Trickey Pond is a 311 acre pristine body of water located next to Route 114 in Naples, Cumberland County (see The Maine Atlas and Gazetteer map 4 B5). I have fished this pond numerous times in the past (for recent examples, click here and here) and have invariably found it … trickey and unpredictable! The fishing can be really slow but also rewarding for those who are willing to put in the time and learn its secrets. Today is my last day of the 2015 hard water season. The past winter was long, cold, brutal, and snowy. We experienced what folks around here call a good ole Maine winta! I’m fishing this morning for a couple of hours but have also organized a picnic for later on today on this pond with about 25 friends and family members. The purpose of our get-together is to shake off “cabin fever”, celebrate the end of the cold season and welcome in the start of spring.
This small splake is coming home for the frying pan!
I arrive at the public boat launch at Trickey Pond by 6:10 am. I drive my truck right on the 24” of solid ice and position myself away from the shallows along the eastern shoreline over a drop-off that plunges from 25 ft deep to over 50 ft deep over a relatively short distance. I’m targeting landlocked Atlantic salmon and splake which like to chase smelt over that drop-off. I place the bait of my first trap 5 ft under the ice in 25 ft of water. The bait on the second trap goes 10 ft deep, that on the third trap 15 ft, and so on. I now have baited hooks from 5 ft to 25 ft below the ice in 25 ft to 50 ft of water. I like this layout because it probes different depths in the water column. I’m all ready by 6:45 am. I climb into my warm cab and start reading the Sunday newspaper, all the while keeping a wary eye on my traps. This is definitely the way I like to ice fish!! My son Joel is scheduled to join me at 7 am, but he fails show up. The sun rises up behind my truck and starts its slow steady arch into the bright blue sky. I finally get my first flag around 9 am in my deepest trap. The spool is turning slowly and the line is shooting downward when I get to the hole. That doesn’t look like landlocked salmon behavior to me, so I’m guessing that it’s either a bass or a splake. I set the hook and ice a fat 15” splake. This one is coming home for the frying pan!
Just like at the beach, except for the two tip-ups between the cars…
I get no more flag action. Joel finally drives up to me on the ice at 10 am. He places two of his traps in shallow water (5 ft and 8 ft, respectively) along the shoreline for brook trout and splake, and the remaining three in deeper water for landlocks and splake. We chat for about an hour in his car but see no action at all. The fishing is definitely slooow today… The picnickers are expected to arrive soon, so we drop all our off-shore bait down to 2 ft off the bottom to see if we can catch some of the fat smallmouth bass which make Trickey Pond famous this time of the year. We start offloading the fire pit, portable BBQ, lawn chairs and other paraphernalia from my truck to set up camp on shore. We’re right on time because our first guests arrive. I get a call around noon to drive up to Route 114 and bring down a few people. I’m gone for no more than 10 minutes. When I return, I see Joel kneeling on the ice next to his 5-ft deep hole looking dejectedly at the end of his broken monofilament line with an air of disbelief on his face… He got a flag and the spool was turning. He set the hook and it felt like he got stuck on a submerged log or some other immovable object. But then the object starting swimming away! Joel has caught hundreds of fish under the ice and he knows when he has something big, and this thing was BIG! He expertly fought the fish and brought it to the hole to discover that he had hooked into a massive smallmouth bass! He got too excited at this point. The fish was so fat that it hardly fit through the 10” hole! Instead of letting it swim around and wait for my return to help, he tried to horse it through the hole and, of course, broke his line in the process. We have no way of knowing how big this hog was, but we surmise that it was well over 20” long and weighed between 5 and 6 lbs….
Who says that ice fishing isn’t a lot of fun!
We now focus our attention on snacking, grilling and socializing with everyone. The weather is glorious. The temperature is in the low 40’s but it feels downright “beachy” without wind and with the warm sun rays bouncing off the glare ice. The kids are noisily running around with their sleds and playing ball. The adults are sitting on the lawn chairs chatting, munching on burgers and hot dogs, and enjoying a beer. Some are working on their (face) tan! The dogs are running themselves ragged fetching tennis balls that don’t seem to want to stop rolling on the ice. Life is truly good and we dare to think about the coming spring and summer. We do get three flags, which generate a great deal of excitement and commotion when everyone runs towards the active hole. These efforts yield one smallmouth bass which gets photographed and released. This is a fantastic way to end a cold but exciting 2015 ice fishing season. So long, Winter, you and I will face off again next year on the ice!
Was the information in this blog useful? I invite you to share your thoughts and opinions. Also, feel free to discuss your fishing experiences at this location.
~ ~ ~ ~ ><« ({(« º >
Copyright protected by Digiprove