After those glowing reports of hundred + fish days at Curlew my nephew and I decided to brave the cold and give the ice fishing a try at Curlew. Arrived at the State Park as three guys were leaving the lake with their gear about 11 am. They had fished around the island and talked to all the groups out there. They had caught none and the other groups had a total of 2 perch and a couple of trout. We all decided to try another area. Access other than the park is limited on Curlew and the resorts are closed. We did finally end up near Tiffany's resort. Drilled some holes near where other holes had been. Found an occasional perch. A group near us started to catch perch with some regularity so we drilled nearer their spot and found the water was deeper... about 44 feet vs the 32 to 38 we started in. Fish came in spurts with several in short succession followed by long lulls. Drilled new holes trying to follow the fish. They seemed to be moving deeper. Caught the first fish a little before 2 pm but managed to ice 23 perch and two trout by dusk. Small jigs tipped with worm or perch eyes fished right at the bottom . Nice average size. Twenty perch yielded 3.25 pounds of skinned perch. (We skin rather than fillet. Its easy and we loose no meat). Also yielded 1 lb 7 oz of eggs. 16 of the 20 perch were females mostly ten inches (9.5 to 10.5). The four males were smaller, about 9 inches. Average size was a little bigger than last years catch so it looks like the population is not crashing or getting stunted. These are nice thick bodied fish. We also had 4.5 pounds of heads and skin so total weight of 20 perch was 9 pounds. Cold day but lack of wind made it tolerable. Ice is ten inches or more.

Hugeinchina

2/11/2019 11:45:54 AM

I'm headed back up for round two this weekend. Its possible that the numbers caught a week or so ago will just end up being one of those "You should have been here last week!" kind of things.

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