Ice Off at Strawberry!

Well, we missed it. This Spring we thought that we had been watching Strawberry very closely waiting for ice off, but obiously we missed the boat. I found out from my Bro.-in-law Jared that he had been up to the Berry on Monday the 12th and that most of the lake was open water. Although disappointed, I decided to go the next day which was Friday the 16th. Jared and I got up there at about 4:30 p.m. and fished until close to dark. We went to our usual spot-Chicken Creek- and I could tell right off the bat that this was not an ordinary ice-off fishing trip. The lake just felt dead. I put powerbait on one pole and a white tube jig tipped with a crawler on the other and began fishing. I finally had one on my tube jig after about 30 minutes. It was the first hit of the day. Throughout the evening I caught 2 fish off of powerbait and 3 off of tube jigs. One with a white tube and the other two with a glow in the dark tube. Jared had one on with a minnow imitating spinner but failed to land it. It was a good trip-well... better than work. I feel that the unseasonably warm temperatures may have caused the poor fishing.