Rapids wins back to back state ice fishing titles
Scott ‘ Coach’ Stankowski
Senior Outdoor Writer
February 23, 2016
Shawano—On Saturday, February 20, over 450 students and 100 coaches gathered for Wisconsin’s 6thannual high school ice fishing championship. This year’s event took place on Shawano Lake on an unseasonably balmy day that resulted in up to 2” of water on the lake due to the warm temperatures.
Tournament director and Wisconsin Interscholastic Fishing Association vice president Teddy Bonde ran an event that was epic.
“This town gathered around this event and made everyone welcome, there were fisherman out on the lake who commented on how great an event this is for kids,” Bonde said after the event.
Resort and bait shop owners made every participant feel welcome sharing secret spots, sharing shanty’s and providing the best support necessary.
The format for this year’s event allowed for teams up to 10 students. They were allowed to fish from 7 a.m. when the flares went off until 2 p.m. with a weigh in by 2:45. Teams could register five northern pike, five legal bass, and one walleye to be measured by length on a certified ‘bump’ board. Coaches had to take pictures of the fish for verification. In addition teams could register five crappies, five bluegills and five perch by weight multiplied by 12 and then added to the gamefish score.
Many teams spent the day on Friday pre-fishing the event. The weather was warm and windy making it tough fishing. The fish had yet to respond to the warm weather as the water itself had not adjusted.
With the overnight lows dipping right around freezing, the lake was a sloppy mess for Saturday. Team strategies varied. The team from New Richmond walked out from the county park as they had taken a team bus and had no other means to travel the lake. Wisconsin Rapids devised a plan to dissect the lake and target different areas to locate the fish. The rest of the field used strategies that ranged in between the extremes to put the fish on the ice.
The day started out warm and sunny and the fish had changed their attitudes as the water flowing into the holes had warmed up the water column.
At weigh in students were honored for big fish in each category. The fish were a .48 ounce gill, .78 ounce crappie, 1.3 pound perch, a 22 inch walleye, 19 inch bass and 31 ¾ inch northern.
Teams were honored to come up to the stage while scores were tabulated. The top ten teams were honored and called up on stage. Host team Shawano placed fifth straying far from their strategy of sitting in shacks and waiting for tip-ups.
With the 10th place team scoring 160 and the third place team Fond du Lac scoring 225, the scores took a significant jump between first and second. The second place team from New Richmond who had stayed put all day long put 296 inches of fish on the ice.
Wisconsin Rapids Co-op, which had won the title last year in Chetek, scored 307 points this year to take the title for two consecutive years. Rapids had 85.44 inches of panfish which calculates to 7.12 pounds of panfish, considerable heft for 15 fish. They had 221.25 inches of gamefish including all categories filled. For their efforts Clam is giving the winning team full ice fishing suits.
Wendy Dallmann of Prairie Farm and president of WIFA commented on how the growth of this organization is amazing. Dallmann who is the inaugural president of WIFA is also part of the crew that has made this the fastest growing extra-curricular event in Wisconsin. The support from media, sponsors and the public has been nothing short of amazing in trying to create responsible fisherman for the future of the sport.
All coaches should be commended on the efforts of getting their kids out to fish, many of which had never done it before. If you are interested in starting a team at your school, go to the Wisconsin High School Ice fishing page, studentfishing.com. Many teams will still be fishing until ice out including this upcoming weekend at the Battle on Bago a major WIFA sponsor. Other major sponsors include CLAMand HT enterprises .
Until next time,
Shoot straight