One of the first things I like to do when fishing a new lake is to find a map. I know you can get a chip for many of the GPS units available today, but when it comes to the hardwater, I still like to have something in front of me to study before making a trip. This is the case of my next ice fishing trip this December. The North American Ice Fishing Championship is held in Alexandria, Minnesota. Located right off I-94, but its 14 hours away from Ida and Monroe County.
What the map gives me is a slight edge, if for no other reason, a mental one. A good map, thats up to date, gives you vegitation, sand bars, edges and drops. If you know the species of fish you are after, you can start to eleminate water right off the bat. I could have said, areas to find fish, but in this case I really want to spend more time at home eleminating areas that should be less than productive. This is a two species event, bluegill and crappie. So typically I would eleminate areas where they should not be, and then concentrate on spots where they typically will hold up.
You can google map companies and get quite a few good results. These are not terribly expensive, usually costing twenty dollars or less. Not much considering when taking the trip we will be fishing for $25,000.00. Its the same case for the angler who takes a long awaited trip, whether its to MN, Wisconsin, Upper Michigan or Canada.
