Cam For Ice?

[ClayBengal]

Have always just gone out and drilled and jigged for walleye with mixed results. How much does your success go up using a camera?

[Carpn]

I haven't used a camera on Erie ice . But a flasher or graph is pretty much a essential .

[Whopper]

IN my opinion, a flasher, ( vexilar, hummingbird ice, or other ) is crucial to putting fish on the ice. I have been on Erie ice for 8 years now, and everyday the fish seem to want a different presentation, lure, minnows or jigging action. If you can mark fish, then sooner or later you can figure out what they want. Sure hope we get ice this winter! !

[miso_ohio]

I have both all though I don't believe the camera works anymore and I agree with everybody else. The camera was neat on a slow day to see what is going on down there but as far as helping me catch fish, I will never go without a flasher. I cant remember the last time I took the camera with me though to ice fish.

About the best use I have ever seen for an underwater Camera is I watched one guy on the Chicago River attach a chumming device to a camera and dropped it down. Water was really clear since this was close to Lake Michigan and I had a blast watching all the different fish come up on the chum and the different ways they went about attacking it.

[ClayBengal]

Thanks for the input. I will look at flashers.

[West Basin]

A flasher will tell you if there are fish below your hole. For those who may not know exactly what a "flasher" is, it's the 'old time' depth sounder with a circular light dial on it. The bottom shows up as a constant color line. Any fish in the sonar cone will show up as color lines at the depth they are at. Your lure will also show up as a color line provided it's up off the bottom. You can actually "watch" fish (walleye) follow your lure up when you jig it up off the bottom, and follow it back down, as the two color lines move on the dial. Takes some practice to know what you are looking at. The benefit of this is you can see that a fish is interested in the lure / bait, and you can anticipate a strike. It also shows you whether or not there are enough fish in the location to stay put. Simpler than a more modern depth / fish finder. It can be a lot of fun to watch, almost like playing an old time video game for real.

A camera, IF deployed correctly in clear enough water conditions, will allow you to actually see the fish and lure. Hard to miss a strike when you are looking at it on a video screen in real time. The other advantage of a camera is you can see if the fish is near or at your bait. A flasher just shows what is in the sonar cone, but you don't necessarily know where in the cone the fish are (unless you see the mark going up and down with your lure, then you know the fish is at the bait). They might be 20 feet away from the lure or right at it. A camera shows you exactly what's around your lure.

No matter what you are doing you still need to have the talent to feel the strike on the pole / line. An ice fisherman should develop this ability first. The flasher and camera just make that easier, as you have more information on what's going on down there.

There are lots of videos on Youtube showing flashers. You may take a look at one I did on Lake Erie in March of 2014 at the website www.ilakeerie.com, videos page. There are a few shots trying to show a walleye following a lure on a flasher.