Available Fishing Guide:
Website: Darrell & Dads Family Guide Service
Hit the ice 11am-430pm and found out there IS a noon and early afternoon bite; You just gotta find 'em. Just myself and three other fishermen on the ice; The three-man party stayed in the shallows and didn't seem to catch much - saw them pull up two perch. One fellow had a pretty nice off-set handle auger which was fast, and he drilled quite a few holes all along the shoreline. I believe drilling a ton of holes is key to locating the schools, but unfortunately he stayed shallow the entire time and didn't find fish.
Found out the fish during noon to early afternoon seemed to be hiding in deeper water. Started off fishing the north shoreline and progressed all the way into the middle of the lake (past the yellow house on the right) into deeper water and found some schools with bigger fish in 35'-45' of water. Took some heavy jigging to get them interested into making strikes; Early morning bite is certainly easier - often times just involves dropping your line down.
Tried a glow shrimpo and in the end didn't seem to matter if I had a plastic lure on or not (it fell off after a while). I'm gonna stop buying lures since they're expensive, and the perch don't seem to care if it's just a plain jig w/ meat. You just gotta find 'em. Plain maggots were OK, but a fresh perch eye made all the difference. Pulling fish out of deeper water caused them to throw up what they were eating - I found a lot of maggots and eyeballs, and somebody else's pink maggots.
Had wanted to try fishing in 75'-85', but turned out to be open water in that area! Ice is 3.5"-4.5" and clear in the north end of the lake.
Fed the heron even closer today, and snapped some great pictures.
Available Fishing Guide:
Website: Darrell & Dads Family Guide Service