It was one of those mild June days that had somehow been transported into the middle of March. Early morning clouds had dissipated turning overcast skies clear and blue, and by 8 a.m. when we arrived at the lake, temperatures were already in the mid-40s and rising steadily. Although the fishing is often spotty, I prefer ice fishing during March over any other month. Perhaps it’s because conditions are generally the most agreeable of the winter, or maybe with open water season nearly at hand, I’m just trying to wring the last vestiges of hard-water angling from the season.

Tom Tardiff and I had driven more than an hour to meet Darren Bailey at the snowbank-confined parking area near the boat ramp of Drew’s Lake in New Limerick. Our trio had formulated plans for an early March ice-drilling outing two weeks previously and finalized our lake selection just two days earlier. Reason one was that Darren had access to a roomy ice fishing shanty owned by his father-in-law that would provide shelter if the weather took a turn for the worst. It didn’t hurt that this cozy hut offered a cook stove and utensils for putting together the fixin’s for a tasty moose steak lunch we had planned.

Setting up

A wide variety of cooperative fish species was our main draw to Drew’s Lake, which is often referred to as Meduxnekeag Lake by area anglers. Brook trout and salmon are always at hand, but it’s the possibility of a monster brown trout that keeps most winter fishermen coming back regardless of the weather conditions. Heavy populations of white and yellow perch and some hefty pickerel always do their part to prevent boredom and keep flags flying as well.

Unlike hand-numbing, face- chilling days in January, setting out tip-ups this trip was a comfortable and convivial task thanks to the sun’s strengthening spring rays and not a breath of wind along the ice. We chose to fish the “small lake” this day, which is actually just a confined narrow portion leading into the larger lake proper. This section has the added advantage of being close to the boat launch where we park, as well as being near the lake’s outlet stream, where fish seem to always congregate under the ice.

We each picked a direction and, working together, set out five traps apiece radiating outward from the ice shanty like tentacles from an octopus. Tom wrestled the growling auger through more than 30 inches of ice for each hole. I shoveled snow clear and scooped ice chips from each opening and Darren rigged the tip-ups with minnows and set them into place. We had silver shiners, golden shiners, and even a few smelt for baits and offered a variety of each, set out at 4- to 12-foot levels in water depths from 8 to 24 feet.

Once the setup work was over, we lugged our knapsacks of gear and bait buckets back to the shanty and stood outside to wait for the first flag. Still a couple of hours before noon and the thermometer had just struggled over the 50-degree mark, so it felt refreshing to just bask in the warm rays and chat. After half an hour with no action, we retired inside and started a fire in the wood stove to pass some time. After getting a little smudge going, Darren looked out a window and spied one of his flags waving for attention.

Of course, we all trooped out to oversee the action, and the reel was going in fits, spitting off a few feet of line, then sitting dormant for a few seconds, then spinning again. During one of the quiet spells Darren lifted the trap from the hole, set it aside and took the line in his fingers. When the fish pulled again, he pulled back, and feeling weight began to overhand fishing line from the water. Then the fish pulled back harder, running and stripping line through his fingers from off the ice. When the run ended, Darren voiced the opinion it was a fair fish, a couple of pounds at least, and began to retrieve some line. That’s when the fish turned again, right in the middle of a pull, and the line went slack. Our first fish was gone, so was the bait and a good deal of our anticipation.

To shake off the gloom of losing the first fish and only strike of the first hour, we each wandered off to check our baits and adjust line depths. Not having to clear ice from each hole or freeze our fingers, thanks to the warm March sun, cheered each of us considerably. However, all of the minnows and smelt were present and accounted for, lively and sadly unmolested by hungry game fish. Puzzling. We had no more than gathered back beside the shanty when one of Tom’s tip-ups flipped a flag, which is fairly common after a bait has been moved. Unfortunately the perpetrator turned out to be an overachieving yellow perch that somehow gagged down a golden shiner a quarter of its own size. We trudged back after the trap was set up with fresh bait and waited and watched some more.

Gettin’ jiggy

By 10:30 we had reached the two-hour mark with only two hits and one perch to show for our efforts and I could see Tom was getting antsy. Never one for patiently waiting, the next thing I saw was Tom coming out of the shanty with a chair. He pulled out and reeled up his closest tip-up, stowed it in his pack basket, and dug out a hand line rigged for jigging with a small silver Swedish Pimple. I rolled my eyes at Darren, he shrugged his shoulders, and Tom grinned at us and said, “At least I feel like I’m actually fishing when I’m fooling with this jig rig.”

Let me tell you right off that I was the disbeliever. If the fish weren’t going to grab a live bait, I figured there wasn’t much chance they would respond to jigs. Even the perch and pickerel had lockjaw, and usually at least one or two of them are hungry or stupid enough to munch on a minnow. But on the plus side, I was less bored watching Tom work his lure than when I was just gazing hopefully at my traps. Less than 10 minutes had passed when my monotony changed to disbelief when Tommy gave a sharp upward tug and exclaimed, “There’s one!”

After a few minutes of give and take, a 14-inch salmon was finning back and forth under the ice hole. Tom worked the fish’s head into the shaft of ice and with a steady upward motion flopped the fish up and onto the snow. His grin actually said it all, but he suggested, “Better get your jigging rods out, boys.” Darren did just that and headed for one of his holes in a little deeper water. Still not convinced, I wandered off to investigate why my baits were being ignored as if they had the plague.

I had just returned my fifth whole and healthy minnow to the water when Darren let out a hoop. His mini spinning rod was bent nearly double and as I got closer it was obvious a fairly good size fish was taking out line. After a short tug of war and a bit of careful maneuvering around the auger hole, Darren yarded a glistening 15-inch brown trout onto the ice. He, too, had used a silver lure. At about 1/8-ounce and 1 1/2 inches long, the shape was similar to the well-known Krocodile lure.

My doubts were fading; perhaps there were days when game fish were actually more interested in artificial baits than real bait fish. Why, when, and where fish take flies, lures, and baits is one of angling’s greatest mysteries, so I don’t know why I should have been surprised by the circumstances. About 15 minutes later Tom caught a 12-inch brookie and soon after Darren missed hooking a fish on a strike. The last brick in my wall of stubbornness and skepticism crumbled and I couldn’t rig up my jigging outfit fast enough.

Perching on a bait bucket, and hovering over my farthest and deepest fishing hole, I worked a silver spinner with a colorful jig head hook and a small tendril of cut bait. I had just lowered my line down to the bottom for the second time, less than five minutes since I began jigging, when I felt a tap, tap, tug. A quick wrist flip hooked me up to a small fish which turned out to be a fair-sized yellow perch. Not my species of choice, but far more fun than just watching my tip-ups.

I suffered a bit of good-natured razzing from the boys, for my reticence as well as for catching “trash” fish, as I attached a fresh piece of bait. As is often the case, since perch are a schooling fish, over the next half-hour I was kept quite busy feeding and fighting yellow and white perch. I really couldn’t complain about steady action considering how slow the morning had been, but I longed for the heavy strike of a trout or salmon. On the other hand, a couple of the white perch were saucer size and would make tasty filets.

Tom had caught a brown trout and released a 10-inch brookie, and Darren had let a foot-long brown trout go and lost another fish three minutes into the tussle, all while I was playing with perch. Time for a change! I picked up and moved toward the shoreline and a hole over 15 feet of water. Tying on a Torpedo, a 1 1/2-inch-long metal tube with beveled ends and a holographic silver skin, I started jigging. Due to its irregular shape, the Torpedo offered wonderfully erratic movement, darting and dodging, glinting and shining, often a couple of feet off to either side of the hole.

I hooked a small brook trout first and released it, then an 18-inch pickerel muckled onto my lure and really put up a great fight. Action slowed for everyone then, and we decided it was a good time to cook up some moose steaks for lunch. As we sat inside the fish hut, cooking and eating in shifts, the fish remained very considerate and kept ignoring our tip-ups. None of us could explain why fishing with jigs was producing steady action, while real, live baits were being neglected.

After lunch we worked our jigs without effect for more than half an hour, and then, as if someone flipped a switch, fishing picked up. For more than an hour we all enjoyed consistent jigging attention from several species, but our only tip-up flag turned out to be a pickerel. Each of us caught a couple of brown trout, my best being an 18 1/2-inch handful that made the entire trip worthwhile, and Darren was all smiles over a 17-inch beautifully speckled brookie. Although Tom hauled in no bragging-size fish, he caught as many as Darren and I together and had the gall to mention it, more than once.

I came to two conclusions after that outing: first, it’s a lot more fun to catch fish on a hand line or jigging rod than on a tip-up. It actually lets the ice fisherman fish. Second, I really believe it was being able to offer our lures at consistently changing and varied depths that drew strikes while our live baits were more or less stationary at one level. Perhaps it was the more erratic movement as well. Whatever the case, the next time your tip-ups are being ignored, change tactics and dig out your jigging rig and if you don’t have a jig line or rod, better get one. It might just make all the difference in the outing. Don’t be reluctant or indecisive like I was or you might really understand that old saying, “The jig’s up.”

Outdoor feature writer Bill Graves can be reached via e-mail at bgravesoutdoors@ainop.com