It’s “making ice.”  Not the thundering roars sometimes heard in mid-winter when a sudden drop in temperature causes the ice to sound like thunder and makes cracks appear all around where you’re sitting on your bucket.  The kind that you’re seeing on the puddles and little ponds that don’t have any fish in them.  The point is that even this latter type of ice gets you thinking about fishing!

You still need to wait a while for safe ice and that can be a problem.  A skier may be able to go where snow is artificially made and a skater to hockey rinks, but a winter angler is at the mercy of the weather.  And staying sane as fickle fronts play with the temperature can be hard to do sometimes.

Still the sanity of the winter angling addict can be preserved for a while by getting him involved with a series of related activities.  Consider the following for starters.

If you are a typical “walk out on the lake and fish in the open” fisherman, the first thing you should do is get back to basics.  That means being sure you have everything you need and that you can carry it all in your two hands and in a single trip.  Unlike the summertime when everything but the kitchen sink can be loaded in the boat at the dock, the winter angler needs to be able to comfortably carry everything.  And that likely means carrying it for a half mile.

My gear and I look like this as I trudge out on the ice.

In one hand is an auger for making 6” holes.  This is pretty much an all purpose size.  And it has a cover for the blades, which is carefully kept on the blades whenever holes are not being drilled.  Blades will stay sharp for a long time if properly protected.

In the other hand is a five-gallon plastic pail, of the type that fast food restaurants buy full of pickles.  Inside that pail is a regular sized plastic bucket that contains just about everything else.  A pair of pliers, a measuring stick, ice creepers, a couple of bread wrappers for carrying fish and my rods, most important of all.  There is also a coffee can with a plastic lid, which serves as a tackle box.  In that are several line spools, a small plastic pill box with sliding top for my “teardrop” lures and three or four plastic camera film boxes for hooks, sinkers, bobbers, etc.  I always carry my live bait in my pockets so it won’t freeze.  My pocket is also the place for a pencil-sized flashlight.

When a minnow bucket and a lantern are also required, I drag them on a sled.

Get all that organized and the next step is checking lure hooks for sharpness and line for knots and weak spots.  I feel that two years of service is maximum for the two-pound test line I typically use.  One spare rod is spooled with four-pound line that I also change every other year as well.

Two more things that can ease the stress of waiting for good ice are the purchasing and maintaining the bulk live bait, usually waxworms, and the study of maps for places to fish.  The former means finding a cool (55 to 65 degrees) place to store it that is dry. This latter activity with the maps will often turn-up several lakes that you’ve wanted to fish but so far haven’t.

After all this preparation you’re on your own.  I suppose you could drive to one of those bodies of water and pace up and down the shoreline.  But I hear that like a “watched pot not boiling” a watched lake doesn’t freeze either.

Good luck with your patience!