have been greatly exaggerated.
I drove up to Burnett's Pond in Savoy State Forest today, arriving around 11:15 AM.
There was 6" to 8" of snow on the ground on the walk down to the Pond, although the Pond itself was ice free.
I had the Pond to myself the whole time - - my only company was some ravens and the radio.
The edges of the Pond were slushy where I got on, and a little sketchy in others, but it was still frozen pretty solid overall.
I chopped through some partially frozen holes, and set up between 11:30 AM and 12 noon. There was 2" of ice over 1" of slush on top of another 8" of ice.
Temps were in the low to mid 30's. The morning was mostly cloudy with occasional patches of sun and blue sky, punctuated by intermittent flakes of snow, but as the day wore on, the wind picked up (to 5 to 10 mph), it clouded over some more and it began to snow harder. By the time I left, about 1/4" to 1/2" had accumulated.
I had my first flag while I was cooking lunch around 12:30 PM - - a pork chop with diced potatoes, carrots and onions sauuteed in a little sofrito and recaito sauce, with a coffee porter beer, and an apple and sriracha covered peanuts for dessert.
The fishing was pretty good. I ended up catching 7 perch (the biggest was 10") and 10 pickerel (the biggest was 19").
I left around 5 PM, and took the long way home (because it's all down hill) to avoid getting stuck.