Weather: Clear, calm, 30's
Moon Phase: 5% Moon
Location: Strawberry Reservoir
Bait: White tube jig tipped with meal worm or minnow
Who Went: Hunt and his cousin zack and uncle Darren, John, Newton, Me
My buddy Hunt came in town for Christmas and wanted to hit the ice like the old days, so I tried to make it an after Christmas party and invite the whole crew, but most bailed on me right at the end. We still had a pretty good turn out and had a lot of fun. We’ve had very little snow this year and were surprised to find the road going around Strawberry Reservoir is still accessible with only a few inches of snow.
In my 10 years of ice fishing Strawberry I’ve never seen it where ice is capping the entire reservoir and this road is still accessible. We took advantage and headed around the lake all the way to Renegade Bay. It was my first time ice fishing there and we were excited to fish new territory. Once we had our gear set up, it didn’t take long for everyone to start catching fish. Hunt’s Uncle Darren had the hot hand to start the day catching 8 fish in the first couple hours.
I struggled to get going, but as usual made my late push at the end.
Bobber John was steady all morning pulling in a fish here and there.
Hunt, Newton, and Zack had a tough time finding their groove, but all landed around 4-6 fish.
We fished in 20-25’ of water using standard white tube jigs tipped with a minnow or meal worm. Both baits worked with similar success. We caught 3 cutthroats over the slot limit at 23 inches, and 3 rainbows in the 14-17 inch range.We had a Bald Eagle that was watching us the whole time looking for a free meal. We placed one
of the rainbows that Darren took home for dinner out beyond us a ways to see if he would fly over and pick it up, but he never did. It looked like I was going to be the Fisherman of the Day (FOD) with a one fish lead, but John tied it up at the very end with 11, and then quickly took the lead with 12. Everyone was ready to go so I told him I conceded, but left my rod in my hole as we packed our gear. John showed great sportsmanship as I wasn’t even paying attention to my rod, and hesitantly, he let me know that my rod was bouncing. I grabbed it and reeled in number 12 and tied John for FOD. It was good to get old friends out on the ice and reminisce the good old days, when we were the fastest in our sport and held every manly record Jordan High School ever had. We had some good laughs!
I had a half day off yet again, and figured I would go on another fish hunt with Johnny Leach this afternoon. I was thinking we should try and find a few whitebass for the freezer this time since I’ve already got a shelf full of bluegill. We started on the Jordan River below the pump house at Utah Lake where I know a little spot that is fed by warm springs and usually attracts fish during the colder months of the year. The fish ended up being there, but so were the fishermen. I was disappointed to see so many people there and once again another secret is gone! The fishermen were catching tiny crappie one after another, but none were big enough to eat. I wasn’t in the mood to combat fish so we moved on to the Lindon Boat Harbor in search of some whitebass. The harbor is iced over with this recent cold snap and there were already a few holes pre-drilled for us when we arrived. We fished for 15 minutes with no bites, and that’s all it took to figure out the white bass were not active, so we left the harbor and headed back to our old reliable bluegill spot where we have been knocking them dead. This time I decided to make a sneak attack when we first got there and throw something that might entice a largemouth to bite. My first cast with my Christmas colored (no pun intended) curly tailed grub landed me a nice 13 inch largemouth!
I casted a few more times and was able to land two more small ones. I guess the fish were feeling the Christmas spirit! They soon figured out we were there and the hits subsided. The bluegill fishing was the same as last week with one on almost every cast. I would try and pull my worm away from the smaller ones this time and patiently wait for a bigger one to bite. A couple times I enticed another largemouth bass to hit, and was able to land one more on a worm. We only kept about 15 of the biggest bluegill along with two largemouths, and it was a good thing, because John ended up leaving before filleting them and any more would have been a nightmare to do myself. I added three more zip loc bags of meat to the freezer for a grand total of eight large bags! I think it’s time to have a bluegill fish fry! 
Rick called me and wanted to hit the Bear River as a last ditch effort to catch some big browns this year. He’s been there twice already during the spawn, but with the overwhelming flows on the rivers this year, both times he went were a bust. The flows were 3 times greater than average this fall and he said the river was high, fast, and really muddy both times he went. The rivers have finally settled down for the year, so we gave it a shot. It was snowing during our drive up and the high for the day was in the teens. With no wind it wasn’t too bad, but the river was feeling the cold and had almost completely iced over! The areas that had moving water looked good, but we never did see a fish.
One of Ricks fishing buddies, Josh, came with us and even though the fishing was miserable, the trip was fun as usual with good talk and a lot of laughs! Hopefully we don’t get pounded by snow this winter and can actually fish some rivers next year. 2011 was crazy! The Great Salt Lake rose over 5 feet in 2011, which is a record, but just one of the many records that were broke this year. Don’t get me wrong, we need the water and I’m glad the lakes are full, but we could have spread it out over a few years instead of getting it all in one. It’s time to start looking forward to ice fishing.
I had a half day off yesterday, so I talked to Johnny Leach and mulled over a few areas we could go to wet a line for a few hours and land some fish. I’m on a new kick to fill my freezer with fish after realizing that I eat more fish than any other meat and have always bought it from the store, all while releasing the fish I catch myself! Duh!
I figured it might be full of bluegill this time of year and I ended up being right. We caught them almost every cast! They weren’t small either, measuring 7-10 inches!
We kept 32 of them and hit the road early to make sure we had enough daylight to fillet them all.
After filleting them, John asked me if I was down for round 2 the next morning. I thought about it and figured why not fill the freezer while the opportunity is there! 
We harvested 60 bluegill, which filled one 5-gallon bucket, and kept us busy with the fillet knife for about an hour and a half.
When we were done we had 2 overfilled gallon baggies full of fillets. We divided them up equally and with all the fillets I got today, plus the ones from yesterday, I had enough bluegill to make about 6 large family size meals for the deep freezer!
True to tradition any time I fillet fish at my house, we always treat Duke to one fish and watch him suck it down in about 3 seconds. That dog will eat anything!
I told Cari my goal is to become a fish hoarder and have nothing but fish in our big freezer in the garage! She didn’t go for it!