The Lake Where You Live

On Saturday morning Birch Lake lay covered in virginal white, not a mark on the fresh snow except a few hoofmarks of deer and a straight-line string tracks of what might have been a fox.

That soon changed. Sonya and Chad and the grandsons had arrived the evening before, and first on the morning agenda, after an early breakfast of potato pancakes, was a visit to the frozen lake. After three bitter-cold days and nights I was reasonably sure the ice would be sound.

We descended the lakefront stairs well equipped. I carried the electric ice auger, 12-year-old Tucker a red cooler that would serve as a chair, 11-year-old Perrin a tote bag with six rod-reel combos, bright-colored tungsten jigs already tied onto the four-pound line.

Sonya and Chad toted the boys’ skates. Border doodle Pizzy bolted down; aging miniature schnauzer Bruce made his way down, step by tentative step. Soon all of us were leaving tracks in the two inches of snow that covered the ice.

I drilled a test hole in the ice and found its thickness acceptable at a very solid four inches. Then I used my handheld GPS to locate my favorite fishing spot. While Sonya and the boys put on their skates and Chad took the dogs for a long walk down the shoreline, I bored a few holes. Sitting down on the cooler, I deployed a jig tipped with a waxworm.

When the first hole didn’t produce, I began working a second. Just as Perrin skated over, the rod tip twitched; I set the hook and soon dragged a 12-inch crappie out from beneath the ice. “Wow, that’s massive,” said Perrin. 

And now Tucker wanted to trade his skates for a jig rod. I bored another hole for him, and soon he was reeling in nice-sized bluegills every couple of minutes. Meanwhile, Perrin amused himself by using the ice skimmer to scoop water out of the unattended holes, turning the surrounding snow to slush and shaping it into mounds.

After about an hour on the ice we all trekked back up to the house, passed a leisurely morning, and enjoyed a lunch of deli sandwiches with vegetables and dip. At mid-afternoon, the boys and I tried fishing again, with little success. A few new holes I drilled didn’t change our fortunes. 

Before we packed up to leave, the neighbors’ golden retriever wandered over, and the boys took a turn frolicking with him in the snow. 

Now it’s Sunday morning. Our company is gone; the black pickup truck pulled out of the driveway just before nine o’clock. But a record of the visit has been preserved. It’s all there down on the lake, imprinted in the snow: The linear marks of the skate blades, the boot prints and dog tracks along the shoreline heading toward the east, the tracks leading to the trampled-down, slushy space around half a dozen perfectly round eight-inch holes in the ice.

The next snowfall will erase all that evidence of the visit. Fortunately I have it recorded somewhere else less tangible but more permanent. I hope the boys and their parents do, too.

Ted Rulseh resides on Birch Lake in Harshaw and is an advocate for lake protection and improvement. His Lakeland Times and Northwoods River News columns are the basis for a book, “A Lakeside Companion,” published by The University of Wisconsin Press. Ted may be reached at [email protected].