The ice fishing season finally seems to be in high gear. The channel on Albert Lea Lake has once again turned into a small village. I actually believe there are more houses on the ice this year than in past years.

For years I have never been a large fan of ice fishing, but I think I could get into it in the right situation.

There still are dangers involved with the ice fishing season. Falling through the ice is the most obvious. The latest example is the two men that went through the ice on Farm Island Lake near Aitkin.

With the warm weather we have had, along with a series of cold-warm-cold, and then mix in a little blanket of snow, it has created a false sense of security. This can create &uot;black ice&uot; which, when covered with a light snow cover, can be very dangerous &045; so caution should always be used when venturing out.

Another danger is improper ventilation when heating a house. A teenage girl died from asphyxiation from poor ventilation in a fish house.

Now that I have done my best to scare you away from the lake, I will remind you that it can be a very enjoyable and relaxing time, not to mention the fact that you can have some very excellent fishing during the winter months.

I am thinking of trying ice fishing this year, but with a portable fish house. Watching Tony Musatov, our area DNR officer, doing an interview on Channel 6 News while someone’s fish house was slowly sinking in the background didn’t exactly make me want to immediately start building one.

Some of the reports I have read from fishing in other areas of the state say the fishing has been fairly good. A lot of the fish on some of the larger Minnesota lakes are being caught in 20 to 35 feet of water.

On Christmas Eve, as I was sitting around with my two sons, we began talking about dogs. My younger son, Brad, had a yellow lab named Brooke, and he was about to move to a different house and he wasn’t going to have the room to keep her. So, he gave her back to Brian, his brother, who he got the dog from to begin with.

Brooke is a pretty good hunting dog and always wants to fetch something. She pretty much always shows up with a tennis ball, stick or half a tree hoping you will wing it up in the air for her to chase. She will fetch for you until she has seizures, so you have to limit the activity sometimes.

One year we were all going to Spider Lake for a June vacation and Brian didn’t have anyone to watch Brooke, so he asked if we could take her along. I said I didn’t see a problem. I was going up on Saturday and they weren’t going to come up until Monday, so I agreed to take Brooke with me.

After I got to the lake and settled into the cabin I went out fishing and left Brooke in her kennel. Upon returning from fishing, Dave the resort owner said my neighbor was complaining because the dog whined and barked the whole time I was gone. As the week went on I realized that the dog probably whined less than the neighbor did.

The next time I went out fishing I took her along. She sat in the front of the boat like an old sailor, sniffing the wind and enjoying the ride. After I anchored I decided to do a little bobber fishing. I cast directly off the back of the boat where I was sitting. All of a sudden I heard this noise and I turned to look just as Brooke was taking this wild leap over my left shoulder. Into the water she went with a large splash, and she was taking dead aim on my bobber. The darned dog was trying to retrieve my bobber. Needless to say, I reeled like mad to avoid an even larger mess.

Attempting to lift a yellow lab into a fishing boat is not something I would recommend.

The next time I went out I had her tied to the front seat pedestal. This should solve the problem, right? Wrong. She was sitting quietly until a family of loons decided to swim fairly close to the boat. The little &uot;bird&uot; flag went up and she tried to jump over the side after them.

I had left just a little too much slack in the rope, and she ended up hanging over the side of the boat by her neck. There may have been just a fleeting moment when the thought was in my mind to leave her there, but I somehow managed to get her into the boat before she choked.

I’ve had a lot of different fishing partners over the years, but none that have kept me on the edge of my seat quite like Brooke did. She’s still a good hunting dog, but she’s definitely not a fishing dog.