Eight Point Lake

Budd Lake Fishing Contest 2/19/12



Dennis & Chachi 

The 2012 Frost Bite Open Fishing Tournament had a big turnout and a great day for ice fishing. My nephew Chachi and I got on the lake at 6:45am ready to fish. Our first stop on our way to registration was at Riches sleeper shanty to meet up with Millais and Rich for the tournament. They moved their shanty to the South shore Saturday night after a two day stay on Houghton Lake. The sleeper shanty experience has added another level to ice fishing all together. Fishing started at 8am and we were setup on South shore along with lots of other fishermen. Things went well early and we hooked all of our pan fish by 9 am. Then we worked the rest of the day trying to find a walleye or a pike to complete the stringer. Everyone in our team and as far as I could see fished hard without ever producing a fish. It turned out to be one of those days and we ended up hooking lots of pan fish, but no big fish. At weigh in no walleyes were caught and the winning team of Mark Reinkee and his wife won the tournament with 9 lbs, one pike and a 10 pan fish. Another fun even made possible by Kens Landing and the Harrison Chamber.

Rich and Chaci fishing 12 FOW

Great ice fishing weather

Houghton Lake 2/17/12

Mark and Tracker waiting for a bite

We fished the West Side of Houghton Lake Friday afternoon from 2 - 7pm.  Mark and I headed out 1.6 miles to one of our winter fishing areas in 9 FOW.  We setup and found good weeds and saw a few walleyes on the camera early.  The fish didn't cooperate at all and we had our fist shut out of the year on HL.  The ice conditions were very good with about 10 to 11 inches in most areas. 

Holly and Danny

West Side of Houghton Lake

Budd Lake 2/12/12

Chachi taking a break by the power dock

We spent seven hours today walking Budd Lake marking out fishing spots for Frost Bite Fishing Tournament that will be held next Sunday.  Chachi and I checked out a lot of new fishing spots and didn't find many fish.  We didn't hook any fish today, but we did find a few new areas that have nice fish structure.

Afternoon setup on the West side

Budd Lake 2/12/12

Underwater camera clip of a musky found in 15 FOW while scouting for walleye.

3" Magnum Report

After getting my boat uncovered and ready I headed for the boat launch at lake Erie metro park only to realize that my fuel line was bad so we decided to hit the Gibraltar Marinas. We ended up slaying the jumbo perch, lunker gills and crappies. We caught about 30 perch over 10" and about 50 gills over 8" and about 10 average size crappies over the weekend. It was nice to sit on the dock watching a bobber in February.

- Rich "3-Inch Mag"

Pratt Lake 2/3/12

 

Slow bite on Pratt Lake.  We made it out on Friday and found lots of fish but not much activity.  The blue gills were scattered in 10 to 18 FOW in most areas we looked.  Ice conditions are still good with about 8 inches in most areas.  If your heading out on the lake make sure you have ice cleats on.

2012 Houghton Lake Ice Fishing Tournament

2012 Sportsmen for Their Neighbors Ice Fishing Tournament

Brought to you by Central Michigan District Health Department

Saturday March 10th, 2012

South Shore DNR Boat Launch Houghton Lake. M-55 and Townline Rd.

Registration begins at 7:00 AM with fishing starting at 8:00 AM.

Weigh in is at 1:00 PM with prizes being given away at 2:00 PM.

Two-person teams

$15 per person prior to event

$20 per person day of event

Prizes for (legal caught):

u Largest Pike

u Largest Walleye

u Largest stringer of Walleye

u Largest stringer of Walleye

u Heaviest mess of pan fish

u Largest Sunfish

u Largest Perch

u Largest Crappie

All fish caught will be donated to local food banks in order to help decrease hunger in Central Michigan. There will also be a canned food drive as well as a wild game drop off to be donated to food banks as well.

Family events will also be going on for those not interested in ice fishing include:

Skating rink, Chili Cook Off, Professional Fisherman appearances, Dietitians

Hotel Rooms at a discount rate through the Beachfront Hotel

www.Beachfronthl.com or call 989-202-4700

(2 queen beds with a beachfront view for $69.99 with a Jacuzzi upgrade for $10 more)

Visit CMDHD.ORG for registration information or contact:

 Jake Trombley

(989) 615-3968

TROMBL49@MSU.EDU

A special thanks to our Premier Sponsor:

Lyman’s on the Lake Buy your bait at Lyman’s!  

Pratt Lake Fishing Report 1/27/12



Pratt Lake Gills

 

The original Friday fishing plan was to head over to Lake Cadillac, but work issues kept us close to home.  We made the best of our situation and drove over to Pratt Lake to try our luck. Mark and I started looking for fish on the South East side of the lake at noon and found lots of bass and sunfish.  We worked our way around the lake and found bass and pan fish in 10 to 18 FOW in most areas we checked out.  We took advantage of the gill fishing and caught a limit while we searched for walleyes.   Overall we caught lots of average sized gills and had a busy time with our tip ups unhooking bass and pike.  No walleyes hooked on this trip, but we did see two nice ones on the fish camera.  The ice conditions were good with seven to eight inches everywhere we fished. 

Lake 13 Report:  Friend of ours have limited out on gills and big perch on the last four trips out to Lake 13. 

Good Luck...

Lake 13 Farwell Michigan

Pratt Lake Ice Fishing Trip 1-27-12.

Ice Fishing Tackle

I stopped at Northwoods last night and picked up a few additions to my ice fishing tackle.  Mark and I are planning on fishing Lake Cadillac on Friday and will be testing out the perch pattern.  If you are looking for good deals on fishing gear check out Northwoods in Pinconning, it's one of our favorite places to shop.

Live Forage Minnow Trap Fish-Fry Minnow 1/8 oz

Live Forage Minnow Trap Fish-Fry Minnow 1/4 oz

Lindy Darter Natural Perch 2"& 1 1/2"

Salmo Chubby Darter Gold Yellow Perch 2" 3/8oz

Budd Lake Fishing Report 1-22-12

20-inch Bass hooked on a Lindy Slick Jig 14 FOW

Fished Budd Lake for the first time this year.  Mark and I fished the South end of the lake looking for pan fish.  We started out fishing at 11am and by 4 pm we had drilled over seventy holes from 17 FOW all the way into 4 FOW finding only small pan fish, musky, and pike.  Found lots of musky and bass in all depths which is a great sign for summer fishing.   The weed cover is way down this year and most of our favorite fishing spots are completely weed free.  It looks like the lake had been treated at some point this year.  At 4:30pm we stopped pan fishing and started jigging for walleyes.  We hooked a nice 20-inch bass, saw a big pike, and missed the only walleye we could make bite.   The ice conditions vary in most locations from 3 to 5 inches with only about half being good clear ice.   I would not take an ATV of snowmobile on the lake at this time after what we saw today. 

Good Luck...

3" Magnum Report - Houghton Lake

Donna

Well, after a short work week I packed up the family and headed back to Houghton Lake for round 2 of 2012 ice fishing on the east bay, I got my wife to come along to see what its all about and she had fun watching me and my dad catch lots of pike while her and the dog sat next to the fireplace keeping warm and hydrated.
We caught lots of 22" pike and a couple keepers, 1 big large mouth that we released on our 2 days of fishing but the Walleyes were hard to find. We jigged everything in our boxes and even tried cutting the heads off our minnows to try and entice those elusive Walleyes but we fell short all weekend. The pike seem to favor the tip ups and Lindy slick jigs.
If you head out on Houghton in the next couple weeks be careful of the ice and don't go somewhere just because someone else did, there are unsafe areas still. We also had heavy snowmobile traffic all weekend and some of them don't care about how close they are to you or your tip ups as we found out.

- Rich "3-inch mag"

Butch with his first pike of the day.

Butch

Rich loves pike...

Bones sleeping the day away

Butch hoping for a walleye

Slick jig pike

Houghton Lake Ice Fishing Report 1/20/12

Last fish of the day

Friday afternoon we fished the East Bay of Houghton Lake.  The ice conditions are still questionable on some parts of Houghton, so we returned back to our fishing area along the West side of the bay.  We picked out a new location in 10 FOW and then used the GPS to help us drill holes along the contours.  After drilling 30 holes we checked each one with the camera and set tip ups in the holes that we found fish.  The day was filled with pike action and lots of missed tip ups.  The walleye bite finally turned on at 6 pm when we had a twenty minute rush of action that resulted in us hooking one walleye on a tip up and losing two jigging.   If you head out on the East Bay this week be prepared to deal with slush and snow drifts. 

Good Luck...

   

Small pike hooked on a Lindy Slick Jig 10 FOW.

Looking for walleyes

East Bay

Houghton Lake Ice Fishing Trip 1-20-12

Houghton Lake Ice Fishing Trip 1-14-12

Houghton Lake 1/14 - 1/15

First walleye of the day.  Lindy Slick Jig

We fished the East Bay of Houghton Lake on Saturday and Sunday.  The ice conditions were better then expected after all of the warm weather last week.  We found 8 to 9 inches of ice in all of our fishing area this weekend.  Saturday we headed out one mile and fished along the West shore of the East Bay in 8 to 10 FOW.  The fishing action was ok at best and we ended up hooking two walleyes, one bass, and a load of small pike.  The best bite started at 3pm and ended by quarter to five.  Both of the walleyes we landed were hooked on Lindy Slick jigs tipped with small blues.  Sunday started out slow and cold.  At the start of the morning we added about 25 new holes in 10 FOW and setup to do some ice trolling.  The first round only produced one small pike and a few weeds.  After a break and a quick warm up in the shanty I made a second at pass at10am and found the fish active the bite very light.  The net result was three missed fish and two hooked walleyes lost at the hole.  We fished hard the rest of the day and monitored our tip ups only to end up hooking a few small pike.  I talked to several fishermen on Saturday and Sunday that were fishing closer to Burger King and they reported small pike and a few walleyes.  Overall we had a great time enjoying the cold weather and hunting for walleyes with our friends.  If the cold weather continues this week we will be moving out of the East Bay and heading West to fish better walleye areas. 

Good Luck...

 

Slick Jig

Mark with a catch and release bass hooked on a tip up 8 FOW.

Riches new creation.

Jason with his very first fish caught through the ice.  26-inch
pike hooked on a tip up in 10 FOW.



Warming Up

First fish hooked in the new shanty.

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Houghton Lake East Bay Ice Fishing Report



Mark with his first walleye of 2012.  Caught on a tip up 8 FOW.

We had a great time fishing on Houghton Lake Friday.  The weather was a little to nice for this time of the year, but it made for a pleasant day on the ice.  Mark and I parked at the beach and walked out about a mile into the East Bay.  The first spot we checked out was in 10 FOW West of the drop off.  We spent an hour looking over all of the holes with the camera and didn't find any structure of fish.  Next we moved West and checked over an old waypoint in 7 FOW and found a dead weed bed.  On our third move we found a fishing spot in 8 FOW that had what we were looking for.  After spending over two hours scouting we got setup and fishing by 10:30am.   Fishing action was good all day.  Overall we hooked two walleye, eleven pike, and lost three fish. On the camera we saw a few very nice perch and lots of pike. The best action was on tip ups fished 14 inches off the bottom.  


Most of Houghton Lake is froze up now but ice conditions are not real good.   In the East Bay we found 5 to 7 inches of ice everywhere we drilled holes. 

Good Luck...
 

Mark and Gary with two HL walleyes

Houghton Lake