Ice Follies

I got to spend a few hours out on the ice this past sunday. It's been a couple of years since I ice fished at all, and the even that time it was in one of those grand hilton suites out on Milacs. This time it was just me and the elements - No shelter, just an old-school outing, like the old days. Daytime high was only 8 degrees, jack. This wasn't some balmy March day jigging for perch. In a previous life I used to get out 8 - 12 times a winter. It's not like that anymore. Comes with the turf when you have kids.

I picked a lake that I used to go to all the time, for three reasons:

1. Familiarity. I would know where to set up without having to move around (the terms of my work-release made time a constraining factor)
2. Good reports. This could be my only trip of the winter so I did my homework. I shot the breeze at a couple of bait shops during the week prior to the outing. I actually bought some stuff while I visited, so the information exchange was friendly and turned out to be quite honest. Never underestimate the value of greasing the palms of your informants.
   
3. The space-time continuum. Seriously. A signifigant deal of my thoughts (Or maybe a deal of my signifigant thoughts) in life made their maiden voyages through my skull during the times I spent sitting on a pail out on that lake. If I am truly going to recommit to my old fishing habit it only seemed logical to me to start up back where I left it off. Back to the well, to drink once more.

Any way.

The journey which used to take 1+ hours from my NE Minneapolis crack house now only takes about 45 minutes from my posh north suburban junior Mcmansion. Yeah, life's been good to me, as the song goes. That 45 minutes does not include the time to stop and pick up a couple of scoops of crappie minnows and a salted nut roll -- a true ice fishing necessity (The salted nut roll, not the minnows).

Out on the ice the first thing that I noticed was that there are a lot more people ice fishing these days. I couldn't get in to my old sweet spot where I would have been sitting in 20' of water (Unless I wanted to stand on one foot between a couple of tip-ups) so I was forced further out on the drop-off, in about 25 feet of water.

People may tell you that angling is an art form or a skill, either of which can be augmented by the inclusion of technology. To some extent that may be true but I submit to anyone who has stumbled across this blog that angling is nothing less than a priviledge. Think about it. There is a connection to nature that no form of food gathering or hunting can match. Even shooting fowl or beasts of the woods fails to approach the relationship that a man must establish with his foray if he hopes to eat. Yes, angling is a gift straight from God, and the overuse of technology difuses the signifigance of this gift.

Nobody fishes outside anymore. Everybody's got shacks. Cardboard shacks. Plywood shacks. Tin shacks. Robo-shacks that transform into trailers and who knows what else, possibly Jappanese arch-villans for all I know. A few old-timers here and there were in fold-up portables, which are what I grew up using. And then there were all those in-fisherman types with their Fish traps and portable sonars and underwater cameras, all pulled behind a snomobile or ATV.

Feh. Damned kids.

I'm probably just bitter because I had to clear the slush out of my holes about every two minutes, and slip bobbering was a joke. Even the rod & reel combo I brought out was useless, as it was so cold that I could barely get the crank to go around on the reel. It was outdoor bare hand-over-bare hand fishing, baby, a la jigsticks. Told you I was old-school. Did I mention that I was a phi beta kappa jig-sticker? Well I learned it from the best.

All told I spent maybe three hours out on the ice, including startup and takedown time, and within that period I iced six black crappies, four of which I kept. They made for a tasty after dinner snack which nourished my soul more than I can express. Fried crappie is like manna from my childhood.