If you’ve never been up north, it’s quite a treat as it’s big water where there are hundreds and hundreds of icehouses on the ice, every size, shape and variety.

As a matter of fact, this year, the Zippel Bay Igloo made its appearance on the ice.

Resembling a large igloo, this large icehouse/bar is a big attraction as it has a full bar, big screen TV, tables and benches where you can not only eat a pizza, you have an opportunity to wet a line while enjoying your favorite drink.

The largest fish taken by anglers in the Igloo is a 48” northern that Desire, the young lady that runs the establishment took the first week in February.

Ice fishing is extremely popular on Lake of the Woods, part of the reason being that in the winter you’re allowed to use two rods and the limit for walleye and sauger is raised to eight (4 walleyes and 4 sauger).

Walleyes are the larger cousin of the sauger, reaching over 10 pounds with the average size probably being in the 2 to 4 pound class.

Walleyes are identified by their greenish gold color along with the white tip on their lower tail fin.

Sauger on the other hand are much more streamlined and more aggressive than walleyes. Primarily a river fish, the average size for sauger would be 1 to 2 pounds with a fish over 3-pounds being a real trophy.

Getting on Lake of the Woods out of Zippel Bay is easy as ice roads are plowed out onto the 30” of ice, allowing fishermen easy access to their houses.  Streets are all marked with street signs such as Perch, Big Fish and Walleye, making it easy for anglers to get to the right spot.

On this trip, we were filming with Nick and Deanna at Zippel Bay Resort. Joining us were Team Outdoorsmen Adventures members Larry Myhre, Sioux City, IA. and Jon Thelen, Crystal, MN.

Our plan was to start shallow in the morning, working deep during the day and then back shallow for the last light bite.

A cold front had rolled in the night before, which generally shuts the fish down or at least makes them a harder to catch so we knew that it could be a tough bite.

To combat the cold front, we went to live bait, (small hook, split shot and micro bobber) while downsizing our presentation using baits like the 3/16th Lindy Frostee Jigging Spoons.

We were using fat head minnows, going with the smaller minnows the majority of the time.

When using the jigging spoon, a whole minnow may be too much for cold front fish, so we went with a partial minnow (minnow head) as this worked best for us.

Every once in awhile, we’d drop down a Lindy Darter which not only caught a few fish, it also attracted fish into the area as several times our locators would light up below the darter and then our livebait rigs would take a fish.

We were fishing in icehouses placed over rock and rubble, fishing the shallower water on the top early and late and as the sun got brighter moving off the edge into deeper water.

Since it was such a lite bite, we needed to keep our live bait rigs at a minimum, going with a small hook, lighter split shot and a bobber.

When fishing cold front conditions, you want you bobber to verily float on the top of the water so that the fish feel no resistance when they mouth your bait.

I like to use a very small slip bobber, one that is just visible in the ice hole.

If you’ve ever had a fish pull your bobber down part way and then let go, that’s a pretty good indicator that your using too large of a float.

If all you have are the larger floats, you can add a larger split shot so that the float will suspend deeper in the water column.

A good locator is a must when ice fishing otherwise you’re fishing blind as all species of fish will move up and down in the water column and can be found a few feet below the ice at times.

If you’re fishing right off the bottom as many ice fishermen do and the fish are above you, you’re in for a long day!

Locators will indicate when a fish comes in under your transducer, which allows you to either bring your bait up or drop it down putting your bait where the fish are.

We all caught some nice fish and a lot of the smaller more aggressive sauger, which is a good sign for the years to come, as there will be a tremendous catchable sauger population in years to come.
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If you’re looking for a place to do some ice fishing yet this winter, Zippel Bay Resort will have icehouses out until the end of March.

We ended up taking home our eight fish limit on this trip and are patiently waiting for the soft water season when we’ll make another trip to Lake of the Woods, the walleye capital of the world.

For more information on Zippel Bay Resort and the excellent fishing on Lake of the Woods, go to www.zippelbayresort.com

Lake of the Woods features lots of eating-size

walleyes such as this one caught by Jon Thelen

Lindy/Little Joe representative. (Journal photo by Larry Myhre)

BAUDETTE, Minn. — The snow covered ice of massive Lake of the Woods stretched out before us like the surface of the moon.

The nicely manicured ice road was easy to negotiate. We were about five miles out from Zippel Bay to find the ice house where we would headquarter for our early morning fishing start.

Nick Painovich, owner with his wife Deanna of Zippel Bay Resort, guided us to the house which he said was located on a shallower rock rubble bar which had produced walleyes in the early and late hours of the day.

Jon Thelen, Lindy/Little Joe rep from Crystal, Minn., opened the ice house door and immediately took over the hole in the northeast corner of the shack.

I remembered then that Nick had told us last year that it always seemed the hole on the northeast produced the most fish.

Jon remembers details like that and after dropping the transducer of his Hummingbird flasher down the hole, he sent down a minnow-tipped Lindy Rattlin’ Flyer Spoon.

Gary Howey, Hartington, Neb, Nick and I were soon in operation as well.

But, we had lingered too long over breakfast at the resort and had missed the early bite. Nick soon had us on our way to another house in deeper water.

With Jon at the northeast hole, we began to jig and began to catch fish.

It was the little saugers that provided the first action. There is a huge year-class of 10-inch saugers coming on now that by next summer and winter will be in that nice keeper size. But, for now we sent them back.

Then the walleyes showed up. Jon scored first with a 15-incher on a Frostee jigging lure tipped with a minnow head.

It was a good way to break the ice (pardon the pun) and we were soon on the way to putting several eating-sized walleyes (known locally as “bucket fish”) in our bucket.

The hottest lure that day seemed to be the Frostee jig, but we also caught fish on the Flyin’ Rattlin Spoon, the the Genz worm in gold color. Minnow head or live minnow, it didn’t seem to matter.

We all kept a second rod down a hole under a Thill bobber with a minnow and took some fish on that as well.

We took a break about noon to visit the Igloo, a 20- by 30-foot ice house which Nick put on the ice for the first time this year. It features food and beverages as well as a large flatscreen TV and ice fishing holes. It has been very popular with both ice fishermen and snowmobilers.

Nick maintains nearly 40 miles of ice road and some 75 ice fishing houses, including sleepers. All told, there are probably up to 400 ice houses along his ice road. Street signs help anglers move around.

It’s been a good bite this year and that should continue through March when the houses will have to come off of the ice.

It was a quiet, late November afternoon when Ron Peterson, publisher of the Journal walked into my office in the newsroom.

He sat in the chair across from my desk where, as editor of the newspaper, I was scanning our news budget before heading up the meeting with the floor editors to decide what the next day’s paper would look like.

“What would you think of producing an outdoor tabloid which we distribute free throughout our area?” he asked.

As the paper’s outdoor writer since 1973, it didn’t take long for me to answer.

“I think it would be a great idea,” I said.

And so it started, a free tabloid devoted to teaching Siouxlanders more about hunting and fishing in our area and throughout the upper Midwest.

The first issue, one of six to be published each year, hit the streets in late January of 2004.

The cover photo was of Dave Genz, known as the father of modern day ice fishing. He was on the ice holding a walleye. I had taken that photo a year earlier on Devil’s Lake in North Dakota.

The whole issue was devoted to ice fishing .

So that’s how it started.

The publication, in the intervening years has changed somewhat.

In that first issue, a 20 pager, every story was written by me.

There’s a problem with that, and it’s called lack of variety.

I soon began adding other writers. Today we have some of the most recognizable outdoorsmen in the upper Midwest writing for us.

They reveal a bunch of tips, techniques, where-to-go, how-to-do information in each issue.

And often, many of these breakthroughs are reported here before anywhere else.

Take, for instance, an article in the current issue by Ted Takasaki, one of the nation’s top competitive walleye fishermen. He talks about using aggressive jigging tactics on early ice walleyes. One of the lures he uses is the new Lindy Darter. A lure he thoroughly tested last winter. He reveals everything he learned in this article. The information is published here for the first time, but remember, you’ll be seeing a lot elsewhere about the Lindy Darter, only later.

If you ice fish, you know Dave Genz. He’s at the forefront of ice fishing technology and has taught all of us how to be more successful on the ice.

He’s also designed many of the lures, rods and other ice fishing paraphernalia which we take for granted today.

His story deals with getting on the ice before the sun breaks the horizon. It’s a tough thing to do and takes planning, but as Genz points out, it is often the most productive time of the day.

Other writers who appear in each issue include Babe Winkelman, a nationally-known outdoorsman who has spent the past 30 years teaching people how to hunt and fish. This time he writes about winterizing your boat and putting away your tackle for next year. In another story he talks about scent control you can’t buy at a store. Deer hunters, take note.

Jim McDonnell, Royal, Iowa, the guy we call “The Fishing Professor,” also writes for each issue. McDonnell, the original fishing guide on the Okoboji’s since the 1960s, often keys his stories to fishing success on the Iowa Great Lakes. The lure of yellow perch and goose hunting in northwest Iowa are two topics he addresses in the latest issue.

Bob Jenson, a long-time fishing educator and outdoor television host, writes about winter river walleyes and end of the season fishing tasks in the current issue.

Gary Howey, Hartington, Neb., outdoor television host and outdoor writer, writes about how to fish early ice safely and in another story, how the sport of ice fishing has changed.

Jerry Carlson, an outdoor writer from the Minneapolis area, writes about hole hopping to catch more winter fish.

I fill in with a blueprint for fishing Iowa’s Great Lakes with a species by species rundown and the best lures and baits for each. In another story I detail the changes in ice fishing gear and what you should have for success.

This little tabloid has evolved into a teaching machine on lots of different outdoor pursuits.

Look for it at various outlets around Sioux City, the Iowa Great Lakes and elsewhere.

We have one goal. That is to give you the best how-to information out there on hunting and fishing in the upper Midwest.

Lake of the Woods lies along the border between Minnesota and Canada.

It’s an impressive body of water and the home of some of the finest fishing that you’ll find anywhere. When most anglers think of Lake of the Woods, the first thing that enters their mind is walleye, as this isn’t called the “Walleye Capital of the World” for no reason.

The walleye and sauger fishing on the lake is unbelievable with numerous year classes found throughout the lake.

Lake of the Woods is much more than just a walleye lake as it has excellent populations of muskie, smallmouth bass, northern pike, perch and crappie. And for those of you who want to go after “really” big fish there’s sturgeon fishing in the Rainy River

With over 6500 miles of shoreline, and 4,000 islands there’s a lot to explore on Lake of the Woods.

Fishing is excellent on all corners of the lake as the Northwest Angle, South Shore and Rainy River all offer excellent fishing.

With every trip to the lake, we find something more interesting and exciting going on in the area.

Two weeks ago, Larry Myhre, Sioux City, IA. and I made a trip up north to spend a little time with our good friends Nick and Deanna Painovich at Zippel Bay Resort.

We’ve fished several times with the folks up there and on every trip it seems like learn a little more about the lake and fishing.

There are numerous ways to fish the lake!  When we were there, smaller boats probing the rock piles, mud flats along the southeastern side of the lake while others were working the rock piles and flats farther out into the lake.

The real Lake of the Woods experience is Charter or Launch Fishing on the larger 30’ vessels.

Over the years, we’ve jigged off them, trolled crankbaits and even fished with bottom bouncers, having excellent luck fishing no matter how we were fishing.

Nick is a launch boat caption extraordinaire, as he can put you on fish faster than anyone I know.

On this trip we did some drifting with bottom bouncers and spinners as well as downrigging while testing the new Lindy Shadling.

Nick, using his Lowrance GPS locator equipped with the LAKEMASTER chip, put us right on the structure that was holding the fish.

Nick would position the boat over the area that we wanted to fish with the bottom bouncer rigs and then using the GPS, skillfully guide the launch over the areas where the fish were holding.

Using this method, and it didn’t take us long to tie into some excellent fish, several of which, weighed in at 4 to 5 pounds which were released as well as our three-man limit of perfect eating size walleyes ad sauger for us to take home.

Since we wanted to test the new crankbait, we also trolled using downriggers along several areas with structure that had held fish previously.

Nick would slowly work the launch along the break lines over 30 foot of water with the downriggers set at 26 feet allowing the Shadlings to run at a depth that put our crankbaits just above where the walleyes were lying.

Trolling crankbaits, we caught our four-man limit of walleye and sauger in short order with the new crankbait, which will be available, the first of the year, accounting for all of our fish.

Lake of the Woods is a beautiful body of water with great fishing in a truly beautiful setting offering an experience unlike no other.

If you haven’t had the opportunity to enjoy all that the Lake of the Woods has to offer, it’s one that you’ll enjoy and a trip with memories that will last forever.

For more information on the Zippel Bay Resort and the fishing and hunting opportunities that’s available on Lake of the Woods go to www.zippelbay.com

If you’d like more information on the great outdoor activities on Lake of the Woods check out www.lakeofthewoodsmn.com

Fords Hunting
Guide Service

Chris Ford, has been guiding bear hunters since 1995. Today he also guides for deer and fish on Lake of the Woods as well as offering island transport and tours.

He typically puts out 110 to 120 bear baits and narrows that down to only the best ones come hunting season.

The first week of this year’s season he had 11 clients and nine of them took bears with 18 opportunities. The second week five hunters had five opportunities and killed three bears.

For more information about his hunts, go to www.fordshuntingguideservice.com

BAUDETTE, Minn. —  The forest had gone dead quiet. The camp robber jays had disappeared. The red squirrel which had been prancing back and forth in front of our ground blind for the past hour was no where to be seen.

I thought I saw movement in the brush behind our bait pile, a hole filled with donuts and pastries covered by logs.
And then it was there. A black bear and it was a shooter.

I nudged Gary and pointed, turning on the video camera at the same time.
He brought his Escort .270 mounted with a 3 X 9 scope to his shoulder and waited.

The camera was running and the bear stepped into view broadside a mere 25 yards away.
I heard Gary slide the safety off…and so did the bear. He was gone as quickly as he had appeared.

We were disappointed but it was only 5:30 p.m. There was plenty of time for another chance.h

We were hunting with Ford’s Guide Service out of Williams,  Minn. Our headquarters was Zippel Bay Resort where Chris Ford pus up his bear hunters.

Chris had said we were on a good bait so we were confident there would be another bear that evening.
But the real story happened in another ground blind a few miles away.

There Terry Ubben, Ankony, Iowa, was sitting alone watching his bait when there was a noise behind him.
He turned and saw a big bear poking his nose into the back window. He also noticed the bear’s paw  under the blind.
Then the bear tried stick his head under the blind.
Twice.

Terry sat there, heart pounding, gun at the ready. And he didn’t move.
The bear left the blind and went to a tree in front. He stood up and looking back at the blind.

For 20 more minutes the bear stalked through the area before offering Terry a broadside shot.
Later, in camp, Chris told us the bear would have had a live weight of abut 210 to 220 pounds. It ended up dressing at 162.

“That’s a very good bear,” he said. “The Minnesota average is  130 pounds dressed.

“I’ll give Terry a lot of credit,” Chris continued. “It took a lot of nerve for him to stay tight and not blow it.”

Our next chance came later that evening. Gary saw the bear approach from our left. I soon had him in the viewfinder. The bear walked directly to the bait. He stood broadside to us, head down.
Gary fired.

I head the bear ‘woof’ and then stumble as it ran out of view.
Later we checked for blood but couldn’t find any.

As instructed we stayed in the blind waiting for Kevin Olson, Chris’s partner. It’s too easy to get lost in these big woods.

It was dark now and we were whispering back and forth. I looked out the shooting window and saw a bear standing looking direct at us no more than 30 feet away.
Then he heard Kevin’s pickup and without a sound was gone.

We couldn’t find any blood, although three of us with flashlights scoured the area.

We decided to come back the next morning and continue the search. We did but it had rained over an inch that night and there was no blood trail.

Reluctantly, we gave up hoping against hope that it had been a miss.

We sat on that stand for two more nights but never saw another bear, although the bait was hit each night.

There’s no better time than right now to chase walleyes in the Big Traverse Bay area of Lake of the Woods.

That’s what Gary Howey, Hartington, Neb., and I did for a few days last week.

We fished out of Zippel Bay Resort which has been our headquarters site for both open water and ice fishing forays on the big lake.

Zippel Bay is on the south shoreline just a few miles west of the mouth of the Rainy River.

The bay itself hosts spectacular fishing for ice-out northern pike as well as perch and walleyes year around and, we’re told, bullheads.

But the walleye gets our nod and we chose to spend a couple of half days fishing for them with Nick Painovich, who with his wife Deanna own and operate the resort.

Painovich is a downrigging machine, and the back of his 30-foot launch, one of about four he has at the resort, sports six electronic Cannon downriggers.

And, he was anxious to show us a new crankbait which he was testing.

“Lindy will be coming out with a new Shadling crankbait next year,” Nick said. “I’ve been testing them, and they are really good.”

We were soon to find out just how good.

Nick let the boat chug along at about two miles an hour while he set out three lines.

We had not gone very far when a rod popped up, signalling a fish on.

I cranked in a nice, 19-inch walleye and we dropped it into the livewell.

The walleye/sauger limit on Lake of the Woods is six with no more than four walleyes. Any walleye measuring between 19.5 and 28 inches must be released.

The sauger are so thick here you will have no trouble putting together two good “eaters.”

Nick’s game plan for walleyes is pretty simple. He uses a good crankbait (and the new Lindy Shadling is really hot right now) and lets out about 30 feet of line before attaching it to the release at the downrigger ball.

The best flats are at 30 feet right now so he stops the counter at 23 feet, figuring the bait will dive about another five, putting him just above the bottom.

It’s a good system, but if you don’t have downriggers you can troll with snap weights or bottom bouncers. Before long the fish will be a lot shallower and along the shoreline.

In the three years we’ve been fishing out of Zipple Bay, we’ve never had to go more than a few miles from the mouth of the bay to catch fish.

It’s all location, location, location, but if you want to make long runs, fine.

I’m just saying you don’t have to do that here.