Bear Lake Report for Friday 2/17/23

[Lundboy54]

It was a balmy -2F at 7am this morning.  Walked out to the rockpile to start the morning.  Ice is now 8-10" thick and growing.  Occasional pressure cracks can open up parallel to shore, but it was totally frozen this morning.  Several 4 wheelers, snowmobiles, and snowdogs on the ice.  Started in 38' on the top of the rockpile.  Caught 3 small WF but that was it.  My friend's son stayed put and said the WF really turned on about 0900.  We wanted bigger trout so we moved out to deeper water.  Good move!  My friend and I caught 4 lakers and 7 cutts between us.  We missed a few too.  Tube jigs tipped with cisco were the ticket.  The trout are starting to feed again (after being stuffed with cisco and dealing with a bright, full moon the last couple of weeks which really slowed the fishing).  We fished until about noon and called it a day.  Sunny and clear with no wind.  Took our jackets off by 10am, but had to keep the bait in our bibs to keep it from freezing solid.  And I mean SOLID.  Pretty sure we pissed off one guy who thought we set up shop too close to him (22 yards away, I measured it).  However, I've had anglers 1/2 again as close in both boats and on the ice and I rarely give it much thought....unless they are casting over my lines and snagging me up.  But this is vertical fishing through the ice.  As my friend said, life's too short to worry about crap like that, and then you die anyway!   Oh, well.....it was a great day on the lake once again and it was nice to see the trout starting feeding again too.  We didn't get anything huge, but we did land a couple of nice cutts today.  One puked-up an 11" whitefish when we landed it.  Who says 6-8" tubes are too big?  Anyway, I bet there will be a grundle of people up fishing this weekend due to many kids having a 4 day weekend for President's Day.   With all that commotion on top of the ice, especially snowmobiles, 4wheelers, snowdogs, and loud power augers, the fishing may shut down.....but maybe not?   My advice is to get away from the noisy areas and set up shop where there is less noise.  There is good access at the plowed out area at 250 E. Loop Drive, but its limited to about 30 vehicles.  You can also access through Ideal Beach Resort, but they charge $5 and don't open until at least 0800.   There is also a nice plowed out area at 150 S. Street in Garden City.  If you want to fish south of Gus Rich Point, you'll have to contenc with 2' of snow for several hundred yards until you hit the lake ice.  There is good access at Cisco Beach, but its been pretty slow over there.  1st Point has good access too, but slow fishing so far.  There have been several groups fishing off the marina and the rockpile just north of the marina, but I haven't talked to any of the anglers in that location, so I have no report.   Sorry for no pics, but it was a cold bugger today and I wanted to get the fish back down the holes.  We did invite a couple fish home with us for dinner though. Good luck out there.

Great report Scott. I was the lucky angler that you guys set up 22 yards away from (and it would have been even closer if I wouldn't have said anything as you started drilling). I was set up by 7:05 am and you guys showed up to my spot at 8:30 am. I understand that it's the rockpile, but every other group out there was spaced out at least 60-75 yards apart. The thing is that you didn't even ask, you just started drilling. If you would have just asked in the first place, I wouldn't have had a problem with it. No hard feelings and nothing but respect to you and your friend. I agree, life is too short to worry about how close anglers are fishing to you, but it's not too short to show some common courtesy.

I agree