Cold Minnetonka ice outing

I met up with some guys from CKOutdoors on lake Minnetonka. it was too cold to stand around and shoot the bull, so i went at the ice drilling and fishing 15 to 20 holes at various depths. I found plenty of fish willing to bite, but the were all tiny sunfish and perch. I got one pike around three pounds on a fatboy jig tipped with maggots. After a while I got tired of fishing, went in Andy's portable to hang out, and he cooked me up some brats with jalepeno chees filling! yummm. Went over to oles portable and chatted for a whille and caught a few young perch too.
Afterwards I procedded to my van for a short nap. Everyone left but andy. we decided to fish til dark hoping for a crappie bite to kick in. Some crappies did move in and I was able to goad a couple into taking T.H.E. jig, but they were not big enough to hold our interest in the bitter cold, so we packed it up. I kept nothing but went home with two big jars of pickled pike thanks to Andy and Mike!

bigmouth

My only decent bluegill out of 30 or so

Nighttime crappies on the jig

Metro panfish outing

Me and Jack hit a small metro lake for some panfish action. we got lots of good eating sized crappies and a few bluegills. They were at around 15 ft down in 20 feet.
I got mine on a fatboy jig with maggots, I think Jack got his on a ratso jig. It was nice to get out in the sun with no wind!

Too Dark? take the first MT bucket poll!

Bass Pundit has let me know that some of my pics on my last post were so in need of brightening that they are "pretty much lousy", so I thought it would be a good opportunity to have a fun little vote to see what others think, so please post your comments on which one you think looks best.

Here is the pic he gave as an example, a bit dark probably, but i thought was ok.

Here are three alternatives you can vote for if you prefer one of these to the original, or you can give it a shot and send me your version which I will post on the bucket!
1. Here is BPs attempt. better lighting for sure, but it looks like it was taken with a foggy lense!


Here are a couple of my attempts
2.


3.

Thanks for your comments! vote 0 for the original, or 1, 2, or 3 for the others, or make your own up. its all for fun though! best fishes!

MT

Snowstorm sunfish

We had our annual up north ice fishing outing this weekend, We were going to fish a few different lakes looking for the biggest panfish. lots of snow and temps down to 30 below had us change our plans and we stayed at the lake were we were staying on and fished for sunfish the whole time.
It was hard to get around without snowmobiles, it was so deep, and the slush was bad, but we still found lots of nice sunfish mostly in 16 ft. We used small jigs tipped with maggots, or plastics, gulp!waxies worked well too.

first fish for me

big huge sunfish!



Casey with a big mule



Jack scores with this nice bull bluegill




snow kept covering my flasher, but it didnt stop me from getting some nice panfish




Cory with a whale!



more good ones

Ultimate panfish league contest

Jack and me fished the ultimate panfish league put on by Matt Johnson Outdoors and Thorne brothers.
It was on Linwood lake, a metro lake that has tons of panfish, the key is to try to find the biggest ones, everywhere in the deep water the sonar would light up with fish. the object is to catch the biggest 5 crappies, sunfish, and perch. we pretty much did not try for perch, since the lake doesnt hold many past the 6 inch cutoff.
We started looking for the crappies, hoping for some mules that would be the money fish! I started using a lindy fatboy jig with the biggest ratso to try and attract the slabs and discourage the small fish from biting. It didnt work perfectly as those tiny crappies were very agressive and had big heads for their size with big mouths, so some time was wasted pulling in lots of dinks to get to the keepers.
We got our 5 keeper crappies, and a couple of sunfish, and I started to focus on the gills, i forgot my maggots in the fridge,but i had some waxworms, and that worked good for the gills, almost too good, got lots of little ones, plus the little crappies and big northerns were likeing the smell of those! I caught my biggest pike of the day on a waxworm, I also got some nice pike on the ratso, wasted alot of time playing them, but it was fun though. I finally got on a hole where I popped three good sunfish. We had our ten keepers. We thought about trying for perch because if you get the trifecta of 15 you get a bonus pound added to your weight.
We decided againts that and when to finding a big 'kicker' mule crappie that would seal the deal. We saw another contestant bag a 13 inch slab near us, and we went to work hole hopping for the big one.I got a good eater sized crappie, and another nice pike, and helped jack ice a 6 pound plus pike, but the big crappie was not in the works for us today. We got our fish together to pick out the best ten and went to the weigh in.
I didn't think we would win because we didn't get any whoppers, but it turned out that the guys who got the big slabs didn't get their 10 fish, so we ended up winning by around 5 oz at 3.6 pounds for 10 panfish.

The UPL Linwood contest results and pics HERE

MT bucket fan club?

wow, I had a good crowd watching me ice this pike!

CKOutdoors ice outing

A bunch of us got out for some good fun, fishing, and food, despite the wind, we had a good time.
the fish were scattered and really had to be worked, I found some in 24 ft and caught quite a few pounding a lindy fatboy jig with maggots. Others caught fish on hair jigs, and plastics got a few.
as well.
I also got to do battle with a nice pike on light line. I also got a nice burbot, my first in a few years. I played tug o war with that on 3 pound test mono, but now its in my fridge!
CK got some pics I will post here when I get em!
I think the most fun what saturday night recapping the day at CKs place looking at the pics and videos and laughing about how various fish were pulled through the hole.
And the food was great too, that spicey chilli and hot brats on the grill! mmmm!
it was good to see some of the anglers from the summer outing, and meet some new ones as well.
Andy gave me a jar full of delicious pickled crappie to take home too! more yummm!
Mabye more fish were caught, I left before noon sunday to avoid possibly getting snowed in!
here are my pics for the weekend.

CK, always up to teaching others his secrets, puts on a jig and sonar clinic


I got this beauty on 3 # mono, it was likew catching moby dick on that tiny rod !



Nice big sunfish!


nice crappie



Team ice heave works some bluegills out of the depths




one for the pan



Chilli time1



dig in!



Yummm



none on the water went hungry today!



yikes! too early for there out there!



some more good keepers





Who needs a coat? a big ol slab likr this will warm your heart!