Lower Bolton Pond

[PikeKing23]

I spend almost all of my time ice fishing for pike with tip ups except for the occasional trip with my daughter when we use (what I consider) small shiners and crawlers (deadstick) for anything.  I keep hearing about 20-30 or more fish days using the run and gun method with the jig stick, so I decided to give it a try.  I usually just set up, eat food, drink beer, and listen to tunes.  We don't move very often.  If I get nothing on a tip up....I get nothing, lol.  I don't even use electronics so this is something very different that what I am used to on the ice.  I never really understood why anglers are so juiced about catching 6" fish that you would be pissed about and kick off your boat in open water.  It was also my turn to bring food for cards that week, so if I could get a pile of eaters, that would be even better.

Anyways, I chose Lower Bolton based on the write up in the CT Lakes and Ponds book that shows it as being in the top 7 for both yellow perch and crappie.  Figured that was a good place to start even though I had never been there.  So I grabbed the 6" Mora/Ridgid set up, a few jigging rods, some spikes and mousies, and hit the road.  I arrived around 8am and followed my navionics to the deepest basin which is around 18' deep.  I drilled 5 holes across the basin and dropped some medium shiners about half way down.  I then drilled about 20 more holes from the edge of the drop toward shallow water going 2 different directions.  I started with a small white tungsten jig and 3 spikes on it.  It didn't take long!

I had pretty much non stop action the entire time I was there.  I ended up with 32 perch, 1 larry, 4 bluegill, and 1 giant goldie.  I was psyched for the goldie and was praying I had found a school, but I guess it was just a lone straggler.  None of the fish had any size to them, but I was having a blast, anyway!  I was only planning on staying for a few hours, but 1 thing I have learned after 40 years of fishing is that when the fish are biting.....you don't leave!  I ended up staying until 3:30pm.  I ran out of food, drink, and energy by then.  The deepest water was not very productive and the shallow water was almost barren, but the transition zones seemed to be loaded with perch.  At 1 point I caught 10 in a row off of 10 straight drops in the same hole.  Almost all hit on a still bait and I wouldn't have seen 3/4 of them without the spring bobber.  This is probably all old hat to most jiggers, but I was pretty happy that I put a successful plan together and made it work on my first real outing, giving it a try. 

Every once in a while I will do some different kind of fishing that brings me back to my childhood.  I went bass fishing in a canoe at a birthday party once and caught 17 dinks.  I once got into a school of big crappie on the CT river at the Discharge.  I even came across a school of huge white perch at bantam over 30' of water.  I have fished all of my life and caught just about everything.  I was even a bass guy for a number of years.  Now I chase the 1 big one, whether it is a pike, striper, carp, or catfish.  I feel satisfied that I have caught enough 12" fish over that time period that I am OK with not getting a bite for multiple outings at a time because I am using big bait and big gear for big fish.  However, I am finding that it is nice to digress every now and then to remember why I started fishing as a youth in the first place.  Especially when I can use my catch for bait. 

BTW-little yellows are a PITA to fillet!  The 4 bluegill and 12 yellows went in the oven wrapped in bacon and topped with cream cheese.  Everybody at cards loved them! The other 20 yellows and the goldie went in the tank for the next big pike trip.  

[westfish]

those unexpected results always make the best days

[damion812]

The perch from there used to be big then the fishing was off shortly after they started stocking it with  Channel cats.

You eat fish from there?  I was asked that once and never even gave it a thought before.  So I looked into and found there was some water quality issues with the place.  The town requested that the state not stock it with cats for a couple years.  Then I found a survey where most people say they don't eat the fish from there. Good to hear I'm not alone now😉maybe the perch are coming back too.

[flukeguy]

Great day, good for you! You were likely very close to the deepest hole in the lake. This pond is about 2 miles from my home, and I fished it even before I moved here in 1985. Bass fishing was great (canoe, hammering the shoreline), but don't know how good that is now (biggest Larry in my life, about 8-1/2 pounds on a Buzzbait). Much fun casting a small popper with a fly rod, off the dam area. Even had some nice smallmouths before they were displaced by the largies. There were a number of sunken brush piles, though they might now be deteriorated.   
  Noticed the perch have gotten considerably smaller, and crappie are scarcer. That usually means there's competition for their food. The water quality issue was a summertime thing a few years ago (some kind of 'itchy' algae?), but I don't think it affected the flesh of fish (check with DEEP). Tried for white cats once, got an 18-incher on a smelly clam bait left over from ocean fishing. Tasted fine.
  Yeah, filleting smaller fish is a chore...if I have many of them the electric fillet knife comes in handy - more waste than by hand, but cuts down on the time investment. (And the remains are frozen, to be buried in the veggie garden come spring.)  Gotta try adding bacon and cream cheese to a future fish dish...or maybe any dish!     

[thndrvlly]

  “I usually just set up, eat food, drink beer, and listen to tunes.  We don't move very often.  If I get nothing on a tip up....I get nothing, lol.”I don't even use electronics
[/quote]                                     My kind of fishing partner!!! Lmao, nice post, see you on the ice sometime!! That’s how we roll lol

[PikeKing23]

Thanks guys.  I talked to an old timer while I was there who said the same thing about the size of the perch.  Used to be big but seem to all be small, now.  Apparently he has been fishing that lake for some time and he said they go in cycles.  He also said that the water quality has improved since the town has been installing actual sewer pipes for the surrounding houses instead of the septic systems that previously existed.

[BWB-ice]

Great post!!
Great info...great insight...great day!

I am a big salt guy and have only been fishing the ice for a few years now and felt the same way about the "little" fish but I now find myself to be a jigging fool while I wait for flags to pop!! It definitely reminds me of my youth fishing for hours for gills on local ponds. And when they're biting...nothing better!

Congrats again on an awesome day.