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Nice to know. I always wondered if the reverse trick really worked.
I have tried flushing a hole you will have floaty shards of ice coming up threw the hole for a long while after flushing.. then the chips freeze edges sides etc.. then if you get a big fish on light line usally they cut the line .. you better off just scooping the chips out.. I find don't know who esle has had similar problems flushing the hole ..
Got to remember ice chips tend to float in drinks etc same with open water.. when you power flush a hole it tends to push chips almost all the way to bottom.. in shallow water and if there's any current it tends to push them back towards hole some times.. plus there not very easy to see threw they tend to move and squirm as as they float up towards surface giving a bad day trying to sight fish.. kinda like haveing cataracts in your vision like stuff floating around in your eye ball wile trying to sight fish.. this is ware I found it's better to just scoop the hole clean..
Chilly, big guy, it feels like you're making it up. I used that trick many times when I was running my Gator and it works. The water just blows the chips down and out to the side. They float to the underside of the ice and stay there though some small proportion at the edge may float back up the hole . As for them freezing to the walls of the hole and cutting your line I frankly don't believe it and never experienced it, I know that a high speed IceGator will do the job and I think most of the power drill units can move enough water for that effect but I've never tried it with my Fuel/Clam setup. Ion, probably not. What type of auger were you using?
What's wrong with doing it the same way as by hand?
I've had much better luck clearing by pulling up and out..If you have a bunch near your hole they'll come up with every fish you catch too..I've tried it enough times to know it's not for me..<°)))>{
I use the reverse. I also use an old thing I can't remember the name of. Stick it in the hole and the two pieces swing open. When you pull it back up then it will close.I lift it slowly and let it drain on the way up, and tend to catch more chips.
One shot skimmer?
Basically is what I do here...at least now. When I used to fish with floats, I always kept my hole free of slush and ice. Helped in keeping the bobber upright and easier to detect bites, especially the light ones. But now that I fish with wires it's not as important. One, a little slush and ice helps, although little, to filter out sunlight. Two, as I stated before, fishing tungstens allow me to get down through a little bit bit of the slop. And three, a couple of the lakes I fish on a regular basis require a lot of hole hopping...the gills are usually suspended and always on the move...so there isn't a lot of time to get the hole nice and pretty. Got to get them while they are there and move on. It's nothing for me and my buddy to punch 30 holes in about 2-3 hours. And if the bite is decent, we can usually have our limits of nice slabs in that length of time...with a little sorting on occasion. So it's a couple of scoops, down the hole, pick up 1 or 2 and on to the next.
I think this all depends on if you fish in a warm shanty or not?In my warm shanty its not a problem.
How does a warm shanty keep shavings from floating back up into the hole?!? If there’s any slope to the underside of the ice itself or if there’s any current to guide the shavings away from your hole it would prob work fine. Or depending on the way your auger shaves/cuts the ice, some might make chunks that float back up, others make ice dust that drift off easier or might even melt a bit as it hits water that is just above freezing. Either way, since I fish outside and don’t need to worry about making a mess inside a shack, it’s just faster and cleaner to keep running the drill after breaking through and pull all the slush up and out one one go.
Regaurdless of all this, if I'm in my flip over, and reverse blow slush out of my 2-3 holes I cut I haven't really ever had an issue with shavings coming back up a hole.