Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Ice Fishing Glossary

This is a work in progress.

Please feel free to offer suggestions via the comments area at the bottom of this page.
(Updated 03/18/2008)

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ


4WH Report
Who, What Where, When and How. Who went fishing, what they caught, When the action took place, where they went and how they presented.
See Also: The Law of Diminishing Returns


A


As good as skunked
No fish worth keeping.(See Also: Keeper)


B


Bad Hand
Eveleth / Ely Lake colloquialism - in a fish house, a condition that occurs when a fisherman finishes his Hamms, puts down the can, and is left with an empty hand.

e.g., "Hey, I gotta bad hand over here!"


Bait Rape
When a fish takes your bait while avoiding the hook.


Bombing Run
Going in to town either for a drink or to purchase off sale liquor for later consumption.


Butt F'N Cold!
When it's so cold that a freshly cleared hole ices over in about 10 seconds - it can only be considered that cold when a person is angling without a shelter.

e.g., "It's not just cold, it's butt f'n cold!"


C

Crowd
Three people crammed into a two person house.





D


Dead sea, The
Lake Mille Lacs
in central Minnesota


E


"Eel Pout, Eel Pout, Eel Pout!"
A chant issued by a competitive ice fisherman with the intent of magically transforming the large fish on his partner's line into a lowly Burbot. It works (Much to the recipient's chagrin) - approximately 25 percent of the time.


Extreme Old School
No shelter, no electronics, Hand Auger


F

Free Range Maggot
A waxworm or eurolarvae that is dropped in favor of a bite on your second line. Said creature is then free to crawl away from wherever it landed.

Free Range Minnow
A minnow that becomes unhooked while landing a fish. Still alive, the crippled fish swims in confused circles in the hole until either it is retrieved, finds its way down the hole or succumbs to its injuries.





G


George Jetson
Someone obsessed with the latest electronics and gizmos. The opposite of an old-schooler.


H


Hardcore
Old School Angling in subzero (Butt F'N Cold!)temperatures.


Harvey Wallbanger
Any loud drunk capable of shamelessly approaching a stranger's portable shelter and engaging in a semicoherant conversation with the startled occupants inside.


Hole Hypnosis
A trance-like condition induced by staring down a hole drilled into the ice, while ingesting moderate to severe amounts of carbon monoxide. Accute cases involve abrupt loss of depth perception, especially when uninterrupted attention is focused on a bobber or stike indicator in excess of 45 minutes.


I





J


Jaques Cousteau
A person who owns an underwater camera.


K


Keeper
Any fish capable of providing fillets larger than a vandekamps fish stick.


L


Law of Diminishing Returns, The
Close friends or relatives have approximately a 50% chance of receiving an accurate 4WH Report. Strangers have virtually no chance.





M


Making Ice
The popping and cracking of lake ice caused by expansion and contraction. Typically occurs at night or on extremely (Hardcore) cold days.
(i.e., "Boy, she's really makin' ice today!")


N


O


Old School
No Shelter, No Electronics
See Also: Extreme Old School





P


Pogey Bait
Snack Food


Prairie Dogging
A condition associated with making it off the lake minutes or seconds prior to an imminent bowel movement.


Q


R





S


Skunked
No Fish (See also: As good as skunked)


Spoon-on-a-Stick
Antique Swedish style cutting device (Not an auger proper) featuring an offset shaft tipped with a cup shaped bore.


Spud
Common name for a large heavy ice chisel used for starting or creating ice holes. Also used to describe the person operating said chisel when they a) start chiseling the ice with 20 or 30 feet of your shelter or b) operate it during the morning or evening bite or other prime fishing hours.


Steve McQueen
Any lake ice motorist who travels in excess of 30 MPH with little or no regard to the proximity of other anglers or property.


T


Territory Marker
Those patches of 'Yellow Snow' you see out on the lake.


U





V


W


X





Y


Z


Back to Top

Thursday, March 6, 2008

Old Friends

Seen Better days...

"The man with the boots does not
mind where he places his foot."
-Irish Proverb


"My optimism wears heavy boots
and is loud."
-Henry Rollins



I've had these bad boys for 25 years. My dad bought them for me in 1983 to replace a crappy pair of Moon Boots. To this day probably one of the nicest things he has ever done for me and that is saying a lot.

I have lost track of how many sets of laces and liners I have gone through.
If you click on the photo and look at the toes you can see that they're shot.

I'm not sure why it is that our footwear tends to personify us more than any other article of our apparel. When soldiers lose a comrade they will march past his empty boots and salute. Of all the outrageous excesses of the Marcos Regime it was Imelda's 1060 pairs of shoes that everyone (at least in the states) remembers.

The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.
And without good footwear, you're going nowhere.

Good boots are like good friends. The better they are, the more you can count on them. They can be taken for granted without being insulted by it. But then again boots are inanimate objects and don't have feelings.

What the @#$!$% am I talking about anyway?

I've gotten a lot of traffic (Like double) lately from people looking for fish house designs but none of these freeloading sunkinthaditches comment on my posts. Is nobody commenting because the quality of my posts is crap, or is the quality of my posts crap because nobody comments? I guess either way if I had to ask it isn't a good thing. According to my stats my most loyal reader is the vi@gr@worm robot who hits my RSS feed like 6000 times a day when he's not busy lighting up my custom 404 page with obscene (and non-existent) URLs.

Sorry this post melted down. I really had high hopes for it, too.

But then again what do you care, whoever you are?
You weren't reading this anyway, were you?

Tuesday, March 4, 2008

The Deep Peace of the Wild

Living Ladder"As to when I shall visit civilization, it will not be soon I think. I have not tired of the wilderness; rather I enjoy its beauty and the vagrant life I lead, more keenly all the time. I prefer the saddle to the streetcar and the star-sprinkled sky to a roof, the obscure and difficult trail, leading into the unknown, to any paved highway, and the deep peace of the wild to the discontent bred by cities."