Ice Fishing Updates

So much for the 2015/16 ice-fishing season in Southern Alberta, a few die-hard anglers are still putting in an effort but I’m cautious of bad ice, it could be fine in the A.M. but go to cubes in the P.M. It seems that the entire season has been a season of bad ice and non-co-operative fish, everyone we talked to has had a tough year.

No caption needed here but.. "Stay safe out there"

Rachel and I got out a few times this winter but did not fish much. It was more fun giving out samples and talking to anglers for us than fishing. We would approach a party of anglers then give one sample to one person and rig it for them to make sure they were using it correctly. Then we would leave and return in a few hours to see how they were getting along. Our greatest thrill this season was the response everyone had using our Electrons. They all asked for more samples. Most folks caught fish and the ones that did not said the Attractors brought them in no problem; they just could not catch them.

Hans about to release a nice Walleye

This Rattlesnake Lake angler in Alberta we only know as Hans was about to release his 7th Walleye when we returned to see how he liked using the Electrons. He had killed his limit of 50 cm Walleye and had a few nice perch on the ice.
Hans admitted that he does not catch anything and will never fish without the Electron again. He was so excited and thankful that we had some to sell him.

We learned a lot this winter regarding salts dissolved in the water, total dissolved solids or TDS seem to disappear as winter drags on. Lakes that were 150 to 200 PPM have dropped to less than 100 PPM; some lakes like Ghost Lake went as low as 50 PPM. We keep track of this because it affects conductivity in the water.

The lower the TDS the less conductivity means the more Electrons you use.
We had no idea that this decrease in TDS was so dramatic in late winter although Jason Fraser, a Calgary area biologist, warned us of this.

Here are the hottest Electron rigs per species

Whitefish

The rig that out fished anything else this winter for Whitefish is the Fresh Water 1 or 2 Low TDS a glass bead (supplied) on a short shank beak hook and a single maggot. This rig clobbered Whites everywhere in Southern Alberta. We suspect it will work for Whites anywhere.
The Electron is so small you can cast it with a fly rod suspended from a strike indicator or a small bobber cast from a lite spinning rod.

Walleye

The rig that Walleye preferred is the Electron Fresh Water 2 or 3, low TDS, a glass bead in clear or yellow (supplied), a short shank hook with a minnow or a scented minnow by Berkley Gulp, Trigger X etc.
A bill-less crank bait with the Electron and a glass bead can be unbeatable.

Perch, Crappy and Pan fish

Perch can’t resist the Electron Fresh Water 1, 2 or 3 series, a glass bead and a hook with maggots, minnow, scented grubs and minnows.
- For very low TDS use the Fresh Water 3 Low TDS
- For a TDS over 200 PPM use the Fresh Water 1 Low TDS.

Tube jigs work great, only use the tube, thread it on the line then thread the appropriate Electron, a glass bead and a short shank hook. Pull it all into the tube (bait is optional). This rig can be used in open water suspended from a bobber or jigged over the weeds.
Fish shallow (3 to 6 feet) at first ice and deeper (50 to 60 feet) at last ice.
See below for photo of small white tube jig.

Northern Pike

Dead lining is Canada's all-time favorite method to catch Pike, a species that quickly responds to the Electron Fish Attractor. The all-time favorite rig for pike is a 6 to 10 inch nylon coated steel leader or equivalent threaded through the anus of a bait fish coming out the mouth. Slide an Electron on the leader into the mouth of the bait.
I seem to have my best luck when the bait lays on the bottom.

Trout

Use an Electron Fresh Water 1, 2 or 3 Low TDS, a glass bead, a short shank hook with maggots, scented grubs or minnows. Pull this into the tube.

Small spoon baits with the Electron slid on the line isolated with a glass bead can be jigged with great success for larger trout of all species.

Do not use any terminal tackle, keep it moving covering all depths.
All Char species respond to tapping the spoon on the bottom.

View fullsize

Photo byJason Fraser

This beautiful Lake Trout was caught in extremely LOW TDS conditions
using 5 Fresh Water 3's in a tube jig.

Tight Lines
Rick Crozier

Finding The Fish using the Coriolis Effect

I’ve spent thousands of hour’s staring down a hole in the ice waiting for fish to show up. Anticipation of action helps with the boredom. Sometimes there are minnows to watch but most of the time there is nothing interesting going on.

The one thing always present is a bit of a current, it’s always there to some degree in every body of water. This intrigued me. How is this possible? There is little or no flow in the dead of winter? So what could be causing this this phenomenon? Well the answer is that the flow is caused by the rotation of the earth on its axes, this phenomenon is called the Coriolis Effect.

Depending where you live on the planet we are travelling over one thousand miles an hour as we rotate on our axes, at the same time we are travelling some 27,000 miles an hour as we rotate around the sun on our yearly journey through space.

This creates a clockwise rotation of water north of the Equator and a counter clockwise rotation south of the Equator. This small current is evident in all lakes, ponds and even in bird baths.

During the 80’s, I was Fishing Editor and #1 Columnist for Alberta Fishing and Hunting Magazine and thought that a story explaining this current I called The Zoo Plankton Drift would be an interesting column. This drift is like a tide that always flows in the same direction to us it is barely noticeable, but to a microbe or protozoan it is a raging torrent complete with whirlpools, back eddies and raceways.

So if the water is always drifting in the same direction, obstacles like points, bays, reefs and islands would create back eddies were Zoo plankton would concentrate, attracting minnows that in turn attract game fish. It made sense to me but before I could write my column this had to be proved.

By looking at lake contours, imagining the clockwise drift it is easy to determine were the back eddies would be. After checking out the other three sides of a structure taking note of minnow and game fish populations the fourth side where the back eddy should be always proved to be more active. Most of these areas have a high density of Clams and Mussels on the bottom. Somehow these filter feeders know where the food is and congregate there.

After proving my theories to myself I wrote an article called the Zoo Plankton Drift that was met with a lot of skepticism. That was in 1986, I think. I’ve been experimenting with this theory ever since, summer and winter and have never found any evidence to dispute it.

Using this pattern to locate hot spots over the years has given me some exceptional fishing but the best thing it’s done is saved my valuable fishing time for the most productive areas.

Tight Lines
Rick Crozier