Getting ready for the first "hen of the woods" search and pick mission. Post pics and report later this afternoon. They are starting to show up here finally.
Registered Member #411 Joined: Wed Oct 10 2007, 09:19AM Location: Diddy Wah Posts: 44
Taking an afternoon nap in the shade of my shanty. What else? Come on O! You of all people should know I can and will sleep just about anywhere.
This was some serious fishing. I saw some of the biggest Gils ever. Tough to put everything together, but when you did, the reward was worth all the effort.
I always struggled with sight fishing. So I was determined to work at it. Okoboji is probably the best environment to learn how. Water clarity is unbelieveable. The Gils were very fussy when it came to bighting. When they did commit, you had to give them some slack, but not too much or they would spit it out faster than a blink of the eye. Set the hook too soon and you'd miss them only to subsequently watch them swim away.
My guesstimate was that if I saw or marked one hundred fish near my jig maybe 25 would actually bite and I would catch about 5 of the 25 that bit. It was that tough for me.
I mostly used horizontal jigs (Russian Mormyshka hole-in-the-head style) with a Little Atom Micro Nuggie. The white nuggie made it easier to see when the fish had the hook fully in its mouth. I was using Clam's new 16" Powerstick sight fishing rod coupled with a Uncle Buck's crappie (fly fishing style) reel spooled with 2lb Gamma Ice line. I learned the hard way that the rod was pretty stiff. I set the hook way too hard and straightened out the hook on the jig on a few of the Bull Gils I first tempted into bighting.
This was my 5th consecutive on-ice-seminar and I think they are still a good investment. Where else can you have the experience of having Dave Genz drill you a hole to fish out of and get personal pointers on how to catch fish on some of the best ice fishing locations in the ice belt?
You couldn't arrange all the lodging, meals, and guide service for twice the price. Normally you would have to put your time in on the water over an entire weekend to have as much success as you do fishing the first couple of hours during the on-ice portion of the seminar.
What's really cool is that I now have the confidence of going to Lake Mille Lacs, MN; Chequamegon Bay, WI; or Lake Okoboji, IA and knowing the local waters and techniques needed to catch fish. The experience also adds to your skill set used on more familiar waters.
Like Todd said - next year Jim Hudson plans on chasing Crappies in Northern Minnesota around the Lake Winnibigosh Cutfoot Sioux area. I'm already planning on going.
I'd like to thank Bruce for arranging my getting towed off the lake late on Sunday. I got stuck on the ramp (my 5th time) in deep slushy snow and he hooked his tow strap to another participants SUV and got me off the lake.
It was a great trip. I'm sorry more of you couldn't attend.
Registered Member #532 Joined: Sat Dec 27 2008, 06:30PM Posts: 690
Those gils love small glow red fat boys and cortland ice flies. 3/4 lb flouro and 5 inch holes. Duck and I were there 4 years ago for 5 days. I caught fish tourney day. Never saw a fish first 3 days. Still think the price is out of my league...
Registered Member #638 Joined: Wed Dec 16 2009, 11:05AM Location: Iowa Posts: 4
That weekend on the ice was the best ever, for me, and met some new friends to ice fish with next year. Already thinking about going next ice season to Okoboji, and Ice Roads in MN. Had a great time! Randy
ICE ROADS LAKE OKABOJI
