Search for county, then lake under county. Everything is in alphabetical order.
CALUMET CO
Round Lake
January 6th
Ice is safe
Time: Late morning
Bait: Waxies & Spikes
Results: We got a lot of small gills and sunfish. Some trout also. Pretty much there was fish down every hole we drilled, it is just they were small. The best areas seem to be the West and NW shore area as far as size and action.
January 7th, 2001
Time: afternoon to evening
Bait: same as above
Results: Same as before. Many many small panfish. Some trout also but even those are only around 7-8 inches. However if you fished deeper I imager larger trout could be found. This will probably conclude my season's expeditions to Round Lake. All of these small fish just aren't normal. Well there was that summer kill 1.5 years ago. Hopefully in about 3-4 years this fishery will have fully recovered.
January 13th 2001
Time: Noon to afternoon
Bait: spikes mostly
Results: Caught some large fish now, but none over 7.5 inches. Seemed to bite more as afternoon went on. But again lots of babies. Took home about 15 nice ones.
January 20, 2001
Time: 9:30-11:30
Results: Fished the NW corner in about 15 feet. We got lots of small ones. 2 keeper gills, one nice trout too.
January 27, 2001
Time: Late morning
Results: Lots of small fish again. Noting much.
March 2nd, 2001
Time: Morning
Results: A few real small ones, fish not biting.
Bullhead Lake
Late November
Ice Thickness: 4 inches
Time: Afternoon
Target Fish: Gills
Bait: Waxies
Presentation: Traditional
Results: Not much, few bites.
December 22, 2000
Ice Thickness: 8 inches
Time: 3:30pm
Target Fish: Bluegill
Bait: Waxies on Teardrop Jig
Presentation: Traditional
Results: One small gill, one perch
Jan 13th 2001
Time: morning and afternoon
Bait: Minnows, waxies, spikes
Results: In the morning I got nothing, saw some crappies be caught in the middle of the lake. In the afternoon we got 2 nice perch, and one flag.
January 20, 2001
Time: 7:00-9:00 and 2:30-5:30
Bait: Minnows
Results: 4 crappies in the morning, 3 in the evening. I was in 32 feet and most of the fish came through at 25 feet down. The window of the bite was pretty short lasting only about 45min to a half an hour. The crappies were nice sized though.
January 21 2001
Time: 6:20am-8:15am
Bait: Minnows
Results: I was with my dad for about the first half hour and we had 4 crappies. After that it was just me alone and I managed to get 5 more. The fish were kind of finicky. Not every school that went through would yeild a bite.
January 27 2001
Time: Early morning and evening
Bait: Minnows
Results: I was out in the morning with my dad and uncle. We got about 14 fish total but a lot of misses by my uncle. The fish were all really nice sized. All of the fish were crappies. However in the evening it was a different story. I got nothing.
March 2nd, 2001
Time: Early Morning
Results: Tried the deep flats where I had such good luck earlier in season, but only
marked fish on bottom, and two crappie schools. It looks like a guy that was
maybe in 25' of water near the landing was catching them well. I did come back later
in the morning and tried SW area of the lake in 27' and got a perch and a big gill,
but by that time it was already 11am and the fish had probably shut off.
March 16th, 2001
Time: Afternoon
One Bite!!
March 20th 2001
Time: Evening
Tried to find crappies, no such luck.
March 21st, 2001
Time: Morning
Results: I got two bites and about a 10inch bass. Whoop dee do.
Graf Lake
February 10th, 2001
Time: 7-10am
Results: I thought that I would go out and try this little known lake. I should
have went to Bullhead. We got 2 flags, one was definately a fish. No panfish bites.
I looked all over this 6 acre lake with the locator and only marked 2 fish. I am pretty
confused. I got a ton of fish there in the summer about 2 years ago.
Long Lake
December 22, 2000
Ice Thickness: 9 inches
Time: morning
Target fish: Gills
Bait: Spikes & Waxies
Presentation: Trad.
Results: 4 keeper gills, one crappie.
December 23, 2000
Ice thickness: See above
Time: Morning
Target Fish: Gills & Crappies
Bait: Waxies & spikes
Presentation: lots of action
Results: 15 keepers, 10 crappies, 5 gills
January 6th, 2001
Time: morning
Fishing is SLOW- FISH NOT BITING HERE
January 18th, 2001
Time: Night
On rumors of good crappie fishing here I stupidly tried to catch some night fishing. A few other guys were out on the ice also. Nothing doing. I marked fish but nothing bit. Lots of shanties still on the lake.
March 2nd, 2001
Time: Morning
Results: Nothing, Long Lake sucks late season.
March 21st, 2001
Time: Morning
Results: I tried around the first point there, which is suppose to be the hot spot
now. Jack Shit.
March 24th, 2001
Time: 3:45-4:50pmn
Results: Sometimes it pays to just keep trying. I finally got some fish, about
13 decent bluegills. Sadly it will be my last trip of the year, I am sick of ice fishing.
Shoe Lake
January 19th, 2001
Time: 11-6
Weather: Partly Sunny
Bait: Minnows & Waxies
Results: Went here on a tip from my uncle. I got a lot of small bluegills. I was fishing in 24-20 ft of water and they would come through at like 6 feet down. I also got around 10 crappies. Not too huge. They seemed to hold more 15ft down. There were a lot more fish down there than that bit.
February 10th, 2001
Time: 10-11am
Weather: Sunny
Results: Got a few bites, one crappie. I marked a lot of fish, but not many bit.
Kind of disappointing.
Tuma Lake
March, 19 2001
Ice is good
Time: Morning
Results: Ok, got 3 gills, one that came off. One of the 3 was real nice. Fish seemed
to be concentrated on the drops of the flat. Only could seem to get one fish out of a
hole and then I would have to drill a new hole.
March 23rd, 2001
Time: Morning
Results: About 3 bites. Not too much doing, ice is getting bad too. Be careful.
March 24th, 2001
Time: Morning
Results: Nothing
PORTAGE CO
Bear Lake
March 2nd, 2001
Time: Afternoon
Results: Stopped by quickly, no fish.
March 11th, 2001
Time: Afternoon
Results: Stopped and drilled one hole off from boat landing. Nothing.
Lake Emily
January 31 2001
Time: Afternoon
Weather: Cool and Windy
Bait: Waxies
Depth: 1-3 ft off bottom
Results: We got about 30 gills, mostly of marginal size. Jig color is definately orange to yellow. If you don't have that don't bother. We just fished in and amongst the
permenant shanties.
February 17th 2001
Time: Afternoon
Results: We decided to give Emily a try before we put an end to this horrible day
fishing. Got there and marked fish, but of course they were uncoperative.
March 2nd, 2001
Time: Afternoon
Results: Stopped by just to see if fish were biting. Not a thing.
Lake Joanis
January 22 2001
Time: 3:30 to 4:30
Weather: Partly Sunny
Bait: Waxies
Depth: 1-3 foot off bottom
Results: I moved around quiet a bit trying to get a feel for where the fish are.
I actually managed to catch some bluegills. I got about 5, two of which were actually
of decent size. I was fishing on the south side of the Island, about half way between
the shore and the Island.
January 24th, 2001
Time: 8:15am-9:15am
Weather: Partly Cloudy
Bait: Waxies
Results: I got a small perch, small gill, and a few bites. The fish were finicky, very
finicky. Hard to get them to bite. Joanis is better in the afternoon I think now.
January 29th 2001
Time: 1:30 to 3:15pm
Weather: Cool and damp
Bait: waxies
Results: I was out with my buddy Brandon and my roomate for a while. Got some small panfish in the NW area of the lake. One crappie. The big excitement of the day was a 16 inch bass Brandon got.
February 3rd, 2001
Lake Joanis Fishing Tourney
Weather: Mostly Cloudy, Flurries
Bait: -- Fished for everything
Results: It was again that time of year, time for the poorly organized fishing tournament
put on my Centertainment. The tournament fishing was for the most part good, unless you got a bad part of the lake. I know one group got like 6 fish all day. Anyways,
the Biggest Norhtern was 25in, Crappie 12.5, Bluegill 8in, Perch 7.5, Largemouth 17in, and Smallmouth 14in. Largest Crappie, smallest overall fish, and largest panfish were all won by my lucky younger brother. The fishing, as I said, was better than expected. The 14in Smallie was a surprise. So was the 12.5 inch crappie. An 11.25 inch was
caught by another group also. Furhermore, the 17in largemouth was a good fish also. And lastly, the number of bluegill, and size was surprising. Our group got over 40 ourselves, and also some of them were 7in+. That may have been the greatest Surprise of all.
February 5th, 2001
Time: 1:20 to 4:14pm
Weather: partly sunny then cloudy
Bait: Spikes
Results: I did well with spikes, even though spikes aren't suppose to be
the best thing to use around here. I first fished an area I did during the
tourney yesterday. I got 2 nice gills, three small ones, and 2 small perch. Then I got
antsy. I tried a few other spots and got a few nibbles and one fish. So I headed
it back to my first spot and got a few bites. It was either the fact that
it clouded up or the afternoon wearing on that shut the fish off. It seems they
turned off around 2:30pm. One of these nights I am going to get out for the
crappies here.
February 7th, 2001
Time: 2:45-5:00pm
Weather: Snowing
Bait: Spikes
Results: The fishing was pretty poor for the first 2 hrs, with mostly tiny
gills being caught. The bite was poor, they liked to just pull at the tail
of the spike. Then at about 4:25 it picked up more, and I got more respectable
fish. Even so, only one of these "respectable" fish was of keeping size, probably
around 7.5 inches.
February 12th 2001
Time: 3:15-5:40pm
Weather: Cloudy
Results: I caught most of all the fish from 3:15 to 4:15. I got about 5 gills and
7 crappie. ALL of the fish were nice sized. One of the crappies was a 13.5 in plate.
I fished about 4 foot off bottom for the crappie. It was a pretty good day on the ice.
February 13th 2001
Time: 1:30-4:30
Weather: Cloudy
Results: What a difference a day makes. Not a single crappie today. I think some
swam through. The minnows got rattled good a few times. Even the bluegill fishing was
quite slow. Not a good day.
February 14th 2001
Time: 8:15-9:10am
Weather: Partly Sunny and Cold
Results: I tried the spot I did so well at 2 days ago. Nothing. Then I went to another
spot where I guess that they are having more luck with smaller crappies. I got one. Slow day.
February 15th 2001
Time: 6:40pm-8:30pm
Weather: Cloudy
Results: I bounced around a lot of different spots. I got one crappie and it was
small. I got the fish kind of right where you walk on the lake. I didn't stay in
that spot long. That spot seems to work well for crappie but they are small there. Where have my big crappies gone?
February 17th 2001
Time: Mid Day
Weather: COLD
Results: Not a lot of fish wanted to bite. We did get two nice gills, and a
nice crappie. Also some small gills and one small crappie. Not that good of action
though.
February 19th, 2001
Time: Morning
Weather: Cloudy, slightly windy, warm.
Results: Fished mostly in the area where you directly walk on the lake. Bluegill
action was slow, only 4. Two of them were decent. I did manage to get one crappie, and I also missed one. The most interesting thing though was the I think Northern that sliced
me off.
February 26th 2001
Time: Afternoon.
Weather: nice, not too cold.
Results: The crappies were in again in my favorite spot on the west end there. Got about 14.
February 27th 2001
Time: afternoon into evening
Weather: Clear and cold
Results: Not too stellar. The crappies were not in the spot they were in yesterday. So I fished in the sure fire spot where you walk out. Got about 10 crappies, not too big excpept for one that was a good 10 inches.
March 5th, 2001
Time: Early Afternoon.
I just was out for a sec to see if my crappies were in. They were not.
March 6th, 2001
Time: Afternoon. No crappies in spots, couple small gills. Not much else.
March 9th, 2001
Time: Afternoon.
Results: Couple half way decent gills, one tiny crappie, and a perch. Not too hot
of a day.
Spring Lake
March 9th, 2001
Time: Midday
Results: Gills were biting well, however only one of keeper size. Also two small
bass. Was fishing right out from landing.
March 11th, 2001
Time: Afternoon
Results: Not much, two perch.
Stoltenberg Pond
February 17th 2001
Time: Morning
Results: A couple small bluegills, not much. Fish were running up high, a few
on bottom. Not a good day fishing.
Sunset Lake
March 2nd, 2001
Time: Afternoon
Results: Stopped by for a bit, nothing.
Tree Lake
March 2nd, 2001
Time: Late Afternoon
Results: Tree seemed a bit more promising. I did mark some fish and we did get
2 small crappies. Guys near us did have quite a few nice ones caught. This lake
could hold promise.
March 5th, 2001
Time: Afternoon
Results: Got a lot of small perch, nothing else. Had one or two larger fish come
off though. No crappies.
WISCONSIN RIVER BACKWATERS
Nov 28, 2000
Location: a few miles NW of Stevens Point (the pipe)
Ice Thickness: 3 in
Time: Afternoon
Target fish: Bluegills
Bait: Waxies on teardrop jigs
Presentation: Traditional
Depth: 6-10 ft, 1 ft off bottom
Results: Fish bit fairly well. We got two crappies, and many bluegills of all sizes. We kept the 2 crappies and we also kept 10 of the bluegills that were of decent size. Three of the 10 were quite large.
February 17th, 2001
Time: Late Morning
Results: Nothing, not a fish. Not even one marked.
March 6th, 2001
Time: afternoon
Results: Couple small perch a ways down, otherwise not much.
Dec 1, 2000
Location: WI River backwaters, red bridge due west of Casimir
Ice Thickness: unsafe - 5in in spots
Target Fish: Bluegills
Bait: Waxies
Presentation: Traditional
Depth: 5-15ft
Results: Many small fish, about 8 keepers ranging from 7-8 inches.
February 17th, 2001
Time: Late Morning
Results: We drilled some holes right by the bridge there. About 20 feet.
We marked some fish, no bites though.