Our young neighbor Zach says the walleyes on Hillman’s Long Lake bite most frequently through the ice at twilight. They are probably so distracted by the beautiful sunsets that they lose their sense of self-preservation and just decide to nibble those tasty minnows after all.
Steve caught this nineteen-incher a little before sunset, on a tip-up. Not much later than an hour after this fish was swimming in the lake, we were eating walleye for dinner. Very tasty!
Fletcher’s Pond, with a surface area of 8,970 acres, is one of the largest inland lakes in Michigan. It is a flooding created in 1935 by the Alpena Power Company. The pond is shallow (no deeper than about 12 feet) and weedy–just the sort of lake where big bass and monster pike hang out. Every mid-February, anglers assemble to try to catch the biggest pike and the biggest perch and all the sizes in between. Carhartt Kid and his dad added a 28-incher to the well. Every colored ball is a pike on its own stringer. It was still early in the day and the biggest pike in the well was just over 32 inches. Last year’s winner was 40 inches.
This angler was intent on augering holes for his tip-ups, undeterred even though the front end of his truck was sinking through the ice. First things first, I guess. The ice was mostly about 20 inches thick, but he’d driven over an especially weedy section that hadn’t frozen solidly.