Tips and tricks for keeping ice clear

[Fieldp66]

What do you do to help keep ice clear after you make a pocket for your decoys? I am hoping to get some tips from people who have more experience breaking ice than I do.

We broke through about an 1 1/2 inches of ice today and it was an on going battle to keep a spot clear of ice and keeping the broken pieces from freezing back together.

I brought my drill with me today and drilling holes in to the frozen ground worked pretty slick for getting the stakes for the field decoys in the ground.

Thanks in advance,

Field

[Hot Lunch]

hunt moving water!

[Fieldp66]

Thanks for that. 

FYI the link in your message doesn't take the user to an active website. I was curious about the walleye fishing advertised.

[Miles]

I used to walk in a big circle breaking ice.  Sometimes you could then push a big  sheet of ice from the circle under the surrounding ice.   If you bust it all up into small chunks it's a constant battle.

[h2ofowlr]

I bring an axe and break big chunks and slip it under the ice with neoprene gauntlet gloves.  Keep a decent hole opened and add movement.  It will keep ice at bay for a while unless really cold.  If really cold you need moving water with a pump or and ice eater, or you place your decoys on top of the ice and work it from there.

[goosegunner]

As h20fowlr said, Break it into as big as pieces as you can, then slide it under the outer edges of your hole. If that's not working and you do get lots of small chunks. Then carry a plastic leaf rake and use it to get all the small pieces.

[Fieldp66]

Thank you for the feed back. Our pump is already a cold blooded bugger so on the 17 degree morning in question it refused to run for me. I could see if we could create a little current I could float all the small peices to one side and then rake them out. I will add an axe and a rake to the mental check list for this spot on frozen days. Thanks again.