80 Hole Day

[GBguy]

No, I wasn't hole hopping. I used my Ridgid Octane and 9ah battery with the 8" Lite Flite to drill 80 holes for sturgeon spearing. The drill did heat up a bit, but performed as expected even with drilling 35 holes one right after another then a short break then another 45 holes back to back. There were still 2 or 3 bars left on the battery even. Ice is 14" thick, though only about half is solid clear ice.

Needless to say I'm very satisfied with this setup. Now if I could only see a sturgeon!

[nindo24]

If only we had ice!!
Glad to hear about your set-up. I finally purchased a power auger this past September and have only been able to get out once so far, and that was back before Christmas. I haven't been able to get out otherwise because I'd need to travel to find ice and my work schedule hasn't allowed that. So I live vicariously through this website, and YouTube.

[GBguy]

Ice isn't ideal here (no truck travel) but it's better than nothing. This is how we cut holes in Wisconsin!

[GBguy]

There are thousands of holes that size on this lake (135k acres) right now. Gotta mark em with lathes and watch out if you're moving around.

[Baetis62]

Just got an update from my kid Sister...two fish on the ice reported on West End of Poygan this morning.  Less Shacks than usual she says.

[GBguy]

Less shacks is right! Aerial shanty court was around 2,500, less than half as many as 2 years ago. Only 44 sturgeon speared on Lake Winnebago, around 100 on the upriver lakes.

That's a 20% success rate on upriver lakes (only 500 licenses) and about a 2% success rate on Winnebago. The upriver harvest of 100 fish was still the lowest opening day since 2007.

Sleeping in my shack tonight, back at it tomorrow!

[Baetis62]

Are U Bago or Up?

[GBguy]

I'm on Winnebago, SE side of the lake.

[Seamonkey84]

OMG, can't wait for the critics to come out of the woodwork for the size of that hole!  Can't tell you how many people on here think a ten inch hole should be outlawed for fear someone will fall in a break a leg.  You can lose a small car in that hole, lol.  But I certainly understand that you need one that big for sturgeon.  However, you will have naysayers, lol.  You go man!!!

Problem is people aren’t required to mark a 10” hole!