ON ISLAND LAKE, NORTH OF DULUTH -- The temperature might have been 8 degrees Sunday afternoon, but Barb Sherer and Autumn Clark of Duluth looked like they were basking on the deck of a cruise ship.
Well, kind of. They had their backs to a Toyota Highlander, so they were out of the wind. Sunshine bathed them in late January light. And they were layered up well.
"It's not bad here, really," Barb said.
They were each jigging minnows, hoping for the fish that would put them on the leader board of the 57th annual United Northern Sportsmen's Ice Fishing Contest.
"I had a good bite, but it got away," Clark said.
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That seemed to be the common story among the 200 or so anglers clustered on the north side of the lake, just off the UNS landing. No official count of entries had been taken, but longtime UNS member Joe Roberts of Duluth was pleased with the turnout.
"I've caught two walleyes and two perch," said James Kunze of Cloquet. "I was in fifth place until the guy behind me weighed in."
First place in the contest was worth $1,000, and a gate prize of $3,000 would go in a drawing to anyone who bought a $5 entry ticket. Where else can you spend five bucks for a chance at dough like that?
Twenty-seven freeze-dried fish hung on the fish board as the contest ended at midafternoon Sunday. Slender little Island Lake walleyes. Plump perch. Lean pike. Even a few rock bass, including the contest winner, a .98-pound rock bass caught by John Stephen of Duluth.
That may be the most valuable rock bass ever caught on Island Lake. Or any lake.
The mood was as much picnic as piscatorial. This is a family fishing contest, with its modest entry fee and laid-back competition. Autumn Clark's two little girls slept in the back of the Highlander as she fished. Laughter rang out from behind the walls of temporary fishing shelters. Two young boys tossed a football.
Everyone seemed happy.
At the edge of the angling circle, three generations of Mindestroms fed minnows to the fish. There was Bob Mindestrom of Island Lake, his son Todd Mindestrom of St. Paul and grandson Vasean Mindestrom, 11, of St. Paul.
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This was Vasean's first time ice-fishing.
"It's much more different than regular fishing," he said. "You have to wait more and have patience."
He could have been giving a clinic on Sunday.
