Pet peeves: Those particularly annoying things that get under your skin no matter how hard you try and ignore ‘em. We polled Target Walleye/Ice fans to find out their biggest ice-fishing pet peeves and compiled them into one big-nasty list. How many are you doing?
1. Garbage left on the ice. If you bring it out, bring it back with you! How hard is that?
2. Losing a fish after it gets wrapped up in the transducer.
3. Snowmobiles are the jet skis of ice fishing. Are they trying to run over your tip-up?
4. Sunflower seeds in my hole.
5. When people set up right on top of you, even though there’s a whole lake.
6. People complaining about you being set up too close.
7. Snake northerns, ‘nuff said.
8. People who keep every fish they catch regardless of size.
9. Trying to re-tie with frozen fingers.
10. The guy that’s first to call you for a hot spot, but as soon as he finds fish it’s a secret.
11. People leaving cigarette butts on the ice.
12. Seeing small little lakes posted all over Facebook.
13. When your tip-up gets frozen in the hole.
14. People that purposely waste fish — if you don’t want it, put it back!
15. Running out of propane.
16. Wind!
17. Driving too fast on the ice — slow down!
18. How most anglers need the internet to find hot spots. Seems long gone are the days of finding your own fish.
19. When people start fishing before everything is set up and don’t offer to help.
20. Marking fish, but can’t get ‘em to bite.
21. People drilling holes during prime time.
22. People who don’t read the rules and regs, and instead ask others online. Even worse are the ones who give answers having never read ‘em either.
23. Buddies that are retired and say they can’t go fishing because they have too much to do.
24. People posting pics of fish and telling everyone exactly where they were caught.
25. When there’s an ice road plowed right over your waypoint.
26. Cleaning frozen fish.
27. When someone thinks you catch the same exact fish over and over: “Must be the same one you caught before,” or, “that’s the one I caught.”
28. Running out of beer.
29. Women hanging all over me once they find out I’m an ice fisherman….
30. Flat-out NOT getting to go!
Joseph
January 11, 2017 at 5:01 pm
The guys that want to join you only after the wheelhouse is set-up (i.e. heat on & holes open)!
Erik
January 15, 2017 at 2:01 am
The guy who posts on Lake-Link how many panfish he caught, the size of each one, how many he kept, how many he threw back, what he was using for bait, what he switched to, what he had for lunch, and then says he’ll post again tomorrow after he’s done fishin!
Erik
January 15, 2017 at 2:07 am
People that don’t even try to find fish on their own and simply drive from group to group of ice shacks and drill a bunch of holes during prime time!
Michael Ferguson
November 8, 2017 at 6:37 pm
Finding my portable the next day in pieces a quarter mile or more from where I parked it after a windy night.
Or worse, waking up in the middle of the night due to wind and knowing I’ll never get back to sleep unless I fetch the portable in the storm-
or worse yet, after getting up not finding it where I left it and wondering whether it was stolen or how far it blew this time….or whether someone decided to move/use it without asking first……or any other ice gear without permission…….
Worse yet…..the guy on my favorite lake who trained his dog to pick up fish on command…..and not really caring whose they are. (I used to think bald eagles were a menace).
Glenn Poole
March 21, 2018 at 3:54 pm
When your buddy drops a Chum Puck or BaitCloud down your hole and it messes up your flasher for the next 25 mins.
Christopher Stanley
March 21, 2018 at 5:07 pm
When the wife comes out to the shack and doesn’t fish, she just wants to talk. Then complains when I don’t respond because I’m focused on the screen. She doesn’t get it!
Rosco Alfonso
March 21, 2018 at 6:28 pm
The chicks hanging all over me once they find out I’m an ice fisherman. It’s a blessing and a curse.
Dwight
September 6, 2019 at 7:48 pm
People that have to set there generators on the ice. Especially the noisy one when they setup 30 feet from you. Set them in your pickup box. I switched to all LED’s and run them, the fan and the TV off a 500 watt inverter and a deep cycle battery.
Steve Kiermaier
October 6, 2021 at 6:37 pm
#29 made me LOL can relate to all of the other 29 issues but not that one
Willy Walleye
October 7, 2021 at 7:38 am
When someone actually fishes one of your holes after drilling out a grid!