I married a man who absolutely loves ice fishing, and now my sons also love it so I would say we are an ice-fishing family even though I do not really enjoy it for long periods of time.  No matter what kind of big ‘ol snow boots I have on, I’m still standing on an ice-cube! One of my son’s has a girlfriend that took all these pictures as she has been loving her introduction to ice fishing.  I’m glad they are all grown up now because for some reason all small kids cannot help but stick their foot in the hole.  My job was to take them to the car, pull off their boots, take off their wet socks, and dry them using the car heater.  Now on cold days they actually have a heater in the tent.

The picture above is a picture she took while the fish were not biting.  It’s also a great picture of the equipment you need to ice fish.  As you can see, the pole is totally different from summer fishing. This is an old-fashion one because the fancier ones have a reel like regular fishing.  The fishing line is real thin like thread, and you lower the line through the hole making sure it doesn’t stick on the side of the ice.  Then that spring on the end of the pole makes it so you can bob the pole up and down and the bait goes up and down slowly beckoning to all the fish saying “Please, come bite me”.

Now, you don’t have to have a tent, but black tents are the best because they absorb up the sun which helps you stay warm inside and the wind is not a factor.  We use tents because they are portable so you put them in the vehicle all folded up, pull them out on the ice and put them up.  This is the biggest tent we have now so all of us can fit in one tent.  But first you drill the holes using a hand auger like the one in the picture or if you like to scare the fish away for a while you can use a big power auger.  Then you put the tent up over the holes.  Everyone grabs a 5 gallon bucket to sit on and starts fishing.  When the fish bites, you set the hook and then hand over hand you pull up the line, or if you have a reel, you can just reel it in.  If it’s a keeper, you throw it in your bucket or on the ice or pose for a  picture like below.  Happy Fishing and keep warm!