Fishing Report, Ice Fishing

Hardwater 101: Part 2/Revisited

 



Contours Lines and Hole Sets

If drilling in the trees is not up your alley, the Big Devil has many different opportunities for you. Humps and drop offs and flat basins. A GPS with Devils Lake chip will assist you in targeting these areas. I would be lost and flying blind without my GPS unit with Lake Chip..

On early ice it is important to realize that the Walleyes are hugging structure and active most in the first two hours of the day and the last hour of the evening. We call both of these periods the Golden Hours and if you are going to target Walleyes on Devils Lake it is imperative that you are on the ice and set up early and late.

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When we are targeting Walleyes on Early Ice we generally get out on the lake in the dark, preferably long before the sun is even close to lightening the horizon. I like to have my holes drilled long before the fish become active.

Devils Lake has almost no night bite, but this early ice walleye action is usually best in under 10 feet of water and drilling can scatter the fish. This is why I like to get my holes drilled long before the Eyes are in the shallows looking for food.!

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What we are looking for on the GPS is contour lines that are forming “O’s” or “8’s”, this signifies rises or depressions. Preferably rises as I have my best Early Ice Walleye successes on humps, Walleye are ambush predators and are coming up, underneath their prey to feed.

When we fishing humps and structure, we seldom, seldom only drill one hole. In fact, I like to drill a series of holes peppering the entire structure both on top of the hump, on the cut, and below on the flat surrounding the hump. You can get the Eyes coming, going, and in between.

 

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Walleye fishing in the a.m. and p.m. Golden Hours is a jigging game on Devils Lake. Along with jigging, however, I also like to set slip bobbers with plain hooks and full minnows, tail hooked. I believe that not only does this struggling bait action ‘call the fish in’, I have also experienced that some of our bigger fish actually come on the set lines and not the active jigging.


I wrote this post for Hardwater 101 just under a year ago.  Oh, how much we have grown.  Initially we were so caught up in having the post be the right length and not go on too long, that post was 388 words.  There is no way I could get in what I really wanted to say in less than 400 words.

To be honest with you, the early season is all about walking out.  The extreme early season like this year, it is pretty much a small body of water game and a guy is chasing Walleye and Pike.

I’m a Wintertime Perch guy as I love the Perch Search.  The exhilaration of drilling onto that Vexilar Christmas Tree eruption is what feeds my passion for ice fishing.   However, after being off the ice in what seems like forever, I will get out and chase just about anything.

Our Northern Feeder lakes are the first to submit to the ice cover and those smaller bodies of water are teeming with Walleye and Pike.  There are some Perch, and if you get one its a big one, but overall we are going up onto those smaller bodies with the intent of catching Walleyes.

Lake Alice, Lake Irvine, Chain Lake, Mike’s Lake, and Dry Lake are the target bodies that we will be going to while the big lake is still in liquid form on top.  Those Northern Feeder lakes were all dry at one time; the late 80’s and early 90’s.  Being as such, they are all pretty uniform in the fact that there isn’t a whole lot of structure.  Lake Irvine was farmed in the early 90’s and is a big field.

Lacking a lot of structure, those fish up there are roamers.  Sometimes it takes a lot of drilling to finding the schools.  A run-and-gun attitude can sometimes be the ticket.  At other times, the guy that drills in and sits and waits will have great success as well.

The little structure that is up there is on Lake Alice.  The Fish and Wildlife service built up a number of Duck Islands around the lake when it was dry and those islands are now submerged.  I was just out to my favorite one on Thursday.  The top of the island is now in 3 feet of water, the surrounding ledge is 5-7 feet and the drop-off out away from the island is in 9 feet.

My favorite way to attack this structured island is to set slip bobbers up shallow, staggered in 3-5-7 feet and then actively jig the outer skirts.  Seems like up there the schools of fish circle those islands looking for food.

Keep in mind, the water up on the feeder lakes is really muddy right now.  On both Alice and Irvine, the holes that I have drilled, a guy can’t even see to the bottom of the ice hole and that is inly 4-6.25 inches.  Might take a little bit for those sediments to settle and the bite to pick up.  Sitting on a spot and waiting AND fishing with live bait might be the two options until we get some more ideal water clarity.

 

Good Luck Out There

Hold On To Your Rod!!

And…

Turn Fishing Into Catching

With…

DevilsLakeFishingReport!!

 

 

About Travis E

Just a Devils Lake outdoor junkie. This is my blog. Follow me for fishing reports, waypoints, and other information that can help make your day on the lake a success! Connect via Facebook, Instagram, or email. Read on for the latest fishing reports. I also offer limited guided day trips and up-to-date waypoints where I’ve recently caught fish. See you on the lake or in the field!
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