Ice Season Ahead of Last Year's

My friend Oliver's been getting out a lot and catching pickerel. Photo is of nice one he caught at Aeroflex. Just about everywhere it's been eight or nine inches of ice. That doesn't include Round Valley Reservoir. I was there shooting photos on Tuesday and there wasn't even skim ice in the back of Ranger Cove. These past couple of weeks would have been good ones to pursue lake trout from shore. I assume Merrill Creek Reservoir isn't frozen, either. It's deeper than Round Valley, but does have a much smaller surface acreage. Aeroflex is pretty deep, too, at 110 feet, but it's well frozen.

This winter's ice season got underway earlier than last year's. A year ago yesterday, Oliver and I fished on five inches of ice at Lake Hopatcong State Park. The last ice fishing I did was in early March, on a foot of ice remaining over Aeroflex. Wonder how thick it will get this year and how long it will last?

Plan on going ice fishing with Oliver on Sunday morning.

Trufuel

Bought a quart at Jaeger's this morning. Less expensive than the nine-something I paid elsewhere last year. Only $8.09 with tax. My auger does guzzle the stuff, but there's room here for recognition, not complaint, because to think I can go ice fish on any thicker than four inches or so without a power auger would be delusional. Unless Oliver cuts the holes.

I did funnel some of my Trufuel from last year and start the engine to test that shaft. As I said in the previous post, wasn't 100% sure there's a problem. Turns fine. It's been a little slow for a couple of years--I think--but I'll let that go until the clutch really does go. 

Maybe there was ice in the gear box. Whatever. It will work.

Going to buy a spark plug gapper and look for my spark plug wrench. Figure the thing to do is keep all three items including the spark plug with the gear.

Clutch

I'll find out for sure tomorrow or Tuesday, but it seems I need to get a new clutch put in my power auger, which means an ice season gathering momentum quickly put on hold for me and my friends. Will get it done as soon as I can.

Last couple of weeks, have thought on occasion about the auger being 10 years old. Often, I get a physical answer to my questions, but this is just obvious, and I should have thought of it independently of the thing apparently have broken altogether. I didn't even think of replacing the spark plug! I have had a replacement for five years and just sort of vaguely thought I'd replace the old whenever it goes bad. No! You just remove that old spark plug and put the new one in! Which I'll do.

The clutch would have been foreseeable for anyone mechanical. At least I figured it out right away, but even so, I need to be certain yet. I guess my wondering about the auger's 10 years was of enough mechanical sensibility to prepare myself to make a quick diagnosis, though as I say, it's not 100 percent just yet. 

21-Inch Bass a Good One

My wife wakes me, and I hear my cell phone downstairs, tell her, "Who would call me at 6:21 a.m.?" Next moment, I realize my alarm never went off at 5:04. (I had set it for 5:04 p.m.) Couldn't account for why I felt like sleeping more. Had gone to sleep at 8:30. But I figured maybe I wouldn't get tired.

Phoned Brian and told him it's my turn to be late. I'd call back when I hit the road. Finding my wool pants wasn't going to work out, though. My wife was up with me looking for them. I put jeans over a merino wool base layer, as if that would work. 

Beginning at one degree F, at Dow's to buy bait. From there, everything went well getting to the lake. Brian gave me a "bib," really heavy-duty woolens to put over my jeans. Privately, I felt as if I had passed one more of life's tests. The kind you do not want to fail. Just loading the Jet Sled, I felt the cold on my thighs, penetrating straight through that thin layer of wool. 

The lake's ice checked out at six inches. I had loaded the power auger in the sled. We got out there, talking animatedly the whole quarter mile. It seemed all was well, as invariably, ice fishing proves to be a good time. I slammed open a hole with my splitting bar. I began to cut a second, when I felt my right arm begin to get sore. "We'll need the power auger, unless you can cut holes," I said. "I left the nut that connects the auger to the power head in my car."

"Let me try this."

A minute later, "You have to get that nut. This isn't going to happen."

When I was 18, it was easy to cut 15 holes through 18 inches of ice with a splitting bar. I didn't bench press much. 280. But that's a lot more than either of us would bench today.

Now the walk felt a little stressful, since it was just to get something I should have remembered, but I got back to Brian in less than 20 minutes. put the auger on the head. Then I tried to pull start the engine. That took us a lot of pulls, before we got it primed right. First time I've had a problem with it in 10 years of use. It seemed almost hopeless, when Brian just pumped that primer bulb, and gas dripped out onto ice. I pulled--come fire or hell water. 

All told--four yellow perch as large as 13 1/2 inches, two little pickerel, and Brian's 21-inch largemouth. We've wanted a big bass through the ice ever since we began fishing here three years ago. We got that fish today and what a highlight it was!

My memory gets worse and worse, but it's progressive.  It's not happening quickly. Whatever is the Ultimate internal logic to life, it lets me in on changes to how I orient myself as I age, rather than pulling the rug out from under me. I hope I'll get out and ice fish at 75. My Dad has Alzheimer's and it's not too hard on him, but he wouldn't be able to ice fish. He is 87 years old, though. 

As we collected the tip-ups to pack them, we found empty hooks with shiners missing, and two or three of the tip-up flags hadn't flown when fish took line. One of them had just a few yards of line left on the spool. I've never before failed to check on tip ups. I never thought of doing it today. Never remembered. 

"It's a good thing we didn't stay until dark," I said. "I probably never would have remembered to check the tip ups. Would've been wasted time."

Our day wasn't that. 

When I was younger, I'd feel apprehensive at the thought of losing memory. At my age now, I'm more inclined to laugh it off. 

Nice Pickerel

Will It Ever Freeze Again?

Pine Barrens Winter Pickerel Thought I'd include a link, but Fred's the star again, with his continued largemouth and pickerel action down there near Long Beach Island, but firmly on the mainland. It was a cold day yesterday, but look what he caught on a 4-inch Senko. I like those pine trees over his head. There's definitely the sense that they invite you to something else, compared to the environment up here where I live in the Highlands.

And my wife tells me we're in for a freeze. I told her that's what we need, for ice fishing. Hoping so. I was just thinking today that Round Valley Reservoir hasn't frozen over since early 2015.

The big question--will it ever freeze over again?

Happy New Year!

Matt and I did get out and fish this last day of the year. His mother came along with Sadie. Round Valley. 

The fishing is hit or miss. I explained to Trish that it's a lot like the surf fishing I do when we go to Island Beach. Sometimes--often--there's simply no fish out there. The surf is barren. Likewise, along the shore of Round Valley. I told her that trout cruise along the shorelines, and if any were to swing in where we were fishing and see and smell the bait, most likely that bait would get taken.

But some days the fish never show.

Trout on Power Bait

Matt and I rode over to Round Valley, where I decided to see if Dave Delucca was at the ramp, instead of going directly through the main gate. He was there, and had caught two rainbows. Got to meet Matt. The three of us talked. Dave was curious about Matt's work on the fusion reactor. (I realized after we got home that I had forgotten to tell Matt that Dave's son was drafted by the Yankees. He never got to play for them, but he managed to have college paid for.)

One of our rods got hit after 10 minutes or so; Matt took it and missed the hit. We had two rods baited with shiners, two with orange Power Bait. The hit came on Power Bait. Matt insisted that the next hit would be mine.

It came as dusk began to fall and we were about to leave. Stripped line off the spool rapidly, but turned out to be a little 14- or 15-inch rainbow, on Power Bait.