116 3rd St SE
Cedar Rapids, Iowa 52401
Essentials for fishing on the ice ... when we get some
Here are some handy tips to make your time on the ice comfortable and successful
CEDAR FALLS — Bah, humbug.
It's nearly Christmas, and there's barely enough ice on Iowa's ponds and lakes to make a decent slushy. At the least, we're one decent cold snap away from the four inches of hard water recommended for safe travel on foot.
Unless you are willing to drive five or six hours north, there's nothing to do about it but wait.
It's times like this when I used to find my buddy, Mike Wirth, sitting in his flipover ice fishing tent in his garage scheming ways to improve comfort, organization and efficiency.
We bought our one-person flipovers about 10 years ago with mobility in mind. They are roughly 20 to 30 pounds lighter than the multi-person tents we had been using, and they are insulated and equipped with minimal ice level lighting.
One of the first things we did was cover the floor of the sled with a piece of carpeting. It limits ice buildup and keeps gear from sliding around and freezing to the floor. We also added a cup holder for our morning coffee or an afternoon refreshment that might freeze if left laying in the bottom of the sled.
Another helpful addition was a small board equipped with strap-type brackets for holding essential tools like pliers, scissors and hook removers. It slips conveniently into the battery tray and is held in place by a Velcro strap.
Rod holders come in handy, too. They are a good way to keep an extra rig within reach if you want to change lures quickly or if you want to dead-stick a minnow while jigging in a separate hole. There are inexpensive pinch-style brackets that will do the trick or you can come up with your own design using PVC pipe.
The older we get, the more important lighting has become. The days when we could make due with headlamps and the ice-level lighting that came with our sleds are long gone. Extra light facilitates everything from tying and changing lures to removing hooks and watching our rod tips for bites. One way to brighten up your tent is to attach rope lighting to the tubing framework with zip ties. There also are light bars available for purchase that simply replace a section of the tubing.
Mike has even wired the lights to toggle switches to eliminate the hassle of hooking up wires to the battery or tangling things in loose wire.
When you spend hours inside an ice tent, a comfortable seat is a must. Our flipovers came with a flat, plank-style seat that could be adjusted to a sitting position, but became a pain in the butt as the day wore on even if you added a throwable boat cushion to sit on. One of the best improvements we made is replacing those seats with upgraded models.
Most ice tents don't offer much for rod and tackle storage, and it's not convenient to dig around in the bottom of your sled for a box of lures or an extra rod. You can build a small tackle compartment from lightweight plywood and screw it to the sled, and you can attach a piece of fabric from front to back to form a handy rod hammock.
Transporting augers was another inconvenience. They didn't fit inside the smaller new tent model, and if you placed them on top while dragging your sled, they sometimes leaked fuel. If you didn't put the blade cover on the auger, it could slice the fabric of your tent. And if you put the auger on top of your sled when it was hot, you could burn the fabric or even melt plastic parts. So, we had a local welding shop make us steel rod brackets that slip into eye bolts and hold the auger for towing.
No matter what you do inside your sled, it can still be a chore to drag it across the ice to your fishing spot, especially if you have a long way to go or you have snow cover to deal with. You can make or purchase a harness that slips over your shoulders and ties around your waist to make dragging easier, and you can attach skis to the bottom of your sled to help navigate snow.
Garage sales or thrift stores are a good place to find an old set of snow skis. Cut them to size and attach them to the sled with spacers. For more clearance, build a 2x4 frame that elevates your sled and allows the snow to pass beneath it.
Hopefully, the fish are hungry and you are set up to catch them efficiently and comfortably. At some point, you'll get hungry, too, and there's nothing like a hot lunch on the ice. Mike designed wire cooking sheets that attach to our propane heaters. Cover the cooking sheet with a piece of aluminum foil and you can warm up just about anything. Pre-cooked burgers and brats work great, and you can grill up onions to go with them and even toast a bun.
All we need now is some good ice.
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