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I had a beautiful winter break to enjoy wonderful winter weather this past week.\u00a0 Snow wasn\u2019t cooperative so pursuits like skiing and snowshoeing got pushed aside.\u00a0 And the warm up had turned everything to glare ice, but after buying some cleats for my boots, ice fishing was on the docket.<\/p>\n
Jack and I slid out onto the hard water for his first ever ice fishing trip.\u00a0 I was being lazy and tried to talk him out of it, but like a great fishing partner he turned up the heat and egged me into the adventure.\u00a0 I\u2019m glad he did.\u00a0\u00a0 That boy was so excited.\u00a0 We had the ice to ourselves and everything from drilling the holes to flipping up the shanty was amzing to him.\u00a0 It was perfect.<\/p>\n
Then we gathered up the boys and went on a man sized adventure to Saginaw Bay.\u00a0 I had never been and have always wanted to go.\u00a0 The Bay is a world class fishery but it is enormous and, frankly, a little intimidating. I mean \u201cwhere to begin?\u201d and \u201cwhat to use?\u201d seem like huge questions.\u00a0 So like any modern angler I spent plenty of time on social media and asked questions like a true tourist at the local shops.\u00a0 And, of course, once we got down there the conditions were not perfect.<\/p>\n
On many bodies of water that means that the fishing probably won\u2019t cooperate.\u00a0 On the Bay it means you could die.\u00a0 The ice heaved up pressure cracks in some places taller than a grown man and opened up other crevices thirty feet wide.\u00a0 Most of the advice we got was that all of the best fishing was across the cracks and that it just wasn\u2019t worth going anywhere else.\u00a0 One super nice clerk smiled at us and said we should go out there to look at the seven foot high heaved ice because it is \u201csomething to see\u201d and \u201cyou\u2019re here anyway and what else are you gonna do?\u201d.<\/p>\n
It was a real let down to an eager angler like me, and I got a good dose of what it can feel like on the other side of the counter when conditions are tough.\u00a0 It was a deflating.\u00a0 But we pulled into the mostly vacant parking spot and geared up between folks pulling over to bend our ear about how bad it was \u201cout there\u201d.\u00a0 Just the same, we pulled the rope on the snowmobile anyway and stepped over the seat in a cloud a blue smoke and roared out onto the big ice knowing well we\u2019d be forced to fish the shallow water on the safe side of things.\u00a0 That was fine by me.\u00a0 I was on the Bay.<\/p>\n
We literally drove out, parked, drilled two holes, set up the tent, and got to getting our jig on.\u00a0 And then the fish showed up and bit in a frenzy on lures that were the wrong color in water that was too shallow.\u00a0 After a couple hours of chaos, we went home just after dark with a limit of walleyes that topped out at twenty-four inches.\u00a0 It was some of the best fishing I\u2019d ever had for any species.\u00a0 It was a bucket list deal for me.\u00a0 And it was nothing other than dumb luck that we only helped along by actually going.\u00a0 I had never caught a walleye jigging through the ice in my entire life.\u00a0 What a fishery.\u00a0 What a time.<\/p>\n
And what a week.\u00a0 The rivers trout fished like mad on the last warm up.\u00a0 If we can hold on to decent winter conditions and get enough snowpack to keep the rivers flowing in late Summer, we should be in for a fantastic season on the Au Sable.\u00a0 Strange as it may seem, that ice fishing trip has me remembering that day on the South Branch during drakes with Dave and that Hendrickson hatch again with Dave and that Sulphur spinner fall with Rusty and all of those other fine, fine times in the woods and waters of Northern Michigan.\u00a0 I love this place.<\/p>\n
Trips dates are getting thin in May and June for our guides, so if you want a chance at the best of what the Au Sable has to offer, call your friends and get one in the books and cross your fingers for the weather and live a clean life for the trout karma.\u00a0 You know—open doors for folks at the gas station and pick up that bobble some kid dropped to the left while his parent had something to do on the right.\u00a0 Get straight with nature because it\u2019s all going to come back to you in May.\u00a0 Also, I\u2019m going to do a few trips again this year but I can only get in the boat once or twice a week so if you want to go just give me a shout.\u00a0 My river boat only has space for one angler at a time but I plan on keeping full.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Free fly tying classes on Saturday at The Old Au Sable have been well attended and well taught.\u00a0 Al Borchers is kicking ass as a patient and attentive instructor and he gives the students a guide\u2019s edge to craft of fly tying.\u00a0 You should come.\u00a0 Bring your own beer.<\/p>\n There\u2019s a spectacular season on the horizon.<\/p>\n Hope you all fill up you hours nicely until Spring,<\/p>\n Andy<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" February 1, 2018 The Old Au Sable Fly Shop Fishing Report I had a beautiful winter break to enjoy wonderful winter weather this past week.\u00a0 Snow wasn\u2019t cooperative so pursuits like skiing and snowshoeing got pushed aside.\u00a0 And the warm up had turned everything to glare ice, but after buying some cleats for … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[155,84,165,167,5],"tags":[74,185],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.oldausable.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1517"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.oldausable.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.oldausable.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.oldausable.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.oldausable.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1517"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.oldausable.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1517\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.oldausable.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1517"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.oldausable.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1517"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.oldausable.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1517"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/a>