On Fri, 04 Feb 2011 11:50:27 -0600, Ignoramus32184
wrote:

I am in Northern Illinois. We have a small lake nearby.

I would estimate that, after extended cold weather, the ice is at
least 15 inches thick.

I have never done ice fishing and I have questions that are pretty
basic.

1) I assume that with a snow shovel and a 6 foot long straight steel
prybar, it should not be a problem to clear a foot of snow and to
break through that ice.

2) When I was a kid, I walked past a recently abandoned ice fishing
hole in Russia. I was shocked to see a giant quantity of fish crowding
the hole, as if they were starved of air and needed desperately to get
a fresh breath of air. Is that due to oxygen deprivation on an ice
covered lake, or was the hole chummed?

Is there some way to get the same effect? The lake was frozen at least
for 5-6 weeks, IIRC.

i


I grew up in northern New England and ice fishing was a good way to
spend weekends when everything was snowed in.

We carried a snow shovel and an ice auger ( you can make one ) and
just shoveled/scrapped off enough snow to get to something fairly
solid. Auger the hole and set your trap. As I remember we used live
minnows for bait.

The "traps" were a folding wood cross with a small reel, to hold the
fish line, on the bottom arm and a flag on the upper. The cross arm
kept it from falling down the hole :-) The flag was on a spring and
bent over and caught on the reel. If the reel turned it released the
spring. You built a fire and sat around the fire ( with the elders
frequently drank from some brown bottles that they kept in a hip
pocket ) and us kids ran around on the ice and when a flag popped up
raced to the hole to get the fish - just haul them in and throw them
out on the ice.

You can build everything you need so, other then the minnows, it is a
pretty cheap sport.