Another fun day on the ice, 2-15

[6poundtest]

This is going to be a long one so grab a snack.........
It was more than fun; to use 870's description from last week, it was epic!
He was able to join me today ahead of the snow and ice storm that's blowing now and we had high hopes of another "crappie" day, similar to what I enjoyed last week. Here's my first pic of the day (camera battery died in the cold a few pics later):



We were in our spot about 10:40 or so with another group of tip up fishermen over toward the far shore. I knew ahead of time that they would be out there and we didn't want to crowd them so I went over to introduce myself and make sure we weren't intruding. I'd gone about 20' when I heard "fish on!" behind me. Well that didn't take long.... a few more steps....."fish on!". 870 was on 'em for sure. I got over to the other folks and we chatted a bit, I asked how they'd been doing; it had been pretty slow for them with just a perch or 2.
I invited them over to check out our setup if they wished and headed back to our area. The picture above is what I found when I got back, maybe 15 minutes of time away. It looked like the start of a good day and it was.
A bit later, the 3 other folks came by for a look-see. Dad with his son and their friend; we'll call them Dave and son Dan, along with Joe, and all their jaws dropped when they saw the fish we had on the ice after just a short time. 870 and I were both on them and the fish were cooperating amazingly well. We explained the whole set up to them, along with the Mega 360 and the 2 sonar units and I think we made their knees go weak with technology and how it was producing for us.
We offered up our rods and holes so they could try it for themselves. Here is 870 with Dan giving it a try for the first time; I think he's 14 or so. Loves to fish and REALLY likes to jig while ice fishing now! He caught on instantly, in fact they all did.



All 3 of them tried it and caught fish; somehow I think some credit cards are going to get scorched on some new jigs, line and ultra-light jigging rods, LOL! Dave does have a sonar unit for the ice but he was only familiar with the flasher dial type readout and liked the traditional sonar screen readout much better. He guaranteed us that he'll have it out next time, set to standard sonar screens. His time with us opened up a whole new world for them all. Joe was the senior of the bunch and has been ice fishing his whole life. What he saw today seemed to stun him as to how the sport has changed. He was delighted to see it in person with his own eyes and to actually experience it first hand.

It was such a joy to introduce others to the current world of ice fishing. These nice folks were long time tip up users with some occasional jigging, if I've got the whole story straight. All 3 were truly amazed at what a different world the sonar opened up to them for jigging on ice. 870 and I spoke later at how happy we both were to have had the opportunity to give them the chance to experience it on such a good perch and crappie bite.

How good was the bite, you ask? Bearing in mind that CT has no limits on panfish, we think we were near a triple digit day between all 5 of us and due to the depth, all were kept.







I have to admit that after hearing that our new found friends weren't having much luck on tip ups, I told 870 that I'd be making sure that they would be taking enough fish home for some future meals and between us all, we filled their 5 gallon bucket with nice perch and crappies.

I don't know if Dan is yawning or in awe of my fishing skills in this pic; I'm leaning toward the yawn. Although he certainly wasn't bored with the action and neither were we!



I asked for permission to post Dan's pics on our forum and we explained about us being members of crappie.com; perhaps they'll swing by and read this post and know that we had a great time with them today and maybe we'll meet up again on the ice.