First things first, we will be OPENING the bait shop this Saturday the 26th and Sunday the 27th from 10 am to 5 pm! We will announce future store hours later in the weekend. The access will ONLY be open to walking and portables. Sorry, NO ATV’s at this time. Our Winter Season Pass is $35. If you’d like to save time, you can fill out our Season Pass form and bring it with you at time of purchase. If you choose to pay our access fee daily, it is $2 to walk out. Once we are able to drive vehicles, the fee to drive on is $3 per day Monday through Thursday and $5 per day on Friday, Saturday and Sunday and Holidays. Here is the Season Pass form… https://drive.google.com/file/d/15onXnmIViNRvCwtsUjkftO5gNT4DPK6e/view?usp=sharing
We took our first ice walk of the season today (Christmas Eve) and only ventured out to Waconia Bay and a little bit in front of the marina. Like many of you, we have been patiently waiting for Lake Waconia to completely freeze over. Wednesday morning over half of the lake was still open. Later in the day the blizzard and extreme cold came in with a roar and left us with a wide variety of ice out to Waconia Bay.
Despite the heavy snow and extreme wind, the ice we checked today, while varied, was in reasonable shape. However, between the marinas there is still a very large area of open water that encompasses what we refer at times to as “the hump” or “the hole” and out to Cemetery Reef. We also see open water on the west and east sides of Coney Island. There is also an area that is deep into Waconia Bay in the weedy shallows where open water existed pre-storm. Thankfully most people don’t go that deep into the bay, but if you’re coming from the park, pay attention. Other areas that we saw driving from the road appeared open in a small spot in southern part of Wagener’s Bay. Also, it’s open by Harm’s Point and going to the north past the western side of Center Reef to the northwest side of the lake. There will likely be pockets open yet on the main lake as there are plenty of ducks, geese and swans hanging around. Basically, if you were hoping to fish Harm’s Point, Center Reef or the main lake to the east, you’ll have to wait as ice is forming, but definitely in the early stages with plenty of open water yet.
Ice that we checked from the marina out to along the weed line that people generally ice fish in Waconia Bay has a base layer of 6 to 7.5 inches with a variety of snow, frozen slush and layered ice/slush on top of that base layer. To give you an idea of the variance, you could find at best ice that had a base layer of 6 inches with 4 inches of frozen slush on top for a combined total of 10 inches. Don’t get too excited by that though, as not far away you could see ice that was a base layer of 6 inches, with 5 inches of water sandwiched between a crusted 4 inch top-layer of frozen slush. It seemed clear that heavy drifting occurred, likely sinking the ice and flooding the snow. Where the snow was thicker, the ice has that sandwiched layer, which would be bad news for anyone bringing anything heavy across that area. Where the snow wasn’t as heavily drifted, as long as it saturated, the extreme cold was able to penetrate it to freeze those areas solid.
In a nutshell, if you’re looking to go fish Waconia Bay in 10 to 15 feet of water, it was good walkable ice. Of course we always advise anglers to check for themselves and be prepared with a chisel and safety picks your first time on the ice wherever you go.
Have a Merry Christmas and we’ll see you on Saturday!
