Ice Introduction

One of my favorite occasions about ice fishing is bringing people new to the sport out for their first trips. Many have been interested in a while or they moved here from a warmer climate and have a genuine interest in wanting to see what it's all about. Nearly everyone I've brought out has a good time and brings their first fish through the ice at some point.

Last weekend, a new friend of mine and recent mover to the area, Jordan, decided that he wanted to try out ice fishing. Having open water fished back in Georgia and Utah before he and his wife moved here, he attended my seminar a couple of weeks ago and wanted to give it a go.

I decided to we'd go up to Deerfield to get him on some trout since the area where we were going was so fruitful the year before. Another friend of mine, Brian, met us up there as well. Once we arrived on the spot, I drilled a few holes with my K-drill and handed the auger to Jordan and told him to drill holes in a grid just keeping them in line with my holes.

One awesome advantage of using the Clam Drill Plate and K-drill is that it's so light and easy to use that nearly anyone can pick it up and start drilling holes with no experience necessary. Then after giving him some instruction on how to use and read a Vexilar screen, we were all looking forward to getting some fish topside.

Brian and I brought up a few each before I had Jordan move a little shallower. No sooner did he move in than red marks started showing up on his Vexilar screen. After a few missed bites as he wasn't used to needing set a hook so much, he caught and reeled in his first hard fighting trout!

The smile on his face said it all! He was hooked! There were a lot of smiles to come. For the next couple of hours, he would catch close to a dozen good sized rainbows while Brian and I caught our fair share as well. I couldn't have asked for a better morning to bring Jordan out on his first trip.

Safe to say that a new icehead was created that morning and I know he's already looking forward to his next trip on the ice. I hope everyone has a chance to introduce someone new to the ice this season. Sometimes nothing beats that feeling of creating a new fan of the hardwater!