bait and headed to the hills in the northwest corner in search of ice. We didn’t have a ton of time, so we checked Park Pond and Woodcreek real quick. Both had just about 3″ of ice. We decided to set up on Woodcreek because I was more famliar with it than Park.

It was 18 degrees when we set up with a bit of a breeze. The new Frabill Icesuit sure came in handy! Unfortunately,there isn’t much to report. We hung out till 9:30 without a single flag. I wanted to move further out, but just didn’t feel like chancing it. We had all the safety gear, but chose to stay in close. As usual, it felt great to dust the gear off and turn the auger! The long term wather looks great for that part of the state. I anticipate seeing quite a few reports fro the hils this coming weekend. Get out there but be safe! Be smart and don’t go it alone…