Ice smelt fishing on a frozen lake is very popular in Japan.
During the season, each frozen lake is visited by many anglers, and nearby fishing tackle shops have large dedicated corners.
Such ice smelt fishing is actually one of the most popular type of fishing on ice in North America.
Phillip A. Sajtar, a good fishing friend from Michigan who I first met on the net, is a specialist smelt angler and has many pics posted on facebook.
I would like to introduce ice smelt fishing in North America based on the pics from Philip.
1 Fishing place
He catches smelt at Lake Gull, a suburb of Battle Creek and Kalamazoo, Michigan.
The lake is about 8k in area and 34m deep. Trout and perch can be caught in addition to smelt. The freezing season is around mid-February, and usually there is 4-6″ of snow on the lake.
2 tent and drill
The tent is generally a cube type tent that I also use.
He uses a tent that’s made by a major ice fishing maker, Clam.
It seems that the drill are rechargeable drills like Japan. I imagine a large drill with an engine in North America, but recently many people use rechargeable drills.
3 tackle and bait
The rod is used a long, soft-tip type rod, and he uses a torso device with multiple hooks similar to Japan.
They usually don’t use floats.
The bait is maggot same as in Japan, and also there are the maggot dyed pink.
4 Fishing
In smelt fishing, night fishing seems to be very popular.
I don’t think there is a lake where we can fish at night in Japan, but it seems to be a common fishing method there.
In the past, I could fish on Lake Hibara at night, and the lights of the tents that appeared on the lake at night were very beautiful.
They use a dedicated LED green light for night fishing. I also bought it.
Also, unlike Japan, they sit on a chair and fish. The angler in the picture is his fishing friend. The tent itself is intended for fishing in a chair, and the upper part is particularly wide which is different from Japanese tents.
5 Fish finder and heating
In ice fishing, many people use flashers. He was also using a flasher.
Garmin Sonar which I use seems to be used for smelt fishing, but it seems that it is used in fishing using lures in videos etc.
For heating they use a gas type heater. I think it is the same as Japan.
6 dishes
As in Japan, caught smelt are often fried in oil and eaten.
Also, because the size of the smelt that can be caught is large, it is common to remove the head and internal organs and then fry.
This is in contrast to eating the very small Japanese smelt.
Among oil dishes, butter fries are particularly popular and look very delicious.
Popular fishing in North America, I promised to go fishing at Lake Gull next season with Philip. Next time I will be able to introduce from the local area in detail.
