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Not to mention the perch were much bigger when there was no limit at all. I think there's holes in your theory.
Tough on the lake trout today. Lots of chasers and very few takers. Got to try out the smitty with the fresh snow. I would have died without it! They should be chomping tomorrow!
There were also a lot let less ice fishermen back then too.
Caught this mystery fish...not sure what it is.
How much snow?
lets say on average there are 50 perch ice fisherman a day on Lake George. If each fisherman keeps his limit of 50 fish, that is 2,500 fish a day. Now lets say that the lake is ice fishable for 60 days. 2,500 x 60 = 150,000 fish!!!!! That's not counting what is caught during open water or the poachers who take more than their fair share. I personally feel that they should reduce the limit to 25 fish per day.
Yes we are definitely seeing a trend in smaller fish over the last few years, we definitely like to keep the bigger ones but at the same time we like to return the big females, maybe its because I stink at filleting the smaller fish but they do make awesome finger foods if done right. Huddle used to be our go to before we got a place on the lake. I did try spoons and minnow or gulp heads to try to get bigger fish but it really didn't work that well, bright ugly tungsten 5mm worked best. They only thing I noticed is the higher you got the fish to come the bigger they were. We caught some pie plate sunnies today that was fun.
I fished huddle today. It was actually my first ice trip out this year. Between me and my buddy, we caught well over 300 perch... but that’s from 6:15am until 5:15pm. I only kept 40. My minimum is 9”.That’s being said, out of 300+ fish, we maybe got 12 jumbos between us both. Also, we were pretty far out. 4” of ice where we were. I have also never seen huddle bay so busy. No lakers caught by us today, but a young boy and his father got a nice 25” laker on a tip up and the boy was ecstatic. Loved seeing his excitement.
Looks like a laker to me
From my limited experience, I get very few slobs. I get a fair number of dinks. I believe three things are effecting my catch: 1) The dinks are more aggressive, as someone else on here has already said, and (2) I'm not able to get down to the bottom of the water column, where the slobs are, quick enough, even using tungston lures. 3) The slobs are not stupid. They didn't get big being stupid. Just MTC's![/quoteI went from tear drops which caught dinks, up to a Hali which was hit and miss but more decent fish then throw aways. Moved up to a large hali which really gets down fast and seems to improve the size. Used the longer chain and clipped a second hook which has worked. I would call them decent but agree no way slobs.]
Was sarcasm. Lucky ridges didnt eat my arse alive this weekend.Another mystery fish...larger this time. I cant keep these things off my jig.