I had the pleasure of attending my first
Thorne Brothers portable shack modification event on Saturday. Thorne Brothers is a fantastic tackle store and if you are a muskie, fly fishing, or ice fishing enthusiast this is your Graceland! Thorne Brothers manufactures some of the best open water and ice fishing rods on the market and you can view them hand crafting your rods right in the store. But in this posting i will be focusing on some of the new ice fishing gear to hit the market this ice season, primarily what was in stock at TB.
I started off the day by going through the store and seeing what ice fishing selection they had for us in attendance. I will say that between all the stores i went to that weekend (two
Cabelas stores, two
Mills Fleet Farm stores,
Dick's Sporting Goods, and
Gander Mountain), that Thorne Brothers had the best selection of ice fishing gear on the shelves. I was able to pick up some various
Little Atom Plastics which were on sale for $1.00 a package which is a great price, i also was able to pick up some
JR's Tackle - Jalapeno Jigs which were new to me but have been on the market for a few years. The jalapeno jigs are made from tungsten and have an elongated body. Most of my ice fishing tackle is getting transitioned over to heavy metal due to the various benefits of heavy metal jigs and these should be a welcomed addition this winter.
I was also able to handle some of the
Thorne Brothers Custom Ice Rods and boy did they feel balanced in your hand! These custom rods are going to cost you more then your standard mass produced rods that you see at most sporting good stores, but you can really tell the difference in quality and components when comparing them.
New from Northland this year is their
Fish Fry Minnow Trap lure. Ive included a picture of the lure to give viewers an idea of what they look like.
The lure is along the lines of other blade baits on the market but what really impressed me was the holographic pattern on the lure; it was very realistic and should be deadly on walleyes, bass, and crappies. They come in three different sizes and i opted for the 1/8th oz model in golden shiner color pattern.
New to the market this year are the
Frabill Straight Line rod/reel combos. The premise of these combos is to reduce line coiling and subsequent lure spin due to the addition of a small fly reel. Many ice fisherman have been utilizing fly reels for a number of years, but it really started to become more main stream in the last few years.
The combo was pretty nice and seemed to be built fairly well. I've never been a fan of most rod and reel combos since one of the components is usually lacking in quality. We will have to see how these hold up this winter when guys start using them so i will hold my judgement until that time.
Clam has a number of new offerings this season including their
Compact LED lights. I picked up the two pack a week ago and man are they bright! They come with a convenient hook and magnet so you can place them anywhere on your shack. The larger light runs off of AA batteries and the smaller light uses AAA batteries. Since these lights utilize LED technology, they will run for a long time.
Clam also came out with a handy
Bait Well and bracket this season. The half gallon bucket is the perfect size for minnows and the bracket allows for the fisherman to have easy access to their bait.
New on the market this year is a lighting system from Clam which utilizes your standard 12 volt battery to power the lights. The LED lights come standard on the brand new
Jason Mitchell Ice Houses which were also introduced this year and i will talk more about in my next installment.
Below are a couple of photos of the LED lights which should do an excellent job of illuminating your portable ice houses when fishing at night or during low light conditions.
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| Stick on LED Lights |
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| Hard Mount LED Lights |
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