Water below the ice? Fact or Fiction

[deadsmelthead]

OK, here it goes. I recently had a conversation with a guy who said he will never ice fish Lake Delta in particular they will not ice fish because the water will be a foot below the ice sometimes.... Now me, having ice fished Delta on a regular basis for some years now and i have yet to see this phenomena... Is this some old wives tale, because i just cant see it happening, i would think shore ice would break..  That and i kinda believe that there would be a tremendous amount of surface suction pulling the ice down..

If anyone has photos of this I'd love to see them because I'm very skeptical especially sine i fish a water it has notoriously been rumored to happen all the time and i have yet to see it...

[tonebea]

I used to fish Sacandaga  Reservoir years ago and they would let water out during the winter, whic would create a pocket of air sometimes a foot or 2 between the ice and water. I don't know if delta has a dam where they could do that.

[bigredonice]

If the ice is thick enough, yes, it will create a pocket of air, but i've ice fished the river a ton when the water level changes, and even with 3' thick of ice, the air gap is only within a few feet of shore, where the ice slopes down to the current water level.

[JJ]

Never seen it but I've heard stories about that happening on Sacandaga Res.: "I cut a hole and it was 10 feet down to the water, they must have drained the reservoir."

http://www.iceshanty.com/ice_fishing/index.php?topic=102896.0

[Gillpill]

that would be fun to reel a fish up through 10 ft of open space and then the hole...not

[Ice Wine]

I have heard this story, or a similar story, from at least four different guys over the years, always second hand. It's fiction. The ice will collapse at the edges under it's own weight over any significant span.

[tonebea]

May be fiction on Delta, but not fiction on other waters. Like I said, I've seen it, and it's not a very comforting feeling. No collapse anywhere, not even the edges.