Drilling ice at Silver Lake, St Mary's, Colorado - Rocky Mountains

I don't believe in recreational fishing but found this ice drilling scene rather interesting as I'd never been near such an operation before. The fishermen didn't seem to mind letting me hang around to ask a few questions. After the video they told me the ice in this location was about 18 inches (46 centimetres) thick and that they've fished on ice as thin as 6 inches ( 15 centimetres). They also told me that for this particular lake the water was deepest near shoreline - something to do with the way it was created or excavated...

I'm not sure of the elevation but am confident it's well over 10,000 feet ( 3,048 metres). In some related videos you can see how incredibly windy it got this day. We stopped at the Clear Creek Ranger District and they said there were gusts up to 55 mph (88 kph). This lake sits about 60 kilometres west of Denver, Colorado.

Here's my personal web page about fishing:
http://www.rogerwendell.com/fish.html

12-12-2009

Category:

Sports

Tags:

• ice
• fishing
• silver
• lake
• st
• mary's
• colorado
• winter
• rocky
• mountains

[adkbeau]

looks like your only 20 feet from shore...

[zeekzilch]

@adkbeau

Yes, they are very close to the shore. Since I'm not a fisherman I have no idea why they'd do it that way and I forgot to ask!

[stoopsesh]

helpless is what id feel like if i left these woods

[zeekzilch]

Yes, you are lucky to be living in a clean, wide-open place that's full of nature and not too many shopping malls and freeways!

[stoopsesh]

thats cool man , but if u liked that come take a trip to northern ontario thats where the winters are

[zeekzilch]

Neil Young wrote a great song about North Ontario! (I think it was titled, "Helpless" or something like that)

[zeekzilch]

Thanks for writing! I believe the temperature was about 20 degrees but have no idea what the wind chill was at that time. Seems like the wind was mild but it got up to gusts of 55 mph later in the day. You can't tell in this video but that green thing behind the guys was a tent they set up later - so they were prepared for everything!

[rlewis1946]

Very Cool! Any idea of the temperature/wind chill? Was that a good three feet of ice?

Reminds me of my Dad and me on Lake Winnebago (Wisconsin) many years ago. Dad used a hand crank drill in those days. We fished for perch, walleye pike and bass.

Thanks for sharing and prompting some good memories!!

RL Atlanta, GA USA