Alright fellas this time of the year can be slow. Hunting has ended and Shed hunting hasn't come into full swing yet. I know there are some ice fishermen/fisher women on here so lets see those fish that you've been catching. Here's one of the bigger walleye's i've caught this year. 22"
I don't get out as much as I would like because all the lakes in my area are filled with panfish, which doesn't get me too excited. Our glacial walleye lakes are all a good three hours away. This year has been pretty uneventful for me. I've been taking a few new people out icefishing to show them the ropes, one of them being my girlfriend. Here is a picture of her with her first ever fish through the ice!
greatwhitehunter- Some of those bluegill have some crazy patterns. I'm a fisheries biologist, but the sunfish family has so many hybrids and different variations that it's almost impossible to tell the difference between them. Those look like some kind of bluegill/pumpkinseed/rock bass combination. Do you see a lot of them with that leopard print on them? Maybe they just look different after sitting on the ice for a while.
You would definitely know a lot more about if then me for sure, but I think the orange bellied ones are pumpkinseeds? The picture with the Marcum in was up by Bemidji and there were definitely some unique ones in the group that I have never seen patterns like that before. Most of the ones I catch are like the one your girlfriend is holding. Fun taking them with isn't it? First thing my girlfriend asks me every Friday morning is when/where we're ice fishing this weekend. That was the most fun I think I have ever had fishing was the day we caught all of those bluegills. Wax worms and the smallest jig with plastic tail on you could find. I have never seen bluegills hammer a jig so hard before.
A pure pumpkinseed usually is a lighter color and has less defined stripes. It would kind of look like a bluegills color with a crappie pattern. Whatever you have there is definitely a unique hybrid to me (there might be millions of hybrids like that, I don't deal with sunfish much). When are you going to hook me up with some darkhouse spearing? I used to have a connection who was huge into spearing in Minnesota, but he recently moved to Michigan.
That is actually something that I have never done, nor do any of my friends. We don't have much for northerns around here so it's a lot easier to fish instead of drive north to spear. Definitely something I wouldn't mind doing someday though.
Awesome pictures guys! I was out two weekends ago and got around 8 12" crappies on Lake Sullivan but don't have any pictures. It's truly sad that I have lived in Minnesota my entire life and have NEVER caught a Walleye.
You need to catch some walleyes! They are blast on the ice or open water. My personal favorite fish to catch and my second favorite to eat after perch.
I lied... About 4 years ago I did catch a 6 inch walleye while at the Brainerd Jaycees ice fishing contest. So small it didn't make the top 100. Smaller than a little perch ha. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
speaking of little perch. Caught a dozen perch this past weekend that were 2-3". Unreal! Catching a lot of 6" eyes too this year. Sent from my SCH-I200 using Tapatalk
Mille lacs? When we caught those crappies we also caught a bunch of perch small enough to go In the bait bucket. Little ****s are the worst.. Nibble your bait off most of the time! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Perch were on Minnewaska. Was using plastic so luckily didn't go through ton of bait! Sent from my SCH-I200 using Tapatalk
