First outing of 2020/21 season

[zcm_82]

I hit a pond from 630-1030 this morning. Ice was pretty variable from 1-4.5" Bite was slow, but the fish were almost all quality gills. Last fish was fish of the day... tank gill that swooped in and inhaled a 1/8oz jigging rap I was bouncing to try to entice a bass that had been cruising under the hole.

[Arquero3d]

Took the day off work today and hit 3 bodies of water.  Slow bite this morning on a big lake,  good bite in the afternoon at the neighbor's pond.  The kids each caught bass approaching 2#.  Took the 12-yr-old daughter out on another lake to fish from 9-11p.m.  We each avoided the skunk, but barely--1 apiece.

[zcm_82]

I went out a couple hours this morning, and brought my boy. The ice was in a lot worse shape than it had been there on Thursday, there were even a couple small open water spots. The bite was terrible... lots of lookers, but couldn't get much to hit. I ended up with 3 dinks gills, and my son got zip.

As a lovely bonus, someone totally slobbed it up out there yesterday.  I ended up picking up about 3 dozen Busch Light cans, a worm container half full of dirt, and assorted other crap. There was also alfalfa strewn all over the place... guessing they were sitting on bales.

[IlliniIce]

checked a pond today that had a good 4+ inches thursday, eased out from bank about 10 feet and first whack with spud shot through about 4 inches of soft ice
gonna be awhile before i fish again but looks like freezing weather on the way
friday was my best day yet this season, lots of big crappies and gills. they were aggressive early, smacking slenders and demons, bite slowed, got em going again on a maki plastic

[zcm_82]

checked a pond today that had a good 4+ inches thursday, eased out from bank about 10 feet and first whack with spud shot through about 4 inches of soft ice
gonna be awhile before i fish again but looks like freezing weather on the way
friday was my best day yet this season, lots of big crappies and gills. they were aggressive early, smacking slenders and demons, bite slowed, got em going again on a maki plastic

We got 9" of snow here over the weekend, and it was 35° today, so it burned right through the ice. All the ponds around here I have been fishing are partly to mostly open water now. The spot I was sitting on 3.5" Saturday morning is wide open this afternoon.

The melt is really a better case scenario than several inches of snow sitting on the ice through the coming cold blast, though. They will lock back up a lot better going from open water or skim than they would have as mushy ice with snow on top.

If the forecast is right, I imagine they'll be fishable again by the end of the weekend, and in real good shape 7-10 days from now.