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I just returned from a few day trip up north in Canada to go ice fishing. My neighbor invited me along on a trip with his brothers and step-dad that they take on regular occasion. It was a lot of fun and I will try and explain how it works with the pictures.
First, you have to get out on the ice. Here is Mark, my neighbor's brother, me
(middle) and my neighbor, John, in front of one of the bombadiers.
These are tracked vehicles with two ski type things up front for
steering. They are pretty minimal vehicles designed only for the one purpose.
Here are the guys from the other hut. John's step brothers and step-dad, Art.
The huts are lined up on the ice, about 50 yards apart.
This helps to show the size of the huts. We had 3 guys to each hut, but
could probably have fit 4. Some of the huts are a little bigger than this
too. You can see on the ground that you don't need a cooler for your beverages.
You can only really stand up in the middle.
I'm holding the fish cam in my hand and you can see one of two of the holes
in the ice and bottom of the hut that you fish through.
Once you are inside, the door is shut and the windows covered,
this is the view on the ground. It's actually one big hole cut in the ice,
but 2 holes cut in the hut.
This shows the setup a little bit. You have a propane fed heater in the middle,
the fish cam on a shelf above that, benches on the right and left, minnows
in the middle and the fish holes in the middle.
Here's the view on the fish cam. It's actually pretty cool. You can see your
bait/lure, what the fish is doing with it, and when the right time is
to try and set the hook. It was like fishing in an aquarium.
We weren't exactly catching monsters on this trip.
We actually barely made it over keeper status and kept
mainly what we thought we could get some meat off of.
It can be a long day on the ice, especially working on
2 hours of sleep and lots of driving.
One of the brothers has been ragged on by the group for dropping
a pair of pliers down the hole like 35+ years ago. He happen to live
up to his reputation by dropping his filet knife down the hole this time.
The other brothers couldn't have been happier.
Here's the whole group sitting down ready to play
some cards. A very tired bunch we are, all working on
little sleep, of which I took full advantage of during the game.
Here's our catch for 2 days of fishing. It's pretty disappointing
considering the limit is 25 a day per guy. We didn't
have any real big ones to show for our effort either.
All that's left is to cut them up...
...and eat them.
That's really cool James! I feel like I learned alot, thanks for the snapshot of what ice fishing is really like! : ) All I knew of it before was from Grumpy Old Men : ).
I'll have to get the pics from you somehow... Glad you all had fun...
What a great experience for you James!