HAPPY NEW year everyone. We decided to have a "Crazy go nuts" sale on the Disco rigs. we need to get this season underway in full force. Ice is starting to form up... we are almost ready to go sit in the shacks!!
$3.75 on the Disco rigs while they last!!
http://mainetackle.com/shop.html

What a season!

The shacks came off the ice.
To clear up any confusion, I did run a sale, it was for 2 weeks in February. Everything went back to the set price after the sale was over.

If you need rigs for perch, next year, or anything else, keep it rolling.

Smelt Rigs are on sale!

The Smelt are running and the weather is warming a little.

I would like to get cleaned out of my inventory this year!!
The Fishin’ Hole is having a blow out sale!!
I have marked smelt rigs down to an all time low price to help wrap the season up…. Or get it moving again (whatever the case may be)
That means good news for the Fishin’ Hole customers!

 

I dropped the price of Smelt Rigs down to $4.00 ea for a week!!! I have never sold them this cheap, but let’s get them in the water!

Celsius rods have dropped to $15 this week as well!

I must have bumped my head, but take advantage of these rates while they last! Hit the website and order away!
Http://www.mainetackle.com

I saw on our Facebook page someone hauled in 500!! Then the next day 4. Keep posting your catch number on the wall folks, it helps us all out. The numbers are looking promising for this weekend, I would be interested in hearing what comes up.

The ice at Bakers is solid and fishable,The shacks are warm, and the water cold!

My smelt fishing secret

Why I think Smelt Fishing is better during a cold snap:
The Temperature out there in the ol’ Atlantic off the coast of Maine right now is somewhere around 40-42 degrees Fahrenheit near the coastline.

A good cold snap cools the shallower brackish waters up in the rivers inland to temps lower than that out there in the bay by quite a bit. River temps raise or lower more quickly than that whole big ocean.

There are schools of Smelts out there in the Atlantic full of eggs and sperm looking for a river to spawn in, it’s why they come up the river.

A cruising school out in the bay would easily notice a temperature drop of even just 1 degree.

I think the fish are out there cruising around, feel a cold water flow and tend to follow it up to find the river spawning eddies. I personally think this MAY be why some of our best catches have been on some of the coldest fishing nights of the season.

The night I talk about the most where we brought in as many as 3,000 smelt was in a snap that was about -20 degrees.

I personally think that cold water flowing into the ocean is like a glaring red flag to the smelts to turn inland toward the river.

(I may be wrong…this is just my own contemplations)

We are heading up to try things out Thursday 1/24, we have shack #7 from 12:30-7:30pm. I will post some results on our facebook page. The projected temp for the evening is -7 degrees.
If you head up to try it, stop by and say hello, hopefully our buckets with be shining with smelts.

Ice is coming

As I look out the window the snow is dropping, so are the temps. You would be hard-pressed to find any ice in Maine ready to walk on yet, so I hope everyone is using a little common sense.
This is the time to get out all the gear, grease reel gears, oil bearings, re-line rods and traps, organize tackleboxes and replenish smelt rigs from the shop.
The Fishin' Hole

Ice Augers - Makin' Holes

One Auger, Two Auger, Old Auger, New Auger.

Maybe I am getting old and stuck in my ways, but I have an old Eskimo 8" gas powered auger that my dad gave to me when he got a little too old to hang on to it effectively. I keep the blades sharp, careful to how it sits, and clean the carb every couple of years and do some general maintenance. It has served me well for a long time.

I hopped online today to just "see what's out there". I know most of the folks on the ice are clamoring after a 10" auger. Apparently they think there will be fish that won't fit through an eight inch hole. I guess we can all dream, and perhaps some of those bass fill a hole. Otherwise the ten inch hole DOES take longer to ice over.

Well Jiffy is now turning out propane powered augers!! This was all new to me. The idea, at first, seemed weird, then genius.  Clean burning, no mixing gas, transport is a snap, no more spilled gas in the bottom of the jetsled. This is something you could just pop right in the back seat of your car when you are done if you had no truck, and it would stink less than your fish.

I will have my eyes on the ice this winter to see who has one. I am anxious to see one in action. The igloo name is pretty solid, has been around for quite some time, and generally leads the way when it comes to making a hole in the ice.

My old Ice auger still has many good hours left in it, so I'm not really ready to put it up for sale just yet, but it's innovations like this that make it tempting.

If anyone has one of these, or has used one, I would be interested in hearing about it. leave a post below or on fishin' hole  facebook page.

Below are some links to more detail on these and other models.
 

Jet Sleds - a must have?

A fisherman's best friend

I can't hardly imagine a day on the ice without our faithful utility sled. Buckets, bait, auger, cooler, stove, rods, traps, there are so many things an ice fisherman wants to bring on the ice, a day without one of these beauties is a day spent trudging gear back and forth from the truck. In Maine, these utility sleds start getting scarce and next to impossible to find as fall wears into winter.
I never would have thought it, but they can be found on Amazon and shipped right to your door. (links to them attached below). Now add to my delight of finding them in camo!

If you will be taking the four wheeler or snow sled on the ice, do yourself a favor and pick up the jetsled hitch. This handy little item keeps the sled from jamming into your tires or track and just gumming up the whole works and damaging gear.
Even on the short trips to the ice shanties at the smelt fishing camps I use our sled. I have found it really convenient to load the sled the night before, lift the whole thing into the truck or SUV and just pull it out when we get to the shacks and go. No messing with gear and shuffling armloads of gear around.  For the light trips or smaller vehicles there are shorter 42" sleds that handle more easily.
This year there has actually been discussion on bringing both to the ice. One for food, auger, shelter and stove and one to run flags with that has bait, traps and rods. Inevitably when running to flags with a sled and bait bucket water sloshes out, the second sled could solve the problem.

I really love the Jet sled and it has become an essential piece of winter fishing gear for The Fishin' Hole.