This story was originally published in January 2024.
You know you’re a Maine kid when Santa leaves you a brand-new Heritage ice fishing trap under the tree each year.
He’s left three so far for our son Bridger, and I’m hoping he keeps at it for a couple more years to complete a set of five.
At 2 years old, Bridger couldn’t care less about what must look to him like some weird, useless contraption with a spinning wheel thing, an antenna and an orange flag, but he’ll come around when he gets older.
For now, I just label them with the year and toss them into a pack basket. I’m sure the intent is to properly equip a little boy born into an outdoor family for when he’s ready to fish.
But in order for that to happen, Ol’ Saint Nick better remember to put some ice in his sleigh on Christmas from now on.
The last few years have been rough for the ice fishing community in our area of the midcoast region. Many lakes and ponds have struggled to freeze solid for more than a few weeks at a time. In many cases, they never freeze over completely or at all.
Warmer-than-normal temperatures combined with big wind and rain storms have left fishermen frustrated, myself included.
For most of us around here, ice fishing has been limited the last several seasons to a handful of outings on a few safely frozen coves, shorelines or very small water bodies.
When it comes to ice fishing, I’ll readily admit that I’m anything but hardcore. To be honest, I never felt as though I liked it all that much, until it was no longer an option.
Growing up, there was never a shortage of ice or fishing opportunities. It was there each winter for us and something we always did. For the most part, I viewed ice fishing as more of an obligatory winter pastime rather than an exciting, highly anticipated recreational opportunity.
Except for the rare warm, sunny day in March, it often seemed far too cold, too windy and too miserable to have all that much fun.
My pants and gloves would become soaked within the first few minutes. My hands were perpetually cold. We always had way too much gear to haul around. The holes froze over constantly.
And I often thought the best part of the day was getting back to a warm truck.
I suppose it wasn’t all bad though. There was usually a snowmobile or ATV to ride around on, as well as a warm ice shack stocked with cribbage boards, a deck of cards and a Coleman stove for cooking deer steak.
Hearing someone yell “Flag!” was always an exciting moment, and a crowd gathered around a hole watching a reel spin wildly was something special. Occasionally, we might even catch a fish to bring home for supper if we could keep the eagles from stealing it.
Then gradually over the years, being able to fish every weekend from January through most of March turned into just a handful of times each season. Then maybe once, twice or not at all.
There’s still plenty of safe ice to fish on in other parts of Maine, but more and more, folks are having to travel farther north from the midcoast to find it.
For our area and points south, ice fishing has become largely a hit or miss proposition. Given my earlier sentiments, one might assume that I wouldn’t miss it in the least, but it’s actually quite the opposite.
The older I get, the more I find myself looking back with regret at the things I took for granted.
I never truly appreciated ice fishing as I should have because I never envisioned a world without it. Now, after several years of routinely driving by open water on our local lakes and ponds in February, I find myself hoping and praying for a few weeks of subzero temperatures.
And though I could travel a few hours from home to fish for a day or two, it’s not the same. I always viewed destination fishing trips as more of an extravagance than a necessity, and I’d much prefer to fish the lakes and ponds I grew up on.
Regardless, I’m willing to bet Santa will bring Bridger two more Heritage traps and I’m certain the Jolly Old Elf will find five more for Bridger’s new little brother.
As much as I dislike oil bills, I’ll do my best to keep my name on the nice list and ask for ice every year from here on out. I hope our boys will get to complain about wet pants and mittens and cold hands while eating deer steak and waiting for the next flag.
I hope they get the chance to set their traps every weekend on the small pond down the road, have fun and make memories of their own instead of just listening to ours.
And as pretty as those black-painted Heritage traps are, I hope they get scratched, dinged, used hard and worn out.