Can you smell that??

[Dakota Iceman]

That is the first official walleye of the season frying in my pan....It cost me a dollar but something tells me that is the cheapest fish I will eat all year. All in all it was a blog worthy adventure, A dead mule deer frozen into the ice 50 yards from the shack. Went through knee high ice water to get up on the "good ice" Booze was drank and we made it off alive without any injury's. Life is good and walleye gods have been appeased. To be continued...

[reddog]

Sorry, Couldnt smell it, because we were cooking up a limit of fresh perch and walleye last night..... but, I can imagine yours was just as tasteful as ours.

Dont wanna know where, just whether you were inland or on the river.

[number]

He was on the river. YOU ATE MY FISH??!! cold man, cold. Entices me to venture out on virgin ice with alcohol. I am on to you dude. To all those out there in ice fishing land, I got DI's dollar. We also have a standing bet of $5 to the first guy that catches a fish on a chubby darter. Going on year 3 and no one has had to pay up yet. And so it begins...

[Dakota Iceman]

Chubby Darter.....the biggest scam to suck fisherman down the swirling vortex since the cordless drill auger!!! I actually used all the treble hooks off of my collection of the above mentioned worthless lure to replace all the ones still imbedded in my rod case. charging batteries and getting ready for another adventure today. Iceman out>

[rundrave]

i have had luck with the darters, can I join the $5 wager?

[Foster]

"i have had luck with the darters, can I join the $5 wager?"

yes, yes you can. come fish w/us and you're in. lol How do you fish w/that lure? Do you use a minnow w/it? Everytime I think about using it, I go to my flying rappala instead.

Went out yesterday pm w/my youngest boy. Tried the dead mule deer spot. Shake down cruise. Ran out of propane. DI to the rescue. Battries are toast on my vex. Cold, very cold all day. no bites. Left DI on the ice w/an extra heater. He called later. His batt went bad on his atv! Good thinking dude, pulling the batt and warming it up. What else... need my headlamp. Should I get a spot light? Need a better minnow bucket. toilet paper. extra lighter. nuff for now.

[rundrave]

yes, yes you can. come fish w/us and you're in. lol How do you fish w/that lure? Do you use a minnow w/it? Everytime I think about using it, I go to my flying rappala instead.

I recommend a small snap or loop knot when attaching the Darter to your line to make sure it can wiggle and swim right.

Try dropping it just below the ice and watch how it swims once to get an idea. I sometimes fish it with nothing, other times I need to put a waxie or 2 on it.

If anything it will draw in fish to the area, I often get hits on the fall and dont even have to jig it.

confidence confidence confidence!

[Foster]

[PoorWordUsage], iforgot my password for my new identity. oh well. stardate:wed, 4-7:30pm. nice out. ice clear. saw a freaky spot in the bay but it was good. the story that i heard was that the ice wasn't raising or lowering at the same rate as the water was. when a hole was dug, water flowed out of the hole for 20ft around. an hour later, all the water flowed back and there was an 8" gap between the water and the ice before it gave way. man, I bet that was cool! clear ice is good ice, right? was in 14 ft. w/current. graphed fish. no bites. forgot my seats. no headlight. dumped all of my minnows. most were dead anyway. i'm out. dues paying evening.

[Dakota Iceman]

You are the man...more info for the blog. The trials and tribulations of Ice Fishing. You are right there are days when you simply have to pay the gods their due....So I'm assuming your all paid up and our next outing will bear results? Let me know when your heading out. Iceman.

[Dakota Iceman]

basically 3 days straight of fishing and not even a bite unless you count the three little bluegills on the stock dam friday night. Was looking back on last years notes and we were catching limits this time last year. The whole river system seems to be very slow for fishing right now. hopefully the weather will change and ignite the bite. Iceman out>

[reddog]

Glad to see we werent doing anythng wrong, because it stunk for us also. We fished Friday morning from 7-930, and didnt get bit. I had about a dozen fish show up in the Vexilar, but couldnt make them go. Seen lots of dead and dying shad frozen into the ice and swimming sluggishly under the ice. I would have to assume that the eyes are foraging on the dead and dying shad, and not taking our offering.

Was good to be back on the ice again in the basin. Hopefully things will get better.

I woulda bet my left nut we were gonna catch some fish, but settled for pheasants and my muzzleloader doe instead.

[Foster]

Tried the railroad bridge last nite. 11' water. no current, looked down by a couple of feet. No bites, no graphed fish. ice is over a foot thick. I had the chubby darter (chubby daughter???)tied on and everything!

[Foster]

Dakota Iceman! Quit holding out on us. Tell the world of your latest exploits!

Surely lake francis case impoundment of the mighty missouri river gave up it's bounty and rewarded your persistance with a booty of football shaped walleye!? Surely, at this moment, your family and friends are expounding on your great fishing prowess! You are probably growing tired of constantly being asked time and again to re-tell the story of how you landed the 'big one' with only a chubby daughter:)and some string.

Thank goodness there is a blizzard raging right now. How else would there be enough walleye left for the other wannabee ice fishermen? As for me, I can only hope that the storm wil abate and someday; someday, I will be able to be graced with your presence. There, I will bask in the radiance of your knowledge and wisdom (cough,cough); knowing full well, that I am meerely (to heck with the spelling!)a pimple on the buttocks of wimpy icefisherman who sits in his pickup and asks you as you come off the ice "how thick is the ice?". Until then Dakota Iceman, I will catch these bottle bass and throttle them mercilessly, one after another! Foster out! (in more ways than one)

[Dakota Iceman]

LOL. I haven't drawn a sober breath in 4 days now and still no fish.....Let the blizzard rage on- Iceman out>

[reddog]

DI,

Anything going on on the next lake up? Im heading out today for the cabin for New Years celebrations snd would like to fish a little

[reddog]

I spent most of my vacation near Plank hunting deer, but I was able to get to the cabin at Chamberlain on Friday night. We spent all day on Saturday, chasing roosters and slept in today.

I did drive up to to Big Bend this morning and was surprised at the lack of activity! One house with a couple guys fishing, back in the deep water off the overflow channel and one house inside the old bridge abutments, unattended.

What gives? Why the inactivity?

[Foster]

Hey RED DOG. the snow and cold shut me down. i push snow for a living. Pretty much worn out after the last 21" episode. i just didn't feel like battling the elements 'if you know what i mean'. I know i'm a [e-mail:[email protected]]. We are like a bunch of old women around here - on the phone asking around who is catching fish and where, constantly wringing our hands waiting on a good report. I have heard good reports in the big bend area and I have also heard that it is a bugger to get on the ice with all of the snow. We are used to cold. we aren't used to snow. 99.9% of us here use atv's to get around, not snowmobiles. In alot of places, we can't even get our pickups in to stage a dropoff of all of our stuff. DI and I went out to mule deer point tonight, one fella I knoe went to the larson place and another at pontoon bay: we had current, no fish were caught! Me and another guy caught fish at mule deer last night (ok he caught, I got skunked). No current. I thought with current tonight, we were gonna slay 'em. didnt happen. The other thing, being a [e-mail:[email protected]], is the drive up there and the drive home. I am so used to a 5 minute drive and catching fish. that 40 min up and 40 min back makes me concerned that i might soil my nice clean pink panties with blue flowers. translated: it's hard to get fired up to drive all that way and then catch no fish when I can drive 5 minutes and get the same results. On another note, did you get a deer? And just exactely where is your cabin? There is a tourney here on the 30th in case youre interested. regards, foster

BTW, Dakota Iceman is currently incapacitated. His alcohol intake over the holiday season was epic. At the moment, he is in rehab learning how to use his extremeties; i.e. learning how to walk and not stumble, how to talk and not slur, how to drive and not swerve. I am so proud of him learning how to wipe his drool and his butt (not at the same time - I cant even do that!)

[reddog]

Foster, Thanks for clearing that up some.

I did get my deer at Plank with the smoke stick. We were also able to get the kids their deer with their leftover east river tags. Robbie (14) shot his doe on Wed, and Emily (20) shot her doe on Thursday. Both one shot kills right in the breadbasket, so the cleaning was easy. Got the meat finished up last night, actually.

Our cabin is north of C city to the top of the hill, then east and then south. Were in the cheap seats, so to say, but we love coming out there and enjoying the South Dakota experience, whether its hunting or fishing or just laying around and playing cards, like this last weekend.

Too bad about DI. I hope he heals up. Dont wanna preach, but theres no healing the liver, you know.. When we get done with fishing, its 2 cocktails, a bite to eat and then we hit the sack so we can do it all over again.

I may make the trek again this weekend. Wife is headed to Des Moines with the girls, and I have no plans. Dont know for sure.

If I need some snow moved at the cabin sometime, Ill give you a call. I was worried when we headed out there Friday night late that I would be stuck moving it with a scoop shovel, but our crp grasses performed perfectly and caught every bit of it excepth the mouth of the driveway, which I was able to get thru without scooping all weekend. That was good, because I wasnt looking forward to moving snow at -17 when we arrived.

R

[Dakota Iceman]

Rehab is for quitters....I aint no quitter! Ok so maybe I been sitting on a bar stool fishing with a short pole for the last week..or two weeks, no matter The slayer has awoken and I am headed south tonight. I watched a snowmobile head that way last night along the shoreline until he was out of sight. That makes me go hmmmm. With the tourny less than three weeks away it's time we found the elusive eye's. They are setting up some where and I intend to find them. It's time to go trap attack!!!! or should I say Team Otter? Run and Gun Baby!!! lets cover some ground and plot some waypoints so we have a gameplan come the end of Jan. The barometric pressure is way up today which generally equates to poor fishing but...."I HAVE A DREAM". Cmon Foster....tell em how wonderful your Chubby Daughter has produced for you...so good you conned your youngest blood into using that worthless lure.....that my friend is sad. You know in your heart that it is junk but all you can see is that $5.00 bill blowing across the parking lot with you in hot pursuit. Did I mention that when the wind blows here it stops in Desmoines? Iceman out>

[Dakota Iceman]

And now a few words from our sponsor in regards to last night's fishing expedition.....(*&%*&$^%#_&(*(&$#%$#$#@#. Iceman out>

[reddog]

Looks like a heat wave is headed your way. Sittin on the bucket, just got alot more comfortable.

[Foster]

Heat wave for sure! Talked to a guy that went up on sharp; had water coming up thru the hole and soaked an area 6-8 ft across each hole. They were in slush all day. They caught fish, but had a miserable time doing it. DI and myself tried last wed. Not one of our better ideas. We did test out our equipment tho and will know what to do when the weather gets bad.

[Foster]

I've been waiting for DI to post. Apparently he is awol. Went up north wed. Got checked by GF&P as well as tribal officials - all good. I do need a trespass liscense tho. Caught some fish - FINALLY!. even owed DI a buck for first walleye on the ice. Biggest news of the day was that I caught a fish on a chubby darter. I think it took 4 yrs. for that lure to work. Went out thurs to dead mule deer and got skunked. fri nite tried the spawning station. had great current and depth, had just one tip up go off. I guess I'm just gonna hafta make the drive if we wanna catch fish. DI, you still out there?

[Foster]

I'm blogging just for the sake of laughing at it in july. went w/larson to north shore. heard tha they wer pikin perch up and walleye. i put my stank on it killed the bite. it's a gift i guess. wind from the east.

[reddog]

Foster.. What the heck is going on out there? Just back from 3 days.