A good bite gone bad

[Mike Frisch]

A couple of buddies and I headed to Ottertail Lake in western Minnesota for some ice fishing this afternoon. Walleyes were our target. We headed for a sharp drop on the edge of a big flat that has produced good catches in the past. We got off to a good start catching a couple of nice fish around 3:00 pm. The bite got better the closer to sundown we got. Around 5;15, however, the fish just quit. We still had numerous fish come through and though we tried a variety of baits and jigging techniques, we just couldn't get them to bite anymore. It was strange as this is usually around the time when the bite peaks for the day. Weather conditions were stable and we couldn't come up with a reason, the fish just quit cooperating. Oh well, days like today make us eager to get back out on the ice and try to figure 'em out again. We did end up with a half-dozen keepers between 15-19". By the way, ice conditions were good. We were a good way out in the lake and we checked the ice periodically as we went. The minimum depth we found was 7", with most of the ice around 9" thick.

Mike Frisch
Fishing The Midwest fishing team member
Elbow Lake, MN

[brian1785]

My first thought would be the fish moved up shallower as the sun went down. Did you move up or stay on the drop?

[Mike Frisch]

Brian - that's a good point, but we had a tip-up set shallower that didn't get bit. Plus, we were still seeing a good number of fish on our flashers, they just wouldn't bite.

Thanks.

Mike Frisch

[fishguy]

that's a very common occurance when fishing early ice walleyes on ottertail--especially on steep drop areas off Grandma's?, try another variation of a depth change, that's all it will take. It's also quite common for the bite to stop at sunset, unlike during the summer months.